There are also mega-churches north of the border, though generally smaller and fewer in number than those found among our neighbours to the south. In 2007, the Toronto Star published an important investigation of one such Canadian church, the Prayer Palace:

[T]he three white pastors – Paul Melnichuk and his 40-year-old twin sons, Tim and Tom – lead lavish lives in contrast to the mainly working-class black families that make up the bulk of the church.

Between them, the pastors have amassed a real estate fortune worth about $12 million. Each owns a multi-million-dollar country estate north of Toronto (Tim’s is worth as much as $5.5 million), they share a Florida vacation villa, and the pastors and their wives drive luxurious cars – among them a Porsche Cayenne SUV, a Lexus RX 330 SUV and a Mercedes-Benz CLK 320 convertible…

The Star went on to reveal further dubious financial practices, including enormous salaries and grand houses for the pastors, and the mysterious purchase of a church and properties in Florida.

The investigative report prompted protests outside the gates of the church, and defiance within. The next Sunday, senior pastor Paul Melnichuk taunted the media, promised to make a response after engaging a special PR team, and then reveled in a demonstration of loyalty:

Within moments, a woman in a burnished gold dress and head-dress ran to the stage and slapped a $50 bill onto Melnichuk’s forehead.

The move was met with cheers and, following a request by a church volunteer, congregation members started throwing money at Melnichuk’s feet.

“First the funds go the church,” said the beaming pastor. “After that, if the folks want to bless me…”

The church volunteers, acting on Melnichuk’s instructions, divided the growing pile of cash into three collection buckets; the pastor then instructed a young member who is training to be a preacher to dip in and take out “a handful of cash.”

“I hope the media got a picture of me with a $50 bill stuck to my forehead,” Melnichuk laughed.

Media and bloggers, like Benediction Blogs On, watched askance, though others, like Catholic IDer and journalist Denyse O’Leary, defended the church, noting that subsequent audits apparently turned up nothing of great interest.

Have you blogged or written about the Prayer Palace or similar religious movements in Canada? Drop us a line and let us know if we can use and link your post in full or in part.

Further reading:

Benediction Blogs On. “Paul Melnichuk of the Prayer Palace Responds…“, March 13, 2007.

Religion News Blog. “Bradenton Church Owner Investigated,” March 7, 2007.

Spiritual Pathways Ministries. “Pastor Paul Melnichuk and the Prayer Palace,” February 20, 2009.

__________. “Should Pastor Paul Melnichuk Live in Palaces…?” December 27, 2007.

achievable ends (I had television business dealings with the subjects of the article in the ’80′s. I wish I was shocked.)

Its director, Faytene Kriskow, explains that “the sexual revolution, the new age movement, secular humanism . . . and the women’s movement… have sunk their ideological claws into a generation and have produced a mass of social wreckage and a trail of shattered lives.” However, a “tribe of believing radicals,” combined with a sympathetic government, just might be enough to “influence every realm of society.”

Says Gruending:

The Ottawa event promises to be a combination of prayer rally and fast, a march, a concert and an action where participants tape shut their mouths in symbolic solidarity with foetuses. There will be “abandon worship and fervent prayer”– which is a descriptor for charismatic and emotional worship. There will be a prayer for peace “with a leader from Israel” and special visits from as yet unidentified members of Parliament. The Cry says that the Ottawa event and those in other centres will cost $300,000 and asks for donations, which it says are tax receiptable. That means that either The Cry, or another organization assisting in the event is registered as a charitable organization.

The Cry was inspired by an American youth initiative named The Call, which describes itself as yet another “divinely initiated” prayer group. The Call grew out of large rally in Washington, D.C. in 1997 organized by the Promise Keepers, a Christian right men’s group. A man named Lou Engle claims that following that gathering he had “a God-given dream” to organize a corresponding youth movement. Conservative Christian youth rallied in Washington D.C. in September 2000 and the movement spread from there, including to Canada.

More The Cry rallies are planned for this year, with a major event in Vancouver in August, which will “prepare the way, in prayer, for the 2010 Olympics.”

Have you written about The Cry, or participated in its events? Drop us a line and let us know.

TheCry Vancouver 2009: Rick Hiebert  The Cry…of the mislead?
Canadian Christianity Lloyd Mackey: Christians debate significance of TheCry (Vancouver 2009)

The same sort of rebranding exercise, evidently, may be practiced in many other sectors of society as well. In March 2009, Benediction Blogs On explored a similar exercise in Vancouver by the Global Harvest Centre and Fresh Fire Ministries, previously home to disgraced Lakeland Revival leader Todd Bentley. The two groups have now become Transform Central and Transform International, respectively.

Bene D believes that this is part of a larger strategy to salvage Bentley’s image as religious leader, advancing on several fronts via the Christian media:

As the Canadians play transformers, Todd Bentley’s parents began to put out feelers into the neo-charismatic community to see how former followers were handling his downfall. Dave Bentley (Todd’s biological father) released information to a  web site NAR considers antagonistic…

Then a few weeks later a puff piece featuring Dave Bentley ran in Canadian Christianity the first of February.

Right on cue, Bentley’s stepmother Darcia has released a ‘newsflash’  at Sound of Fire Productions. Darcia and Dave Bentley also run a site called Freedom Fire Ministries.   

What is interesting is this is the second time his parents have said he is undergoing restoration at Rick Joyner’s Morningstar Ministries. Only hard core fans seem to be playing along, because the powers that be which hold power aren’t saying anything. After the flurry of distancing last year, I think the decision has been made to starve fans of news to better a comeback and the parents are either going with the program or not quite following the apostle’s script.  

Most interesting, however, is Bene D’s use of Quantcast web traffic statistics to suggest that charismatic groups involved in the revival are vastly inflating the numbers of people they claim to be reaching:

What I find even more interesting is how easily lies come and how easy it is to believe them.

During Lakeland the claims of the numbers of people watching the online streaming were hyped, as professional marketing kicked into high gear. The claims as they have been throughout religious history were over the top. Thousands healed, millions watching.   The numbers decimate the hype,  it’s becoming clear key players took a hit when the shows star ran off.

To be fair, this site mostly measures US traffic with some global, and Quantcast makes no claim this all of this is hard data, (see the symbols for estimated).  Still, it’s a far cry from the millions being reached, thousands being healed, and the dead raised, isn’t it?…

Dennis Gruending

The Ottawa-based National House of Prayer (NHOP) is organizing a National Prayer Sunday for our government and its leaders on June 29. You may not have heard of the NHOP or its prayer list so I will take a brief look at both. You may be surprised – but first a brief bit of history.

Rob and Fran Parker are a couple from British Columbia who say they felt God calling them to set up a house of prayer in the capital. Mr. Parker has a long association with an organization called Watchmen for the Nations, and after a gathering of the group in 1996 he organized a prayer-walk from Calgary to Ottawa. In 2004, the NHOP purchased a former convent not far from parliament hill for $900,000. They’ve added staff and volunteers and regularly host groups, including youth, from across the country to engage in formation as prayer leaders. NHOP personnel appear to have ready access to parliament hill. They attend question period, sit in at committees and lead prayer meetings. They were invited by the National Prayer Breakfast in 2007 to participate in a workshop following the meal, and the publicity for this year’s event invited people to an NHOP open house.

Each week on its website the NHOP asks people to offer prayers on a variety of issues and for individuals in public life, and the group also posts other prayer requests and observations on a blog. The most prayed for piece of legislation in 2008 has been MP Ken Epp’s Bill C-484 (The Unborn Victims of Crime Act), which would create a separate offence for killing or injuring a fetus during an attack on a pregnant woman. The bill has passed second reading in the House of Commons and has been sent off to a committee for examination. It is controversial because many believe that if passed the bill could be used as a wedge to re-criminalize abortion. The NHOP blog posting on April 30 talked about “practical things” that could be done to support Epp and his bill. These included praying, organizing a national fast, signing a petition of support on Epp’s website, and writing handwritten letters to MPs in support of the Bill C-484.

Earlier in 2008 another blog entry requested prayers for passage of Bill C-2, the federal government’s anti-crime bill. Yet another recommended prayers that a conservative jurist be appointed to replace Mr. Justice Michel Bastarache, who has announced his retirement from the Supreme Court of Canada. The same blog entry expressed approval that the court appears to be turning back a growing number of charter cases.  

Another entry requested prayers for “a total overhaul or abolition of the current human rights councils in this country” and referred readers to conservative pundit Ezra Levant’s articles for further information. The case provoking the prayer request involves a human rights complaint into comments made about Muslims by writer Mark Steyn in Macleans magazine.

The NHOP website is also requesting prayers for the success of an event called The Cry, which is to be held on parliament hill on August 23rd.  The website says: “Let’s intercede that thousands of believers will attend this wonderful event.” Similar youth rallies were held in 2002 and 2006 to dramatize concern about what organizers described as the moral and social decline in Canada. Guest speakers at those rallies included the Parkers from NHOP and David Demian, head of Watchmen for the Nations. Demian and his organization are dedicated supporters of the Israeli government and its policies.
 
Where does NHOP fit into the wider picture? In an interview with the Ottawa Citizen in January 2006, the Parkers describe the prayer house as a registered charity that welcomes Christians of all denominations. They say it is not an advocacy group and does not endorse political parties. The Citizen article also says that the NHOP “has the financial backing of churches and religious organizations with links to the grassroots evangelical groups that helped Stockwell Day defeat Preston Manning in the 2000 Canadian Alliance leadership race.”

The NHOP exists within a charismatic and Pentecostal movement known for its emotional and enthusiastic forms of worship. NHOP also leans toward Christian reconstructionism – a belief that government and all of society must submit to the Bible’s moral principles. It may be this strong Biblical focus that explains an NHOP blog posting following a demonstration at the Chinese embassy this spring calling for a free Tibet. “Some of our prayers go in that direction,” the NHOP blog said. “However, on another level, our deeper cry in prayer is ‘Free Tibet!’ Free it from the centuries of spiritual darkness and oppression that the Tibetan Buddhist priests exerted over the people. Free them from the power of blinded obedience to the Dalai Lama.” This statement is particularly odd because the government named the Dalai Lama as honourary Canadian citizen in 2007, one of only four people ever to receive that distinction. 

The NHOP is just one of a number of conservative Christian groups to locate in Ottawa within the past few years, a development that indicates the growing influence in Canada of the religious right.

June 23, 2008
Used by permission of Dennis Gruending, Pulpit and Politics. All rights reserved.

Have you blogged about The National House of Prayer in Ottawa? Drop us a line and let us know if we can use and link your post in full or in part.

Birthpangs: Cinderella with amnesia?
Bene Diction Blogs On: Canada National Prayer Breakfast

Further reading:

Pauline Tam: The Ottawa Citizen. January 12, 2006
Christians snap up convent as place to pray for politicians
‘Charismatic’ group believes Canada’s revival to begin in Ottawa

Meaghan Wood: Canadian Christianity. undated.  National House of Prayer officially underway in Ottawa