SSW writer Love Devine touched on this story yesterday, but I couldn't let this go by without pointing out a few things that flowed right of the mouth of Bishop Eddie Long.
The current probe by U.S. Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) into the "excessive compensation" of executives of non-profit entities, centers around televangelists and the mega churches they head. In 2005, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution looked into the compensation of Atlanta-area televangelist, Bishop Eddie Long. Long was gifted over $3 million in three years by a his church's compensation board where his wife Vanessa is a member (which is illegal, by the way1).
The amount of money and the expensive items the church "gifted" to Long is certainly obscene, but his narcissistic comments regarding his God-given claim to his extravagant lifestyle are nothing short of what the hellage.
Bishop Eddie Long to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
"You've got to put me on a different scale than the little black preacher sitting over there that's supposed to be just getting by because the people are suffering." Wha?
"We touch a lot of people, " Long said. "This is a world-impacting ministry, and I personally get a little offended when my integrity is questioned." You ain't special and therefore immune to scrutiny. If you are innocent of wrong-doing, the truth will reveal itself.
"I have great integrity with my congregation, " Long said. "I would never take their money and use them to build my own personal happiness." Said the man with a $300,000 vehicle "gifted" by that congregation.
Long said a church board oversaw his charity's decisions to compensate him.
"It's not like I wake up and say, 'I think I want a Bentley." Well maybe not you, but your wife did.
Long said he represented a "paradigm shift" in the black church. He said he won't be like other pastors who died broke while giving everything to congregations that "wanted them to live in poverty and preach to them about prosperity." I see Long lives by the "F*ck you, pay me" credo.
Any problem people may have with his charity, Long said, was rooted in some people's expectations that pastors should be poor.
"I would love to sit with you and walk with you through the Bible to show that Jesus wasn't poor, " he said. But of course, he had no time to show the reporter how Jesus was ballin' in Galilee.
His congregation is inspired by seeing its pastor do well, Long said.
"I'm not going to apologize for anything. . . . " Yeah, the congregation wants to prevent you from scratching and scraping for donations for a roof fund, not living in a mansion they essentially own that you would turn the dogs out on them if they tried to ring the door bell. I'm sure they're really inspiried by the church turning them down for assistiance because the W-2 forms you require them to show doesn't match with their tithing.
You take full advantage of the tax-exempt status, yet you act as IRS auditors to the people who give to you freely.
1 Churches and nonprofits are required to follow the same IRS rules regarding compensation. In general, an individual(s) salary and benefits should not be excessive and must be approved by the majority of board of directors who are unpaid and not related to the individual(s).
BISHOP EDDIE LONG'S COMPENSATION
Between 1997 and 2000, Long received $3.07
million in compensation from Bishop Eddie Long Ministries Inc.
$1,450,000 --House
$1,037,992 --Salary
$350,812 --Use of Bentley
$195,145 --Home improvements, including $135,560 for landscape improvements, $3,286 for
a parsonage pool table, $35,169 for a built-in hutch, plus other items.
$13,074 --Property taxes
$16,000 --Expense account
$9,600 --Benefits, deferred compensation
$3,072,623 --TotalSources: Form 990
income tax returns filed by Bishop Eddie Long Ministries Inc. and DeKalb County
tax records.
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