Some news is difficult to place. This one could be in any number of boards, but I'll park it here for the time being. A different headline could read: "Has Opulence Had its Day?"
California’s Crystal Cathedral Files for Bankruptcy
By REBECCA CATHCART
Published: October 18, 2010
Crystal Cathedral, the landmark megachurch in Orange County, Calif., where the “Hour of Power” is taped, filed for bankruptcy protection, church officials announced Monday.
Damian Dovarganes/Associated Press
Crystal Cathedral, in Orange County, is $55 million in debt, but says its outreach and “Hour of Power” broadcast will continue.
“Budgets could not be cut fast enough to keep up with the unprecedented rapid decline in revenue due to the recession,” Sheila Schuller Coleman, the church’s senior pastor, said in a statement. In a news conference on Monday, church officials said ministry outreach and programs, including the weekly broadcast, would continue. But the church, which is $55 million in debt, has reduced the number of stations that it pays to broadcast the program.
“Challenging situations are nothing new to our 55-year ministry,” said the Rev. Robert H. Schuller, who founded the church in a drive-in theater and was instrumental in starting the worship broadcast in 1970. A decade later, the church moved to a cavernous glass building that seats almost 3,000 on a 40-acre campus in Garden Grove. Since 2006, church leadership has changed hands three times. Dr. Schuller retired, passing control to his son. Robert A. Schuller left in 2008, leaving his sister in charge.
I wonder if they will blame the sister (who blames the recession) rather than the false gospel many people have come to realize is as far away from Scripture as Polaris is from Earth?
(About 430 light-years. That is for those who would ask.)