Quote Originally Posted by ragnarok1981 View Post
Churches in Detroit are one of the biggest detriments to the city being revitalized, and they will never help make the city better. There are already far too many churches in the city and we could do without at least half of them and still have more than enough left over for everyone in the city several times over. The leaders of these churches are running one of the biggest con games ever and the victims of this con are too naive and or stupid to see it for what it really is. If you looked up the leaders of the major churches in the city and where they lived I think you would be amazed to see how well they live. For example look at "Bishop" Wayne T Jackson. He runs the great faith ministries here in Detroit and in Atlanta. I would imagine that a great number of his flock live in low income areas while he lives out in W. Bloomfield. But he also had his church buy the Arch Diocese residence in Palmer woods for him and his family. This home is the largest in Detroit but the city gets no tax revenue from it because it is now owned by a church so it is tax exempt. The real kicker here is that he does not even live in the home, I hear his mother in law might live there, but for the most part they use it for sunday brunch and to entertain out of town guests. This con-artist should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law for ripping off all these poor people who are stupidly handing over their hard earned money to him so he can live in the lap of luxury while they live in the decaying ruins of a once great city. As a Palmer Woods resident myself I find this guy even more offensive because of his complete lack of morals and how he interacts with the rest of the neighborhood. We have a concert series and a home tour each year, but when asked if they would host a concert in their massive home, or be on the home tour they asked for something like 2000 just to have the right to use their home. They are not the only church leaders with a home in Palmer Woods or one of the other nicer neighborhoods in Detroit either. There are plenty of other church leaders living in mansions and that just amazes me that their followers let them do it. If you believe that Jesus Christ existed then you would believe that he taught to give to the poor and to share your wealth with the needy. But it seems that a large number of Black and many non black mega church leaders are taking that teaching and reversing it by taking from the poor, the needy, the down trodden, and enriching themselves. At least the Catholic church only has the very top leaders living in luxury but the majority of its priests live like their church members. As you can see I clearly have a major bias when it comes to all this because I find most organized religion to be superstitious nonsense from days gone by, but I still feel that if people are going to worship then they deserve better than what they are getting.
The city of Detroit could probably solve its debt issues if it took a look at the churchs around the city and all the property they own and told them that they can have tax exempt status for a church but not the extra property.
Finally there is also a practice here in Detroit and I am sure it is common in other urban cities where the political parties are basically subjected to a shakedown by the church leaders. It is well known that if you want to win an election in Detroit you have to give a certain amount of money to these churchs to "help get out the vote". In otherwords it means you have to bribe the preacher to get him to support you and have him get his flock to support you. Ending this practice would go a long way to stopping the corruption in Detroit because as we all saw in the Kwame scandal, all the major church leaders here falling all over themselves to support him and say how it is such an injustice, eventhough he had committed adultery, theft, and who knows how many other sins. Why are they all so willing to forgive him and praise him? The money.
You make sound arguments; however, completely irrelevant to my point. Corruption exists in every relgious faction. The key to organizing this faith based city is convincing the corrupt that they are leaving money on the table with their small picture practices.