Cult of Personality - investing in James Mac not Jesus Christ

The Danger

So what is the danger of a church amassing a debt load of this magnitude?  First, one need look no further than the recent history of the Crystal Cathedral to see what debt can do to a church.   Whereas the Crystal Cathedral once lived as if it was flush with cash, the church was forced to file for bankruptcy in October 2010.  According to the Christian Post, the Cathedral was estimated to be $50 million in debt, before being forced to sell its property to the Roman Catholic diocese for $57.5 million.  What’s more, according to a 2012 report on churchexecutive.com, the Crystal Cathedral is far from alone in its circumstances:

There’s a new development in the housing crisis: Foreclosures are hitting houses of worship.  According to a report from Reuters, 2011 was a record year for foreclosures on church buildings. Prior to the Great Recession, bank seizures of houses of worship were rarer than atheists in foxholes, with only a handful of foreclosures occurring in the decade prior to 2008.  That all changed when the mortgage crisis hit.

In addition to this, there are other dangers as well.  Take the typical pastor of a mega-church, for instance.  Assume, for a moment, that he were to have a moral failure on the magnitude of Ted Haggard.  Hypothetically speaking, let us say it was discovered that this pastor was involved in high stakes gambling.  In such circumstances, it is not uncommon for pastors to be removed from their ministry.  Moreover, it is not unreasonable to assume that such an event might lead to a sizeable decline in the attendance of the church, which in turn would lead to a decline in the financial stability of the church.  In such a scenerio, the pastor escapes with virtually no personal financial responsibility.  He is free, just as Haggard was, to start a new church and a new life, with no ties to his former congregation or their misery.
Or what about a less salacious scenerio?  What if the pastor of a church with debt were to suddenly die or decide to leave the church to pursue other endeavors, much as celebrity pastors, such as Rob Bell, have done.  When the ministry of a church is largely based around a central charismatic figure, is it unreasonable to suggest that in a pastor’s absence the church might well suffer the loss of congregants and the accompanying tithe base?  And if that did indeed occur, might a church carrying a large debt not find itself struggling to make its payments?
We think that it should be recognized that this wild accumulation of debt in the pursuit of oversized buildings flies in the face of biblical wisdom  and the teachings of Crown Ministries on debt, both of which were taught at HBC for years.