I saw the video which has gone viral, for reasons that seem curious to me. It actually wasn't the video of Tyler donating a million dollars, nor him summarily being caught up in the moment laying hands on the bishop. What concerns me most is the vitriolic comments bloggers who seem to have little else to do with their time than armchair refereeing of matters ecclesiastical, spouting out their misinterpreted scriptures to spew their unmerited vindictiveness against two men, clergy or layman, bishop or deacon, straight, gay, bi or tri (trying to have sex but can't), who as far as we can tell have either raised or spent millions of dollars to help possibly millions of people live better lives, or at least shift their consciousness towards resolving the lives they live more peacefully.
What's even more disturbing is that most of the negative and judgmental comments are from people who love to quote scripture to defend or support their critical positions. So-called atheists and agnostics rarely even bother to address such matters; just "believers," bible-toting and bible quoting "believers."
Some of these same people love Tyler's work and adore Madea, laugh at her jokes, the cussin' she gets by with, the lying, conniving, the making fun or sport of our religiosity, and the list goes on. Then he makes a large gift to another highly regarded African American bishop and people start protesting. If Tyler had done his "alms" in secret, he'd be accused of never helping his people. He does it openly and he's accused of bragging. Jesus did his miracles openly, from changing water to wine, to multiplying fish and loaves to feeding thousands of people. He noticed the widow's mite and made mention of it. Both he and the Apostle Paul were supported by wealthy women, Jesus having allowed a woman some perceive to be a prostitute to use perfume worth a year's wages, which she presumably earned through her trade, to anoint his feet from her Alabaster Box. All this is recorded in the same bible from which these people quote and shoot their bible bullets from their pious, religious AK-47s. I like to call them Bible Bazookas.
Again, it is this same group that decried Bishop Jakes for having Oprah -- who some call the largest New Age Guru on the planet -- at Megafest, which by the way was a very inclusive event, both this one and the one in ATL.
I am equally as intrigued to note that on OWN last Sunday, sometime after Super Soul Sunday, there was a program with a hypnotist who specialized in regression into past life experiences, while on either corner of the screen Tyler's new weekly series was being advertised, as well as T. D. Jakes appearing on Oprah's Life Class that very night. I both see and sense a shift in consciousness, attitudes and approaches to ways of relating faith to culture and remaining spiritually relevant in a changing world.
Both Tyler and T. D. are what is called Holy Ghost-filled Christians, who some would consider unequally yoked with "unbelievers," or at least those who believe differently from them. Joel Osteen, touted as the nation's pastor, and certainly one of its favorite ones, who has also appeared with Oprah a few times, would have to be placed in that category as well, at least by those who hold to such literal translations of scripture. I do not.
Carlton Pearson
In 1977, Pearson founded Higher Dimensions Ministries (now New Dimensions ), in Tulsa, which grew to over 5,000.
More recently, he has felt a passion to proclaim the "Gospel Of Inclusion" and has written a widely acclaimed book by that name, published by Simon and Schuster. It confronts the Christian church's exclusivism as being inconsistent, in spirit with the teachings of Jesus.
Bishop Pearson recently served as the Interim Senior Minister at Christ Universal Temple in Chicago. He and Gina now host New Dimensions of Chicago, building a local multi-cultural and radically Inclusive spiritual community that emphasizes expanded consciousness and Self Actualization. His newest book, God Is Not A Christian, Nor A Jew, Muslim, Hindu...God Dwells With Us, In Us, Around Us, As Us was published by Simon and Schuster and released in the spring of 2010.
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