Religious broadcasters hope to put turbulent times behind them, but fallout from the televangelist scandals lingers on.
At the closing banquet of the National Religious Broadcasters’ (NRB) annual convention last month, President Jerry Rose articulated a vision that most NRB members share. “Tonight,” he proclaimed, “we begin a new era for the National Religious Broadcasters.” Indeed, few associated with religious broadcasting are sorry to see the close of a decade that began with explosive growth but ended with scandal and unwelcome scrutiny.
At this year’s meeting in Washington, D.C., the emphasis was on the future: a new executive director, expanding technology, and rapidly changing events around the world. Yet, the lingering effects of scandal and financial disarray remain.
Challenges For The Nineties
One of the biggest signals for change may be the installation of E. Brandt Gustavson as executive director. A former administrator at Moody Bible Institute and Trans World Radio, Gustavson succeeds Ben Armstrong, who announced his retirement last spring after 23 years with NRB. In a speech at his induction ceremony, Gustavson surprised many members by announcing a series of specific management proposals, including in-depth financial and organizational analysis of NRB (see “Priority Projects,” p. 32).
Gustavson’s speech was seen as an acknowledgment of several administrative problems that have plagued NRB recently—not the least of which is a severe financial crunch. Implementation of Gustavson’s goals could mean wholesale reorganization. “As grand as our days have been in the past under Ben’s … leadership, I believe the potential is there for the best days ahead,” Gustavson told the group, who gave him a standing ovation.
Rose was also optimistic about the future. “God has opened more doors for us in radio and television than we ever would have dreamed,” he told the assembled delegates.
One of the doors Rose referred to was the advancing world of technology as a tool to spread the gospel. “Our responsibility as Christians in the nineties is to take advantage of all the technology available to us,” he said. As a demonstration, the NRB sponsored a live, two-way satellite discussion between convention delegates and religious broadcasters in London.
The topic of the satellite discussion was one debated throughout the convention: how to address the breathtaking changes in Europe. Many broadcasters used the convention to plan new ventures aimed at the Eastern Bloc. For example, Pat Robertson announced receiving permission from the Soviet government for his Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) to open a ministry center in Moscow that will distribute Christian videos, Bibles, tracts, and literature.
But not all European broadcasters were pleased at the prospect of a massive influx of American Christian broadcasting. Some raised the concern that a form of “religious imperialism” may set in. Rose acknowledged the danger. “My hope is that we don’t go in like we have all the answers,” he said.
Lingering Impact
Despite the focus on the future, however, the past would not quite go away. At a press conference, Rose admitted that the fund-raising and other scandals are “still having an impact” financially on NRB members, but he asserted that “it appears this year has been a turnaround year.”
Questions about how individual broadcasters use their medium were raised again this year as well, thanks to a book that Moody Press timed for release during the convention. The Agony of Deceit: What Some TV Preachers Are Really Teaching, edited by Michael Horton, terms as “heresy” the theology of several major televangelists who are mainly from the charismatic tradition.
“The gospel heralded by some of the television preachers is even more perverted than that proclaimed by Tetzel’s indulgences at the time of Luther,” Horton says. Pat Robertson and Larry Lea, two keynote speakers at this year’s convention, were among those mentioned in the book, though it largely concentrates on non-NRB members such as Robert Tilton, Kenneth Hagin, Kenneth Copeland, Fred Price, and Earl Paulk. Paul Crouch, mentioned frequently in the book, resigned from NRB in January (see “Crouch’s Trinity Broadcasting Leaves NRB”).
Rose would not comment directly on the book, but in response to press questions he noted that the NRB has always represented “a broad scope of evangelical Christianity.” “The genius of the NRB has always been the ability to put those [theological] differences aside and come together with a common goal,” he said. “Any theological conflict that exists between member organizations does not represent an NRB position nor an endorsement by NRB.” Rose said all NRB members must subscribe to the National Association of Evangelicals’ Statement of Faith.
Crouch’s Trinity Broadcasting Leaves NRB
One of the nation’s largest religious broadcasters, Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN), has resigned from the National Religious Broadcasters, following a nearly two-year investigation of the ministry by the NRB Ethics Committee. Included in the complaints received by the committee against TBN and its founder, Paul Crouch, were charges of “hostile takeovers” in acquiring new stations, age and sex discrimination in hiring practices, and mistreatment of employees.
After looking into the allegations, the NRB Ethics Committee in January sent Crouch a letter informing him that their panel “lacks the staff and financial resources to do thorough and complete discovery in these matters.” Thus, the letter said, “the Committee finds there is insufficient evidence to warrant termination of membership.” The letter went on to urge that Crouch and his accusers submit to “an independent board of Christian conciliation” to resolve the matter.
Crouch resigned immediately upon receiving the letter. “I didn’t get a fair shake from NRB [and] the ethics committee,” he told CHRISTIANITY TODAY in an interview. “I felt that was a very insipid, watered-down statement … and I’m not going to have anything to do with an ethics committee that I feel is highly unethical in and of itself.”
Crouch said he believed the matter could have been quickly and easily cleared up by examination of Federal Communications Commission (FCC) records and interviews. He characterized the charges as “a vendetta” by former business associates. He also dismissed the allegations of mistreatment of employees. “You can go to any organization in the world and find a disgruntled employee or two that are unhappy about something or other,” he said. Noting that he has been “regularly looked into” by the Internal Revenue Service, the FCC, state officials, and the media, Crouch said, “What do I need with a kangaroo court ethics committee?”
The ethics committee defended its handling of the matter and claimed that Crouch was not totally cooperative with the investigation. At the annual convention in Washington, the ethics committee voted to issue a stronger statement about the situation. “[T]he decision … does not mean that we do not consider the complaints of a serious nature, nor does the decision represent an exoneration by the NRB,” the clarification said. “Though there was not adequate documentation to warrant termination of membership, we do consider the complaints of a serious nature, and strongly suggest that TBN and the complainants seek resolution through Christian arbitration,” the committee reiterated.
NRB president Jerry Rose said Crouch’s resignation “was not a surprise, because we felt they were not willing to make the board adjustments to be certified by EFICOM [Ethics and Financial Integrity Commission].” (Under EFICOM guidelines, boards may not be dominated by family members.)
Crouch told CT that his board configuration was a factor in the resignation. “I choose to have family control on the board of Trinity Broadcasting. It’s perfectly legal,” he said. “If Congress passes a law that it is illegal, we’ll change our board.”
Crouch denied the resignation will remove him from accountability. “From day one, we’ve said to friend and foe alike: Come, bring your lawyers and your auditors and have a look at the audited financial statement of Trinity. That’s a standing invitation,” he said.
He said he hopes one day to return to NRB membership, but added, “At this point, under its present leadership, it is so prejudiced against Trinity that I don’t feel welcomed there.” He said the resignation was a “spiritual decision.” “After much prayer and intercession, I felt a distinct release from the Lord to simply remove myself at this time,” he said.
Eficom Update
A more intricate balancing act for the NRB next year may be keeping all the members happy with the new mandatory Ethics and Financial Integrity Commission (EFICOM) code. According to Rose, 213 of 883 NRB members have received certification through EFICOM: 116 through EFICOM and 97 by virtue of being members of the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability. In addition, 30 applications are pending, and 40 organizations are still working on the application. Twenty-eight members are foreign corporations, and 140 are self-proclaimed for-profit groups, both of which are currently exempt from EFICOM regulations.
Rose said that in the coming weeks, NRB will be individually contacting the remaining nearly 300 members to discover why they have not responded. “We suspect that many of those are for-profits,” he said.
At the convention, several proposed changes in EFICOM were approved, including easing restrictions so that “adjustments” to the code no longer require a “cumbersome” NRB constitutional bylaw change. Rose said the other changes are “still in the development stage” and cannot yet be made public.
Rose defended the pace at which EFICOM has been developing. “Unfortunately, we may have given the perception that we were going to have this thing together in six months or a year. You can’t put this type of thing together in that amount of time,” he said.
According to NRB spokesman Ron Kopczick, the final list of EFICOM-approved members will be published in its entirety sometime this spring in the organization’s Religious Broadcasting magazine. He said the list will be available to the public upon request.
Many members remain uncomfortable with EFICOM, particularly with the prohibition of family-dominated boards. Smaller “mom and pop” operations, whose compliance postponement expires in May, are also concerned about the costs of the auditing procedures. Other groups, while claiming they adhere to ethical principles, are reluctant to relinquish that authority to the NRB. And the continual tinkering with guidelines and deadlines has left some members uneasy about how EFICOM will finally look.
EFICOM was a hot topic for informal meetings and hallway conversations among members. One issue frequently brought up was the possibility that several members would leave NRB to begin their own association—one that would not have EFICOM-like guidelines, or would make compliance voluntary rather than mandatory. NRB officials said they had not heard of any such movement and continued to hold out high hopes for the future of EFICOM. “Coming back to the convention next year, we’re going to have some very positive things happening in the context of EFICOM,” Rose said.
By Kim A. Lawton in Washington, D.C.
Priority Projects
New executive director E. Brandt Gustavson outlined a “preliminary agenda” of his management priorities for dealing with some of the organizational and financial problems facing the NRB. Included in that agenda:
• Evaluation of all areas of activity in the national office to determine usefulness, effectiveness, and advisability of each.
• Financial analysis of each department, particularly the national convention, to determine accurately income and expense; a new effort to strive for sizable surplus income from the convention.
• Continued development of EFICOM until all nonprofit members are in full standing.
• Study of the organizational structure of NRB, with an eye to modernization that will better meet the needs of the membership.
• Assessment of the location of the national office to determine if a new locale would be preferable; additional assessment of whether the national convention should continue to be held in Washington, D.C., or rotate to other locations.
• Polling of the membership to determine needs NRB can help fill.
• Development of public-relations opportunities to give the media and the people of the United States a true picture of the goals of religious broadcasting, in an effort to counteract past disclosures that have hurt the industry.
