Folks have been enjoying this one in the comments…
There must be a bad connection on the hotline between Oral Roberts University President Richard Roberts and the Man Upstairs. Somehow Roberts, who is also chief executive of the socially conservative college, got the idea that donations to shape young fundie minds of tomorrow were supposed to go into his bank account.
God is also apparently telling him to deny all allegations in a lawsuit that has a breathtaking litany of charges. They are quite sleazy (something we're all too familiar with at this point when it comes to these bible-beating hypocrites). (AP):
And the big charge that threatens the existence of the university itself — Richard Roberts is also accused of asking a professor in 2005 assign students and use university resources to work on a Tulsa pol's election bid for mayor. That would be a violation of state and federal law since ORU is a nonprofit.
• A longtime maintenance employee was fired so that an underage male friend of Mrs. Roberts could have his position.
• Mrs. Roberts - who is a member of the board of regents and is referred to as ORU's "first lady" on the university's Web site - frequently had cell-phone bills of more than $800 per month, with hundreds of text messages sent between 1 a.m. to 3 a.m. to "underage males who had been provided phones at university expense."
• The university jet was used to take one daughter and several friends on a senior trip to Orlando, Fla., and the Bahamas. The $29,411 trip was billed to the ministry as an "evangelistic function of the president."
• Mrs. Roberts spent more than $39,000 at one Chico's clothing store alone in less than a year, and had other accounts in Texas and California. She also repeatedly said, "As long as I wear it once on TV, we can charge it off." The document cites inconsistencies in clothing purchases and actual usage on TV.
• Mrs. Roberts was given a white Lexus SUV and a red Mercedes convertible by ministry donors.
• University and ministry employees are regularly summoned to the Roberts' home to do the daughters' homework.
• The university and ministry maintain a stable of horses for exclusive use by the Roberts' children.
• The Roberts' home has been remodeled 11 times in the past 14 years.
Roemerman on Record has the damning letter sent out by an ORU faculty member's using their ORU email account in support of the pol, Randi Miller, for mayor. It's after the jump.
Roberts, as expected, had a different message from God about personal responsibility and this lawsuit.
Subject: Attention All Campaigners
Attention All Campaigners
Our ORU reputation has been challenged!!! President Roberts has thrown his support behind Randi Miller for Mayor of Tulsa. The opposition has been quoted as saying that "ORU is a paper tiger" and "they can't deliver what's needed to win this race.". Well guess what, we need to show them just what we CAN deliver.
There are only 50 days until the primary election and we need EVERYONE OF YOU!
There will be team leader positions available along with lots of responsibilities. We have a terrific head quarters to work out of and a caring candidate who will take care of her volunteers.
We need you, and we need you now. Come sign up in the Government office as soon as possible. We have activates starting as early as THIS Wednesday!
HERE WE GO……
Dr. Mr. Brooker &r. Mrs. Brooker
Dr. Tim Brooker
Coordinator, Department of Government
Oral Roberts University
(918) 495-****
Roberts said God told him: "We live in a litigious society. Anyone can get mad and file a lawsuit against another person whether they have a legitimate case or not. This lawsuit … is about intimidation, blackmail and extortion."Wonkette's take is hysterical.
H/t blogenfreude.
42 Responses to “Why does God hate Oral Roberts University?”
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The topper…well, I don’t know how to choose. But doing the daughters’ homework was awesome. Oh, and the horses.
And speaking of “class,” if Ms. Roberts was going to spend all that cash on clothes…Chico’s? Really? Do you love nautical-themed sweater sets that much, lady?
Best ORU one-liner I ever heard. If Oral Roberts is a faith-healer, why does he need a medical school?
totally OT, but I can’t figure out how to email this to you or Amanda:
http://www.deadlinehollywooddaily.com/
(Several stories half-way down. Supposedly Warner Bros are now refusing to make any movies with female leads?!)
Oh, and Chico’s doesn’t really have nautical-themed sweaters, BTW. Comfy stretch pants, snazzy tops, and wicked jewelry, yes. The first thing I’ve heard about Mrs. Roberts that indicate she maybe might possibly perhaps have a smidgen of good taste.
Hey, even God gets backed up sometimes.A friend of mine attended a school that is, or was, in the same athletic conference as ORU. They delighted in dreaming up banners with which to torment visiting ORU teams, cheerleaders and fans. The best one: “We welcome Oral Roberts and his brothers Nasal and Anal.”
Curious note: The ORU cheerleaders, according to my friend, were consistently mega-hawt. And, of course, untouchable. One of God’s little jokes, I guess.
Horses?
Seriously- the university kept horses for them?
And not one of the students got pissed off about that?
Chico’s??? I mean, it’s nice and all, but if she’s going to steal, why not Armani? at least Talbot’s. Jeez, show some initiative!
Huhuhuhuhuhuhuh, heheheheheheheh, you said oral.
(Hey, someone had to say it given all of this.)
BREAKING:
Off topic, somewhat, but still can be filed under Rethug Hypocrites:
Mike Jones, the former escort who outed Ted Haggard, has alleged he also entertained Larry Craig.
Although Jones doesn’t have tape on Craig, he seems credible: for one, because Jones refused to pile on to the toe-tapping mess, but had resolved only to speak up if Craig refused to resign from Congress.
Isn’t this a fancy way of saying BOY?
Man, if I was going to spend $40,000 of embezzled money on clothes, I’d buy the goddamned Batsuit.
At least I’d look nice at the trial.
As for Alred’s comments on the dearth of female leads in Hollywood, I’ve seen some of that from the inside.
Top executives are men who hire men, by and large, for directors and writers, all of whom don’t get so-called “women’s films.”
Don’t see the point to them, don’t like the scripts, and so on and so forth.
And most women who survive in that boy’s world have had to adopt the Peter Pan world view.
By the by, I saw a screening of the “new” Ben Stiller comedy (if by new, you mean most recent) Heartbreak Kid and it’s boystown all the way, but not funny in the least. (Whereas the ’70s Heartbreak Kid, written and directed by Elaine May was both funny and a hit.
The Stiller/Farrelly Brothers non-comedy is laying an egg at the box office: ya think that will convince movie execs they should make no more male lead comedies, or even no more Ben Stillers? Or bankroll yet another Farrelly Brothers non-starter.
Nope and no and nada.
About 20 years ago, a cousin of mine and his from a fundie church down south both won a scholarship to this school.
Near the end of their senior year of high school, he got her pregnant. I had actually bought condoms for him during my last visit over the xmas vacation that year, and of course he told me that he “couldn’t” use them. We got into an argument that if he was going to “fornicate” that birth control was the lesser of two “evils”.
By their church’s standards they did the “right” thing. He married her, and they went ahead with the pregnancy. During the summer they tried to get into some couples housing (apparently it was not unusual for both spouses to attend simultaneously or get married while in college).
Everything was fine til an administrator realized that they were only married 1 month, but she was clearly further along than 1 month in the pregnancy, and immediately rescinded the scholarships for “moral turpitude” or some other nonsense.
The story ended well though, my cousin and his wife now realized the hypocrisies of it all.
They realized that if she had gotten an abortion and not told anyone, they would have been allowed to attend.
They realized that although the school claimed to be “pro-life”, they would have been happier if they had aborted and kept it a secret. He walked around his church trying to point out the discrepancy in attitude, and was threatened.
My cousins wife on the other hand actually, to this day, blames the kids, and unlike my cousin (now divorced), is still a member of her church in good standing. She never realized the hypocrisies.
1. Like Ned Flanders, two of my brothers graduated from ORU. I reeeally have to watch what I say at reunions.
2. “Only Robots” University. Feel free to steal this.
3. Could this thing be any more Stalinesque?
http://www.oru.edu/aboutoru/prayinghands.php
Our biggest wish when I was in college is that we would play Oral Roberts in some sport.
Why, you ask?
I attended Morehead State University.
Morehead vs. Oral Roberts: Head Out To The Game. We so wanted that on a t-shirt.
WF
But A LIBERAL CHURCH HAD AN ANTIWAR SERMON DURING AN ELECTION CAMPAIGN!
Unless there’s more than that, it’s going to be hard to get in the way of ORU’s tax exemption. But, as always, the pettiness of hypocrisy is so thoroughly telling. Even if they used to be in it for the power and the glory, now they’re in it for the perks. The kids’ homework? Geez.
Talk about selling your birthright for a mess of pottage.
So its been what, about twenty years that all this rabid corporate religious right has been built? And now it is falling down, simply no doubt due to the fact that it was built on lies.
Proof that one cannot make something out of absolutely nothing but deceit and greed.
The only thing better would have been if one of Ms. Roberts’ boy toys had made a tape of a midnight trist. Now, that would have gorgeous!
As for the movie making, I have always heard that movies and even television is directed to white middle class 13 year old boys and twenty-something white middle class males. Despite statistics that have repeatedly shown that there are other groups, like women and people of color who have money to spend and interests as well.
The look at the movement of women inside the industry just proves that film and television directors, like many males in our culture, could care less what the ‘other’ thinks, despite it being in their interest to do so.
the merits of chico’s aside (my mom loves them), how does one drop 39k there? Isnt that like spending 2k at Taco Bell?
Seriously- the university kept horses for them?
And not one of the students got pissed off about that?
The religious reich is completely unconcerned with god and absolutely concerned with caste. Fundies aren’t really creating a belief system as much as they maintain a social system. God endorses whatever Daddy-Leader says. God, practically speaking, is a little bitch to a fundie.
They realized that although the school claimed to be “pro-life”, they would have been happier if they had aborted and kept it a secret. He walked around his church trying to point out the discrepancy in attitude, and was threatened.
My cousins wife on the other hand actually, to this day, blames the kids, and unlike my cousin (now divorced), is still a member of her church in good standing. She never realized the hypocrisies.
This is hypocrisy, but it is nevertheless consistent with the true purpose of fundamentalism. The fundies were able to act morally (and socially — the victims lost their scholarship) superior due to failure of the victims to choose the most immoral, deceitful path in the fundies’ own belief system. Again, actual beliefs are a means to an ends. The ends are self-aggradizement, popularity, and wealth.
These really are the people Jesus warned us about.
The charge-off for the clothing may well be taxable income to Mrs. Roberts. If she gets the clothes and keeps them, it’s taxable income to her. You cannot count mere standard North American business attire as a working condition fringe; it’s not treated like nursing uniforms or fire protective gear. The fact that she wore the clothing on a TV shoot does not shield the clothes from income taxes; if a law firm buys a standard for an attorney’s trial, that’s taxable income to the lawyer.
Perhaps more ominously, 501(c)(3) public charities, which ORU almost certainly is claiming to be, are not supposed to be set up for the private inurement of anyone. Now fair-market value compensation for services rendered and market-rate interest are fine, but 40K worth of slush fund clothing to the wife of the president of the University - bearing the same surname as the founder - could get an independent IRS nasty. Is the IRS independent under Bush? Beats me.
God does not hate Oral.
The people to be blamed are the naive and gullible fans who send their hard earned cash and assets to these televancrooks.
If they did not send them, Oral would not have money to burn and there would be no scandal, and he might be at a McDonald’s earning some clean income flipping burgers.
See Paul’s message, #16. How many IRS investigations have you heard of fundamentalist churches for political sermonizing?
Actually, a lot of Chico’s stuff (the jackets especially) is in the >$100 range, so it’s not that hard to rack up quite a shocking amount at the cash register buying an ordinary outfit. (One of the reasons I hit them during the sales period only) $40K does seem a bit excessive unless she’s got an Imelda Marcos complex with Chico’s jackets.
The charge-off for the clothing may well be taxable income to Mrs. Roberts. If she gets the clothes and keeps them, it’s taxable income to her. You cannot count mere standard North American business attire as a working condition fringe; it’s not treated like nursing uniforms or fire protective gear. The fact that she wore the clothing on a TV shoot does not shield the clothes from income taxes; if a law firm buys a standard for an attorney’s trial, that’s taxable income to the lawyer.
But Mrs. Roberts is not working for a for-profit organization. She is a co-pastor of the Oral Roberts ministry, and those clothes are her vestments if she wears them just for a service, and they belong to the ministry and not to her. But they are indeed income to her if she keeps them. This assumes that she has an everyday wardrobe, which she probably does.
Oooh, ORU. I would be content to drive around Tulsa and NOT see the giant complex of gilt buildings and that CREEPY golden statue of Roberts’ disembodied, praying hands. Their football team gets teased a lot about their strict curfews, and I for one could never go to a college with a stringent dress code and mandatory church. Bleh.
I’m glad that crazy bastard might actually get what he deserves.
A friend of mine lives in Wichita, and attends the Shockers’ baseball games, sitting with a group behind the centerfield fence and genteelly heckling the opposing players. During a game against ORU, one of the group started talking to the ORU center fielder over several innings, finally asking him, “Did you ever see Jesus?” The next inning, with runners on, the question was “How tall was he?” The player was laughing so hard he couldn’t move to field a ball hit to him, and wound up being removed from the game.
Man, if I was going to spend $40,000 of embezzled money on clothes, I’d buy the goddamned Batsuit.
With or without nipples?
A university has an airplane? What’s that all about? Do they need it to get around campus? These people have to be the most pathetic excuses for human beings; greedy, theiving hypocrites.
In Christianity, even the ladies are pedos.
My first introduction to Oral Roberts was a Bible we once had with commentary by him, back when he was still building his school. It kind of weirded me out at the time, but I figured he at least had good intentions. Since then I’ve seen them get pretty scary-fundamentalist, which means I’m disappointed in my uncle and cousin who have degrees from ORU. I wonder what they will make of this all, and am biting my tongue to not say, “They deserve whatever they get,” either about my relatives or the ORU staff. Schadenfreude is delicious, but I feel bad afterward….
Please. Can’t someone at ORU write the english language? Sure, the letter is illegal and violates the tax code, but the grammar, word usage and spelling are wrong. This is higher education??
Fixed that for ya.
Rickie Roberts has a wandering unfullfilled wife and offered inappropriate support for a politician named Randi with an “i”, This drama train seems on the fast track to “self-hating gay town”.
Too bad because in my “Self hating gay televangelist Office pool” my money was on Perry Stone.
If Roberts and his wife are like most of the tycoonevangelists, their house, cars and everything else are nominally owned by the ministry or one of its dummy corporations, with them being allowed use of them for the convenience of the ministry. So really all she needs is a one walk-in closet in the house labeled “my clothes” and another labeled “vestments”. And then when she wants to dress up for something that isn’t pastoral, she just looks in the mirror and says, “May I please borrow some of the vestments?” The vestry committee of one looks back and says, “Sure, no problem.”
I wouldn’t be surprised, given that tab, if all of these outfits only got worn a few times before being discarded.
What’s the Supreme Car Salesman’s
adviceWord on rustproofing? I’m kind of shopping and getting conflicting messages on whether it’s for real or a test of faith.“What’s the Supreme Car Salesman’s
adviceWord on rustproofing? I’m kind of shopping and getting conflicting messages on whether it’s for real or a test of faith.”Not only that, but what does god say about those extended warranties?…
Who needs an extended warranty when the rapture is a comin’ soon (and I’m going, of course)!
Randi with an i, sounds like a nom de drag to moi…
I assumed Randi-with-an-i meant the mayor was a woman. A quick Google & Wikipedia search confirms that.
No wonder her daughter didn’t like to bring her boyfriends home to meet Mom.
There is no doubt that most human beings are childish because they need to have a big Daddy called God that they have to worship. For thousands of years criminals have exploited this deep psychological need in the name of religion to exploit and scam human beings. Unless human beings grow up and mature, this scam and exploitation would continue.
Why should folks get excited about the horses? Many folks love to ride, pet and groom them. And to those folks, shovelling up afterwards is a tiny price to pay. And my compost heap could use a couple truckloads of manure, so, um, can I have some too?