The one thing that always fascinated me about the different cultures in this world is that while they all practice different religions – the primary belief in a Higher Power is the same. What has always bothered me, however, is that in all of these different religions – there is another unfortunate similarity – those who exploit people’s religious beliefs for their own financial gain.

For a person to portray themselves as someone who can communicate with God and tell their followers to give them money “because God commands them to” – only to use that money for their own greedy material desires, is to me, the lowest form of crime that there is. And unfortunately – there are many of these criminals that have prayed on innocent believers for years – and are somehow still getting away with it.

My personal favorite of these criminals is Oral Roberts, who in 1987, locked himself in a tower and tearfully told his nationwide audience of followers that God had threatened to “call him home” if he did not raise eight million dollars by his creditor’s deadline. I don’t know what is worse – that Roberts used God’s name to extort money from his followers because of his own debt and irresponsibility – or that his followers actually gave him the money.

Another famous thief who’s weapon is the Lord is Jim Bakker. In the 1980’s, Bakker was the leader of the PTL Ministry, which was so popular, that they had millions of devoted followers and worldwide viewers – and even ran Heritage USA – which was the third most popular theme park in the world. Then, in 1986, Bakker’s scam was blown wide open when the “Godly man” was caught in a sexual relationship with his secretary – Jessica Hahn – which led to an investigation of the PTL that landed Bakker in jail on twenty-four counts of fraud for bilking his followers out of one hundred and fifty eight million dollars.

Jimmy Swaggart is another crook who uses the Lord’s name to fill his bank account – and his other desires as well. At one time, Swaggart was the leader of one of the largest, most popular, most accepted – and most successful religious organizations in recent history – and he was caught using the money that was donated to his church “to do God’s work” – to buy drugs and solicit prostitutes. And even after his famous 1998 tearful confession on worldwide television – he was caught not even three years later in a Jaguar with another prostitute – so much for repentance.

As I stated earlier, the act of stealing money donated for religious purposes stretches farther then just Christianity. Just yesterday, a Federal Judge here in Brooklyn, New York sentenced Rabbi Efroim Stein and Rabbi Jacob Bronner to thirty-three months in jail for stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars that was meant to go to survivors of the Holocaust. Receiving a two and a half million dollar grant from the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development to “meet the needs of Holocaust survivors” – Bronner and Stein took a portion of the money and “purchased” non-existent goods from companies that kicked the money back to the Rabbi’s hungry wallets.

No matter the religion, no matter the crook – and no matter the reason – using God’s name to solicit innocent people to fork over their hard earned money which they believe is going to a good cause to avoid having to actually earn a living is one of the dirtiest things a person can do. To me, these thieves are even worse then those individuals who rob a bank with a ski mask and a gun – because at least the bank robber has enough guts to make his victims aware that he is a thief – rather then hide behind a Bible and lie to his victims through a bad suit and through a fake smile.