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THE PROSPERITY GOSPEL

Pastor's Empire Built on Acts of Faith, and Cash

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Regarding the Crouches' salaries, the ministry said that during the network's first 21 years, Paul was paid less than $40,000 a year on average and Jan less than $35,000. The couple accepted higher compensation only in the last decade, as they approached retirement, officials said. Their current salaries were determined by independent compensation experts hired by the ministry's accounting firm, TBN said.

Devoted viewers say the Crouches have nothing to apologize for. Indeed, the ministry's material success is part of its appeal to believers — proof that the Crouches enjoy God's favor.

The most visible evidence of the Crouches' success is Trinity Christian City International in Costa Mesa, a striking white wedding cake of a building surrounded by reflecting pools, sculptures and neoclassical colonnades.

Visitors to the complex, alongside the San Diego Freeway, can attend live studio broadcasts, buy TBN-branded clothing and stroll down a re-creation of Via Dolorosa, the street in Jerusalem where Jesus walked to his crucifixion. In a high-tech 50-seat theater, people watch biblical movies in seats that tremble during the quakes, storms and other disasters recounted in the Scriptures.

The ministry owns a similar complex near Dallas and a Christian entertainment center outside Nashville.

But most TBN devotees will never visit those places. They connect with the network through its television programs, which provide a spiritual lifeline for millions. Many of these viewers worship in their living rooms. TBN preachers are their pastors.

"I don't go to church…. I turn the TV on and it's right there," said Sherry Peters, a bookkeeper in Mississippi. "Sometimes I will watch it for weeks on end, every day."

Olivia Foster, 52, of Westminster, sends the network $70 a month out of her $820 disability check.

"Without TBN, I wouldn't be here," said Foster, who lives alone and suffers from AIDS. "That's the Gospel truth. It gave me purpose that God could use me. I watch it 18 hours a day."

A Ham-Radio Start

Paul Crouch is the son of Pentacostal missionaries. Raised in Missouri, he took an interest in broadcasting at 12, when a friend introduced him to ham radio. By 15, he was a licensed operator. In a high school essay, he wrote that he "would one day use this invention of shortwave radio to send the Gospel around the world," according to his autobiography, Hello World!

At the Central Bible Institute in Springfield, Mo., Crouch and fellow students wired the campus for low-wattage radio and broadcast Gospel messages.

After graduation, Crouch stayed in Springfield and went to work for the Assemblies of God, a branch of Pentacostalism whose rituals include faith healing and speaking in tongues. His job was to maintain a film library. At the time — the early 1950s — many Protestant denominations were experimenting with movies and television as tools to win converts and teach the faithful.

During a visit to Rapid City, S.D., in 1956, Crouch was smitten by "a slight 98-pound angel" in a red dress, he later recalled. This was Jan Bethany, daughter of a leading Assemblies of God pastor.

The two married a year later and eventually settled in Rapid City, where Crouch became an associate pastor of his brother-in-law's church. In 1961, the Crouches left to run the Assemblies of God's new broadcast production facility in Burbank.

Twelve years later, the Crouches went out on their own, renting air time on KBSA-TV Channel 46 in Santa Ana. TBN's first studio set included pieces of furniture from the Crouches' bedroom, with a shower curtain as a backdrop.

The televangelists Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, then friends of the couple, moved from Michigan to help with the fledgling network and lived with the Crouches for a time.

The partnership didn't last long. In his autobiography, Crouch says that Jim Bakker tried to take over the network, but failed. The Bakkers then left for South Carolina and started their own TV ministry, which was a huge success before it was wrecked by scandal in 1987. Bakker admitted to an affair with a secretary and was later convicted of defrauding followers who invested in a religious retreat.

TBN, meanwhile, was quietly broadening its reach — with help from the Almighty, by Crouch's account. During the network's first day on the air, God moved a mountain so a clear broadcast signal could reach an antenna atop Mt. Wilson, Crouch wrote in his autobiography.

"And we will ever know that it was not just a spiritual mountain — this was a real dirt, rock and tree mountain!"

In its early days, TBN delivered programming through a web of UHF and low-power stations. Then, as the cable industry developed, Crouch bought time on systems across the country.

One evening in 1975, he was inspired to embrace a new technology. Crouch wrote that he was sitting in the den of his Newport Beach home when God projected a map of the U.S. on the ceiling. Beams of light struck major population centers, then spread throughout the country.

"I sat there transfixed by what I was seeing as I cried out to God to show me what all this meant," Crouch wrote. "As I waited upon the Lord, He spoke a ringing, resounding word to my spirit — 'Satellite!' "

While other televangelists concentrated on developing programs, Crouch built an unmatched distribution system. TBN outlasted or eclipsed its rivals and now leads all faith networks in revenue and viewership.

Today, the ministry and its subsidiaries own 23 full-power stations in the U.S. — including KTBN Channel 40 in Santa Ana — and 252 low-power stations serving rural areas.

Overseas, the network owns interests in stations in El Salvador, Spain and Kenya. Contracts with cable and satellite companies and station owners further extend its reach.

All-told, TBN airs on more than 6,000 stations in 75 countries, including places as remote as Rarotonga in the Cook Islands and Mbabane, Swaziland. Its programs are also available over the Internet.