CoreIssue
03-24-2006, 03:15 PM
I don't know how many of you have received these mailings, but I got my first one today.
This article sums it up:
"Once a traveling tent-revival preacher, the Rev. James Eugene Ewing built a direct-mail empire from his mansion in Los Angeles that brings millions of dollars flowing into a Tulsa post office box.
Ewing's computerized mailing operation, Saint Matthew's Churches, mails more than 1 million letters per month, many to poor, uneducated people, while Ewing lives in a mansion and drives luxury cars.
The letters contain an alluring promise of 'seed faith:' send Saint Matthew's your money and God will reward you with cash, a cure to your illness, a new home and other blessings. They often contain items such as prayer cloths, a 'Jesus eyes handkerchief,' golden coins, communion wafers and 'sackcloth billfolds.' Recipients are often warned to open the letters in private and not discuss them with others.
(Picture deleted)
Mailings from Saint Matthew's Churches often contain items, some pictured here, such as ''miracle cakes,'' coins, prayer cloths and fake currency. An attorney for the organization said they are faith items that help believers focus their prayers.
Photo: Michael Wyke / Tulsa World
The approach reaped Ewing and his organization a gross income of more than $100 million since 1993, including $26 million in 1999, the last year Saint Matthew's made its tax records public. And while much of the money is spent on postage and salaries, Ewing's company receives nonprofit status and pays no federal taxes.
Though Ewing claims it is a church, Saint Matthew's Churches, once called St. Matthew Publishing Inc., has no address other than a Tulsa post office box. It has two listed phone numbers in Tulsa and both are answered by a recorded religious message.
The organization is not related to other Tulsa-area churches named St. Matthew's, though many of them have received calls asking to be removed from its mailing list.
Ole Anthony, founder of the Trinity Foundation (http://www.trinityfi.org/), a nonprofit religious watchdog group, has tracked Ewing's organization for years. The foundation was largely responsible for exposing televangelist Robert Tilton in 1991 after Anthony said he found prayer requests sent to Tilton in Tulsa trash Dumpsters.
(Picture deleted)
Ole Anthony, the founder of the Trinity Foundation, sits among posters displaying mailings by the Rev. James Eugene Ewing and his organization.
Photo: James Gibbard / Tulsa World
At the time, Tilton and Ewing shared the same Tulsa attorney, J.C. Joyce. Saint Matthew's Churches is incorporated at Joyce's downtown Tulsa law office and the organization paid Joyce's law firm more than $2.6 million for legal services during three years, records show.
Anthony has also obtained documents that describe how Ewing and his organization use demographic data to target the poor.
To read the complete article click here (http://www.loper.org/~george/trends/2003/Apr/815.html)
This article sums it up:
"Once a traveling tent-revival preacher, the Rev. James Eugene Ewing built a direct-mail empire from his mansion in Los Angeles that brings millions of dollars flowing into a Tulsa post office box.
Ewing's computerized mailing operation, Saint Matthew's Churches, mails more than 1 million letters per month, many to poor, uneducated people, while Ewing lives in a mansion and drives luxury cars.
The letters contain an alluring promise of 'seed faith:' send Saint Matthew's your money and God will reward you with cash, a cure to your illness, a new home and other blessings. They often contain items such as prayer cloths, a 'Jesus eyes handkerchief,' golden coins, communion wafers and 'sackcloth billfolds.' Recipients are often warned to open the letters in private and not discuss them with others.
(Picture deleted)
Mailings from Saint Matthew's Churches often contain items, some pictured here, such as ''miracle cakes,'' coins, prayer cloths and fake currency. An attorney for the organization said they are faith items that help believers focus their prayers.
Photo: Michael Wyke / Tulsa World
The approach reaped Ewing and his organization a gross income of more than $100 million since 1993, including $26 million in 1999, the last year Saint Matthew's made its tax records public. And while much of the money is spent on postage and salaries, Ewing's company receives nonprofit status and pays no federal taxes.
Though Ewing claims it is a church, Saint Matthew's Churches, once called St. Matthew Publishing Inc., has no address other than a Tulsa post office box. It has two listed phone numbers in Tulsa and both are answered by a recorded religious message.
The organization is not related to other Tulsa-area churches named St. Matthew's, though many of them have received calls asking to be removed from its mailing list.
Ole Anthony, founder of the Trinity Foundation (http://www.trinityfi.org/), a nonprofit religious watchdog group, has tracked Ewing's organization for years. The foundation was largely responsible for exposing televangelist Robert Tilton in 1991 after Anthony said he found prayer requests sent to Tilton in Tulsa trash Dumpsters.
(Picture deleted)
Ole Anthony, the founder of the Trinity Foundation, sits among posters displaying mailings by the Rev. James Eugene Ewing and his organization.
Photo: James Gibbard / Tulsa World
At the time, Tilton and Ewing shared the same Tulsa attorney, J.C. Joyce. Saint Matthew's Churches is incorporated at Joyce's downtown Tulsa law office and the organization paid Joyce's law firm more than $2.6 million for legal services during three years, records show.
Anthony has also obtained documents that describe how Ewing and his organization use demographic data to target the poor.
To read the complete article click here (http://www.loper.org/~george/trends/2003/Apr/815.html)