Hanegraaff Goes Over the Edge
Hank Hanegraaff of the Christian Research Institute (CRI) made a desparate plea to his supporters for donations.
The reason for the emergency is that donations were mistakenly thrown in the trash by the postal workers. The post office responsible says no donations were thrown away.
Hank explained to his supporters that for three months many donations were sent to another company which threw the donations in the trash. He claims that "hundreds of thousands of dollars" were lost because it took place in the last three months of the year. He says that 17% of the CRI's donations come in during those three months. The CRI takes in about $8,000,000 annually.
Hank made a public statement that the post office in question accepted blame. "Our local U.S. post office has accepted full responsibility for this error and has fixed the problem," he said. U.S. Postal officials say no one has spoken to Hank or anyone at the CRI. "Nobody knows about this," said Richard Maher, U.S. Postal Service spokesman for Southern California. [Ed. note: It's obvious Hank lied for some reason. Every rational person must question his integrity.]
Alan Baron, the chief operating officer of On-Target Marketing said his company did not throw any of CRI's mail away. He said his company received one tray of mail of CRI's and it was given to CRI the same day. "I don't know why this is being blown out of proportion," he said. "This was a very limited problem and it was quickly solved." [Ed. note: Hank either used the incident to beg for more money or he is mentally unstable. If he used the incident which cost him no loss of revenue as a fund-raising scam he is honesty must be questioned. If he believes the story he told he needs professional help. Either way he is spirtiually unfit to head the CRI.]
This "incident" was discovered by Bill Alnor, a journalism professor at Texas A&M University Kingsville. He spotted a fund-raising appeal on the CRI web site which claimed donations had been lost. Mr. Alnor wrote a story in his on-line magazine -- Christian Sentinel -- questioning the claims of Hank.
Paul Young, executive vice-president of CRI, called Mr. Alnor's story "a pack of lies." Young claims that when he noticed a drop in donations in October he met with postal officials and only discovered where the donations had gone to when an employee of On Target Marketing called CRI in December. He claims he dug out a postal bag of letters addressed to CRI from their trash bin He can't understand why CRI's claim differs from On Target's and the Postal Service. [Ed. note: Young is either lying like Hank or he needs professional help. It doesn't take three months to find out why mail is being mis-routed. His claims contradict that of Mr. Baron of On Target Marketing. Mr. Baron would not throw mail away knowing he could be sued. I seriously doubt the mail clerk at On Target tossed CRI's mail away for three months without saying anything.]
The CRI has been running deficits. In 2002 it was in the red $560,000. In 2003 the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability conducted an audit of CRI's books and found numerous problems. Hank reimbursed CRI a "significant" amount of money. In the wake of that six employees were fired or resigned after complaining that Hank was commingling his money with the institute's. Hank denied any wrongdoing although he made a "significant reimbursement."
Hank received $280,000 in salary and allowances in 2002 and his wife, Kathy, received $111,000. [Ed. note: Their salaries have been increased since then even though the institute is in the red. Employees at CRI say they rarely see Kathy they and did not know she was employed by CRI.] (Los Angeles Times, 1.23.2005)
WAKE UP BELIEVERS! Hank has a long history of unusual "incidents" in his religious career. He worked under the founder of the Christian Research Institute, Dr. Walter Martin, for several years before Dr. Martin passed on in the 1980s. He spoke at the funeral service and said that earlier that week Dr. Martin told him privately that he had chosen him to succeed him. He managed to take control even though he faced opposition.
His claim of succesion was rejected by Dr. Martin's wife and also by Dr. Robert Morey who had worked with Dr. Martin. Dr. Morey stated that Dr. Martin had told him the week of his death that he wanted him to succeed him. Either Hank or Dr. Morey lied about this or both did.
Hank raised money specifically to buy a religious campus in Orange County and did not follow through. Instead of refunding the money to donors he used it to buy an expensive home and also a new building in Rancho Santa Margarita. He eventually sold his home and the CRI HQ building at a handsome profit and moved to N. Carolina. I do not know what he did with the surplus funds he made by the sale of his home and HQ building. He claims CRI is in debt because of the move and has been soliciting donations.
Hank was also sued by some former employees and settled the case out of court for $20,000. He spent around $500,000 to fight the lawsuit.
Mr. Alnor at the time of the above noted lawsuit was the executive director of Evangelical Ministries to New Religions (EMNR), and had successfully led its board to look into numerous proven ethical problems surrounding the embattled CRI leader. Hank fought back to take some pressure off of himself. He spent a lot of CRI's money that year trying to take Mr. Alnor out. Hank and Elliot Miller were later forced out of EMNR when they refused to sign an ethical standards agreement.
Hank also fired numerous employees after taking control and forced many others out. I was told this by an employee who worked for Dr. Martin for many years.
Hank was mistakenly accused of buying a Lexus and launched an attack against the individual who made an honest error. Yet despite Hank's anger over being falsely accused of owning a Lexus, CRI bought one for him to use in July 2002. The purchase of the blue $66,000 Lexus SE was reported in the July 16, 2003 Christianity Today magazine.
The purchase angered various folks within CRI who were concerned about the ministry's extravagant spending, including Hanegraaff's salary that had zoomed to the more than $250,000 level -- all without merit or justification. These massive spending increases by the Hanegraaff family were also happening at the same time CRI was constantly crying for money, even using the term "emergency" as they used huge telemarketing firms to bring in more cash.
At the same time donors' money was being spent on such things as Hanegraaff's $3,000 plus a month country club dues where he regularly played golf at his gated community in Southern California. CRI also spent $8,000 in flooring for Hank's home office, and for Hanegraaff's vitamins and flowers he sent to his mother, and for maintenance bills in excess of $1,000 for the Hanegraaff children's computers, not to mention exorbitant salaries for Hank and his wife, Kathy. It appears as though Hank has a love of money (I Tim. 6.10).
Hank has also been caught plagarizing the work of at least three authors and he also took credit for a memory system that he stole from someone else.
Hank's credibility, integrity, honesty and spirituality must be questioned due to the ongoing "incidents" in his religious career. I must also note that he divorced his first wife and one of his daughters allegedly dabbled in the occult.
It is my discernment from what I have heard and read about Hank that he has serious emotional and spiritual problems. He is not fit to head CRI and must step down.
I have listened to Hank's radio program from the first day he took over -- missing very few programs. I have recorded hundreds of segments and have heard him teach numerous false doctrines. He is not fit to teach Scripture and must step down.
Here is a short list of the false doctrines that Hank teaches:
The HOLY SPIRIT does not literally dwell within believers;
The descriptions of Hell (Hades) and the Lake of Fire are not real, but merely symbolic;
There is one God who has three personalities;
Virtually all Biblical eschatology was fulfilled in 70 A.D.;
Angels do not have extension in space;
There currently is no place called Heaven nor is there a Hades;
The story of the rich man and Lazaros (Lk. 19) is a parable;
When a believer dies he does not go to a specific place such as Heaven. Instead we go nowhere because we are spirits and spirits do not have extension in space; and
The Tree of Life was not and is not a literal tree (Rev. 3.22; Rev. 22.2,19).
Hank also teaches that celebration of Christmas is holy and those who teach it is a pagan festival are teaching a false doctrine. His support of the Roman Catholic Corp. is also distrubing.
Hank is not accountable to the body of YAHSHUA. He is a loose cannon and he is bringing shame on Messianic Faith. He must be held accountable. If you donate money to Hank -- STOP! It is one way to hold him accountable.