Criticism of Robertson's Faith Healing
In the 1970s and 1980s Robertson was a faith healer. James Randi devoted a chapter of his book The Faith Healers, criticising Robertson faith healing. Randi commented that "in 1986, soon after the full importance of the AIDS epidemic began to become evident, Robertson was attempting to cure it" by proclaiming people cured after prayer. Randi commented, "Gerry Straub, a former associate of Pat Robertson and his television producer, pointed out in his book Salvation for Sale the astonishing fact that God seemed to time miracles to conform with standard television format," and "God would stop speaking to Pat and stop healing exactly in time with the theme music." Randi explained that "in 1979, it appeared to Robertson's staff that their boss had been taking lessons from Oral Roberts" and "proposed to film the Second Coming!". The project was eventually publicly dropped, but "budget allocations are made for their development." Martin Gardner also criticized Robertson's faith healing in Gardner's work Beyond Reason.
Read more about this topic: Pat Robertson Controversies
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