Body: | "And many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned; and in their greed they will exploit you with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep." 2 Peter 2:2
God's Frequency is 39.17 Mhz.
The Investigation Of Peter Popoff
Science and the Paranormal magazine, 1987
Click to View See actual video of Popoff in the act of fraud!
Click to View Get the Real Player FREE
Why is this fraud still on TV????
Why do many Pentecostals think he is saved and that the Holy Spirit is performing miracles through him?
The incredible story From Science and the Paranormal magazine, 1987 ...
Click to View For centuries, religious people have claimed that they have
engaged in direct communications with God. Wouldn't it be interesting just
once to tap into those private and personal conversations?
Click to View
The Amazing Randi
(Professional Magician)
It happens that a group of researchers, sponsored by the Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion (CSER), a new offshoot of the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP) lead by special investigator and magician James Randi [Amazing Randi], has managed to actually capture on tape some of those "divine" conversations between God and well-known television evangelist and faith healer Reverend Peter Popoff!
Click to View See actual video of Popoff in the act of fraud!
Click to View The first words were captured by a secret team of researchers
as the Reverend Peter Popoff of Upland, California, stepped onto a stage at
San Francisco's Civic Auditorium, where he was about to start a faith
healing service that would be videotaped for his weekly national broadcast.
The team heard (and captured on tape) an affectionate feminine voice from
above: Hello, Petey. I love you! I'm talking to you. Can you hear me? If
you can't you're in trouble, 'cause I'm talking as well as I can! (Her
voice suddenly becomes businesslike.) ;I'm looking up names right now. This
secret team of two was located in a hidden section of the auditorium
complex. It consisted of Alec Jason, an electronics expert, and his
assistant Bob Steiner. Jason was giving the thumbs-up sign to Steiner as
they began a number of surreptitious recordings designed to expose how
Reverend Peter Popoff was able to "divinely" recite personal details about
audience members and their afflictions during his popular faith-healing
services.
Click to View Peter Popoff, like many faith healers, calls out the names,
illnesses, and sometimes addresses of people at his crusades, then "lays
hands" on them and prays for their healing. The impression given at such
services is that the information comes directly from God; indeed, a
magazine distributed by Popoff's organization described an audience member
being "called out by the Spirit for healing". Those in the audience are so
impressed by Popoff's "Gift of Knowledge" that they break into applause.
The subjects picked are so overwhelmed that they often break into tears.
One woman who was "healed" at one of the meetings and later interviewed by
CSER stated: " know he is real from the way he talked. He actually knew my
address and had no notes to look at! he is real, all right!"
Click to View Evangelist/healer Peter Popoff has headquarters in Upland,
California, whence he sends out slick fund-raising literature that is
generated and printed by computer to appear as if it were personally typed
and signed. Those on Popoff's mailing list have received Russian currency,
handkerchiefs, and red felt hearts to be carried or worn, then each to be
sent back with a check attached. Special envelopes and endless appeals for
the emergency needs of his ministry arrive every week. Each is personalized
by the computer, which drops the recipient's first name into the text
occasionally after the salutation "Brother". Sometimes the letters start
off typed, and in an ensuing page turn into what appears to be a
handwritten request for money from Reverend Popoff himself. This
"handwriting" is printed as well. A man preparing to enter the Popoff
crusade in San Francisco in February was approached by a TV interviewer,
"Why are you coming to see Reverend Popoff?" he was asked. "Peter wrote to
me", replied the man, "and wanted me to come here today for a special
message God has for me." He was blissfully unaware that thousands of
persons in the Bay area received identical letters - identical, that is,
except for the personalized effect generated by Popoff's computer.
Click to View These slick mail campaigns have paid off. Popoff is seen
nationwide on 51 television outlets and heard on 40 radio stations, and has
an average monthly budget of $550,000, according to his business manager.
Popoff's effect on his followers is so great that on several occasions he
has asked his audience to "break free of the Devil" by throwing their
medications up onto the stage. Dozens of people have come forward and
tossed their medicine bottles onto the platform. Prescriptions for
digitalis, nitroglycerine tablets, oral diabetes medication, and many
unidentified pills were discarded by people who might have needed such
substances to stay alive.
Click to View When world-famous magician and psychic investigator James
Randi and his close magician friend Steve Shaw first attended a Popoff
healing, they noticed that Popoff "called out" people from the audience
fast and accurately. He gave their ailments, named relatives, and even
threw in an occasional street address for good measure. After Randi and
Shaw had observed Popoff dealing with twenty or so people, it was obvious
to them that Popoff was not using some mnemonic device. Shaw told Randi,
"He's got something else going for him, and I think I know what I have to
do." Randi agreed and sent Steve to get a closer look at Popoff. Steve
noticed that Popoff was wearing a hearing aid in his left ear. (That device
is somewhat unusual for someone who claims to be able to perform miraculous
healings.) You can see the shiny plastic in there, clear as can be, Shaw
told Randi. Since Popoff had a tiny receiver of some sort in his left ear,
Randi needed an electronic surveillance expert. He enlisted the help of San
Francisco based Alec Jason, who had extensive experience in police,
detective, and intelligence work. A few weeks later, Popoff came to San
Francisco. The day before his show, Jason visited the Auditorium with a
twenty thousand dollar computerized scanning system, which Jason left
turned on for a couple of hours.
Click to View Jason's electronic scanner is useful to locate anything new
that is being broadcast. It works by going through all the radio
frequencies, and memorizes essentially everything that is on the air. The
scanner would be brought back when Popoff was performing, and it would
automatically compare the different broadcast signals. Everything that it
had heard before, it would ignore - so it would just look for new signals.
The idea was to save time.
Click to View See actual video of Popoff in the act of fraud!
Click to View Get the Real Player FREE
Alec Jason and his assistant, Bob Steiner, had hardly set up the tape
recorder and turned on the scanner before the scanner zeroed in on
frequency 39.17 Megahertz (MHz). The feminine voice boomed loud and clear
over their private earphones, "Hello, Petey. I love you! I'm talking to
you. Can you hear me? If you can't, you're in trouble, 'cause I'm talking
as well as I can!" (Her voice suddenly becomes business like.) "I'm looking
up names right now." Jason and Steiner knew that they had struck pay dirt!
The funny thing about it was that it turned out that God was a woman; God
spoke on frequency 39.17 MHz (in a band width normally used only by police
and fire departments); and God sounded exactly like Popoff's wife
Elizabeth!
Click to View See actual video of Popoff in the act of fraud!
Click to View Get the Real Player FREE
Click to View With the help of the scanner, Jason and Steiner were able to
hear and record the entire conversation. Elizabeth: "Way over to the other
side on the other balcony is Josephine Parino. Run all the way over to the
right side now. Josephine Parino. Josephine Parino." Popoff asks the
assembled worshipers: "Who's Josephine?" Elizabeth" Parino. Popoff Parino.
Josephine Parino identifies herself. "Elizabeth: She's got cancer of the
stomach." Transcribing the tape later on, Randi, Jason, and Steiner heard
such comments as: "I have a hot one for you. Robert Kaywood. He's got a
chest condition that needs surgery. Robert Kaywood. Kaywood. Kaywood. He
needs surgery. His veins aren't formed. He prays that God will heal him
today. Later on, they heard: "Dear, she...no, she should be there on your
right side. Right side. No, that's not her! No, that's not her! In the
blue... Oh! That might be here. Okay. She lives at 4267 Masterson, and
she's praying for her daughter Joy, who's allergic to food." This was
followed by laughter from Elizabeth and Pam, the wife of Reeford Shirrell
(Popoff's number two man). Elizabeth Popoff was out of the audience's view
but apparently able to see her husband via TV monitors.
Click to View Elizabeth Popoff speaks: "Reeford's got a hot one!"
(Laughter.) "Reeford's so excited! He came running in back here and scared
us half to death! You ready for a hot one? Okay! Want a hot one? Hot one!
Hot off the press! Ruby Lee Harris. Ruby Lee. She is standing in the far
back where there's no chairs. (Long pause) "...Ruby Lee Harris. She's
against the back wall. She's got lumps in her breast. You might want to
whisper it - have her walk down! Have her run up there. Run! Oh! Look at
her run! (Loud laughter) "she's got knots in her breast." (Laughter and
giggles.) A home run! A home run!" (Then, later on, giggles are heard, and
Pam speaks.) "At any rate, she should kick him in the face!" (giggles)
(Elizabeth speaks.) "Pam says to make her - Pam thinks that you should have
her kick him in the face (Giggles.) The team recorded hours of
conversations in which Elizabeth Popoff radioed to her husband personal
details that she and other aides gathered from the audience in
conversations before the service and from prayer request cards filled out
there. Elizabeth Popoff and several aides would scout the audience looking
for "hot" ones. They would ask them, "Is Jesus going to heal you? And
what's your name, and where do you live? Have you had this condition long?"
They would write all this information down on cards, which later on
Elizabeth would recite during the service via her concealed transmitter.
She carried the power source in a large handbag, and the transmitter and
microphone were hidden under her blouse.
Click to View Randi, however, needed incontrovertible evidence that this
was the way the information was conveyed. Randi enlisted the help of many
volunteers in several cities to adopt false names and diseases and act like
"hot" ones. That plan worked beautifully. Randi's stooges were approached
and questioned by Elizabeth Popoff. During the show, Popoff called out the
false names and diseases in exactly the order that Elizabeth Popoff had
approached them. She didn't even bother to shuffle the cards! One stooge,
Don Henvick, was exceptional. Don dressed in various disguises, going even
so far as to shave his beard and head.He was able to present a convincing
and tempting target for the faith healers by his fine acting.
Click to View In San Francisco, the Reverend Popoff call him out as a
bearded man under the assumed name "Tom Hendry", and cured him of a broken
home and that bondage to alcohol. In Anaheim, Don (this time bald and
clean-shaven scored again when Popoff fell for another of his aliases, this
time calling him out as Vergil Jorgenson, and attempting to heal a bogus
serious arthritic condition.
Click to View Subsequently, Popoff, apparently enthralled by Henvick's
powerful performance as a man possessed by the Holy Spirit, broadcast both
of these healings on his shows! Randi next instructed Don to be cured of a
disease that he couldn't possibly have. They settled on uterine cancer! To
have uterine cancer you need a uterus. To have a uterus you need to be a
woman. Don went around to various thrift stores looking for dresses.
Friends helped him with the makeup. The last stop was to obtain a
wheelchair so that Popoff could call him (her?) out as "Bernice Manicoff"
Scott Morris, an editor at Omni, went along as "her son." After they
entered the auditorium for the show, they situated themselves in the aisle
close to Elizabeth Popoff. There were told that the chair was blocking the
aisle and so they moved around to a couple of other places before they were
directed to the orchestra pit, where two empty wheelchairs were parked. Two
women with canes walked into the pit and sat in the empty wheelchairs (the
chairs were rented by Popoff). One of the women remarked, "I guess this is
where they want us to sit." Later both women were called out, and a big
deal was made out of the fact that they can walk, which is how they got
into the rented wheelchairs in the first place. Praise the miracles of
Peter Popoff! Don- or should we say -"Bernice" - sent her "son" to speak to
Elizabeth to give her a story that "mom" would sure like to say "Hi!" but
can't walk that far from her wheelchair without getting tired. Elizabeth
made a note of it and sent Brother Reeford over. Aside from pleasantries,
he asked two questions: "How long have you been in that wheelchair?" and
"Can you walk at all?" People who can't walk are given short shrift, but
when "Bernice" told him that she'd been in the wheelchair for a couple of
years "off and on,"and "Oh, yes, I can walk a little," Reeford obtained her
name and the fact that her doctors think that "Beatrice" might have uterine
cancer and that she feels much better whenever she watches Rev. Popoff on
TV.
Click to View The suspense grew during the show as the healing progressed
until finally Popoff stood five feet in front of Don and called his alias,
"Bernice Manicoff" He promised to burn the cancer out of her body. He laid
hands on "Bernice" and Don gave his his most ladylike shriek as he was
shocked by the power of the Holy Ghost. Popoff then commanded "Bernice" to
rise out of the wheelchair and walk! Don staggered to his feet and walked
back and forth across the stage to the loud cheers of the crowd. Don's
performance was perfect - almost.
Click to View It was only later that Don learned what had been said about
him on the secret transmission. Elizabeth: "Bernice. Bernice Manicoff.
Manicoff. The woman with hair on her face. She's in a wheelchair and can
walk..." After Don rose from the wheelchair and started to walk, Elizabeth
started screaming to Popoff via the secret transmitter: "That's the guy
from Anaheim! He's a stooge! It's a man - a man! Get away from him! That's
the guy from Anaheim! Drop him fast!" Upon hearing this, Randi and the
other investigators felt that it was time to wrap things up. They had
already hours and hours of taped conversations and lots of other damning
evidence. The investigation had already lasted six months, involved over
sixty volunteers, and had sent teams of investigators into faith-healing
meetings in such far-flung cities as Rochester, Brooklyn, Houston,
Stockton, Anaheim, Sacramento, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Detroit, St.
Louis, and Ft. Lauderdale - teams that have uncovered a shocking tale of
trickery and deceit on the part of several popular faith healers who have
used their religious authority and media coverage to mislead millions of
people.
Click to View Randi was scheduled to do an appearance on Johny Carson's
Tonight Show. Randi reasoned that this would be a wonderful place to break
the news. The Tonight Show had an audience in the millions, and Randi knew
that Carson was sympathetic to Randi's work. The show was a success, and
Carson and the audience loved it. Randi received a tremendous ovation from
the studio audience, and in the ensuing weeks Carson received a tremendous
amount of postive mail, including an improving letter from Jerry Falwell.
Randi profited too. Seven thousand orders for his book Flim -Flam came in
during the next few days. It all goes to show that some people want to hear
what's going on. There were a a few people, who, the day after the Carson
broadcast, were not so pleased. The press had latched onto Randi's
revelation and had started deluging the Popoff ministry with phone calls.
Popoff issued a formal, prepared statement from his headquarters:
"Everything Amazing Randi has said is not true. We were already considering
legal action because we knew he was faking miracles at the crusades for his
own purposes.
Click to View Peter Popoff Evangelistic Association is being attacked, but
we are not alone. This group has also targeted Jerry Falwell, Oral Roberts,
Jimmy Swaggart, and Pat Robertson, in addition to Reverend Popoff. We would
like to ask Christians to pray concerning this attack on all these
Christian organizations. This man is a magician and is using these tactics
to get publicity for a book that he is writing to discredit God's work. We
believe that God will not allow this attack on his ministry to continue."
Click to View When the Popoff ministry was asked whether Popoff used a
secret receiver in his ear, Janice Gleason, a public relations consultant
for the Popoff organization, said that the electronic receiver in Popoff's
ear was used only to keep in touch with the television crew. (In the hours
of taped transmissions, there was not one communication with the television
crew.) Gleason said she believed that the woman's voice heard on the
Tonight Show was faked. But Popoff later admitted that it was his wife who
was communicating with him. Popoff compared his ministry to a TV game show.
"It's just like The Price is Right; they expect to be called down," he
said. "This is a very effective format for television." Popoff, however,
perhaps because of the notoriety, decided to abandon this "game show"
format, a least temporarily: his last few television broadcasts have
contained no displays of his "Gift of Knowledge."
Science and the Paranormal magazine, 1987
Click to View
Sometimes Truth makes Love hurt
"You are seeking to kill Me, a man who has told you the truth" Jn 8:40
Click to View
Click to View
Go to 20th Century tongues refuted section
Go To Start: WWW.BIBLE.CA
|