Pat Robertson, a popular televangelist who founded “The 700 Club” as he grew a tiny Virginia television station into the Christian Broadcasting Network, died Thursday at age 93.
Robertson, who ran for president in 1988, was a Southern Baptist minister who advocated for conservative Christians and was influential in Republican politics, particularly as the founder and leader of the Christian Coalition of America.
In the 1988 presidential caucus vote run by the Alaska Republican Party, Robertson won the vote with nearly double the number of votes given to then-Vice President George H.W. Bush. Robertson took 47%, with Bush getting 24% and Sen. Bob Dole coming in third with 20%.
Many of his statements are highly controversial to the liberal media and Democrats, but some of the statements were prophetic. For example, in 1992 he wrote, “The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians.”
He held many traditional Southern Baptist ideas, such as men being the head of households, homosexuality being a sin, and more.
The Christian Broadcasting Network announced his death today. Almost immediately, the leftist Alaska social media account known as The Mudflats danced on his grave: “They keep calling him a ‘trailblazer.’ The trail he’s on *now* is blazing, all right.”
But blaze a trail in Christian outreach, he did: According to Robertson’s website, CBN is one of the largest Christian broadcasting group in the world, with programs in 200 countries and 70 different languages. “The 700 Club” is a project Robertson started in 1996. He retired from the show in 2021, when he turned 91.
He was also the founder of International Family Entertainment Inc., Regent University, Operation Blessing International Relief and Development Corporation, American Center for Law and Justice, The Flying Hospital, Inc., and other organizations and broadcast entities.
Marion Gordon “Pat” Robertson was born on March 22, 1930, in Lexington, Virginia, to A. Willis Robertson and Gladys Churchill Robertson. His father served for 34 years in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate. Read his biography at his website at this link.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
