Jim Bakker: US televangelist, disgraced in fraud and sex scandal, dies at 86
Jim Bakker, the prominent US televangelist who rose to fame in the 1980s before being imprisoned for fraud, has died at age 86. His career was marked by both massive financial success and a major sex scandal that led to his downfall and subsequent prison sentence.
Why it matters
Bakker's life serves as a significant case study in the intersection of religion, media, and scandal in American culture.
US televangelist Jim Bakker, who built a multimillion-dollar empire and lived in opulence before being disgraced by a sex scandal, fraud conviction for defrauding followers and divorce from television co-host Tammy Faye, died on Monday at age 86.
The death of Bakker was revealed on social media by his second wife, Lori Bakker
“It is with a broken heart that I share that my beloved husband, Jim Bakker, went home to be with the Lord this evening,” she wrote on the Facebook and Instagram pages of her husband’s latest television ministry.
She paid tribute to Bakker as a “pioneer of Christian television”; the cause and circumstances of his death were not revealed.
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