Dick Dewart and his wife Joan are off to seek marriage counselling after The Miracle Channel revealed he had an affair.
Dewart has resigned. He started the channel in 1995, which is available on cable and satellite in Canada. The ‘network’ has been a source of controversy over the years, it airs a mix of US religious televangelists and some Canadian evangelicals. The channel is in Lethbridge, Alberta, and was in the news again in February/March in regards to a CRTC hearing over it’s fundraising practices.
His affair and resignation was publicly announced by CEO Ray Block, after being announced in the Block/Dewart’s church Sunday. Dewart had been part of the senior leadership at Lethbridge Gateway Centre and Victory Church. Unnamed sources in the church and at the channel say Dewart had a three year affair with a church/channel married employee.
For more than eleven years the Miracle Channel has proclaimed the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ through media. The television signal has expanded across Canada and has been and continues to be a source of hope and encouragement to many viewers. The mandate of the Miracle Channel Association to change the spiritual climate of the nations through Christian media remains the vision of this ministry. We are thankful that God raised up a couple to begin this ministry and appreciate the years of commitment and service of co-founders Dick and Joan Dewert.
This is why it makes it very difficult to write this letter to you. The Miracle Channel Association has accepted the resignation of its president, Dick Dewert. Dick, who co-founded the channel in 1995, has resigned due to an extra-marital relationship with another woman. The Miracle Channel Association does not condone this behaviour and has accepted his resignation.
The Dewart’s had The Miracle Channel flagship show, the channel is considered a charity, and a complaint was made to the CRTC about an on air statements suggesting viewers cash in their retirement savings and and charge up the credit cards. The CRTC determined:
…the channel had violated the code of ethics for religious programming. In their pitch for money, it said, the Miracle Channel hosts “predicted divine consequences of not responding, or exaggerated positive results of responding.”
Contrary to their claims, it added, donating to the channel cannot “cure nicotine additions or cancer, spur immediate financial success or enable the quicker repayment of outstanding debts.”
The station made about 7.5 million last year. Most of the programming is what theologians call Word-Faith Movement which is a deviation from orthodox Christianity.
The Dewarts and management submitted a document to the CRTC promising to implement a new internal fundraising policy. They have applied for transmitters in Calgary and Edmonton.
Dewart’s writing and presence has been removed from the Miracle Channel website.
For a balanced counterpoint to Miracle Channel theology and behavior, see The Miracle Channel Review, a site that monitors the programming and fundraising with a goal of transparency and accountability.
The Miracle Channel has been called the ‘northern TBN’, and is similar to GodTV in the UK.
Other coverage:
Lethbridge Herald: Dick’s done at Miracle Channel
Edmonton Journal: Miracle Channel founder quits over affair
Globe and Mail - Report on Business, New Miracle Channel Boss, old CRTC woes
Blast Furnace Canada
The Miracle Channel - wiki
(Dewart’s fund raising skills are mentioned The Walrus Magazine article by Marci McDonald: Stephen Harper and the Theocrats. Canadian Christian College President Charles McVety has a show and taped Prayer Palace services run twice weekly. Paul Melnichuk’s Toronto church was the focus of a March 2007 Toronto Star investigation)
Published 1 year, 6 months ago
Search
Subscribe 
You are currently browsing the Bene Diction Blogs On weblog archives.
Related Entries
- Leap blogging
- CRTC denies Miracle Channel expansion
- Canada's version of evangelical pundits
- John Bunyan gets a call from publishing marketers
- Donald Rumsfeld resigns
- Joel's Army: The Call, The Cry
- Today at the Mission
- Bam Bam Bentley and dissent in the Lakeland leadership
- 4 My Canada
- Dr. Johnston's terms of Reference for advisement
For blog design, Wordpress or MovableType coding or blog consulting, see cre8d design.
Oddly enough what struck me most about this matter was the fact that the letter mentioned he had an affair with another woman.
They could have said he had an affair. Period. It’s so important for these fringe groups to avoid the inference of anything to do with same sex relationships.
Sin is sin and betraying the trust of his wife and breaking his marriage vows is the problem here.
Oh well, guess I’m just getting liberal in my old age….
Dewart railed against same sex marraige, so the distinction had to be made in their eyes.
No word on whether or not the other couple was offered marraige counselling.
I think you’re both reading too much into “with another woman.” or what distinction “had to be made”. I think they were just reporting the news.
And I don’t think “fringe group” is appropriate when website hits and television following world-wide was in the millions of people.
It’s all disappointing enough without having to fault-find and take pot-shots at the group that remains. Dick made this decision for his life, not all the employees of Miracle Channel. The damage is done, and the future of the many innocent employees and their families of Miracle Channel is at stake, because of a bad leadership decision. I doubt Dick will ever recover from what was a very bad decision, with far-reaching consequences, no matter who it was with.
Let’s give the new leadership the benefit of the doubt. And see how they do.
Would you show me the numbers please?
The website stats and the viewer numbers?
Potential audience and technology ( ie: repeaters) are not the same as actual eyeballs. What are the real numbers?
I agree with you. Mrs. Dewart is never going to be the same. Neither is Dick’s mistress or her husband. Or their children.
An affair by a founder who has made a lot of money making moral pronoucements on Canadian airways representing a religion certainly does impact employees of The Miracle Channel in particularly agregious ways.
Sorry, I can’t seem to find where I got the numbers now. I understand having to back that up. So, I have to retract the statement.
I guess in the end, the important things are to be senstive to innocents that have been hurt, and also to be forgiving to those who have done wrong - not ’cause they deserve it - but mainly for our own hearts.
It seems we already agree on that. Thanks.
It’s okay, I wasn’t expecting you could, Canada has only begun to implement a rating system for cable and satellite through BBM and Nielson. There is another service, subscriber, no way of knowing if CJIL is audience monitored. You’d have to be an employee with access to the real numbers.
Couldn’t find numbers in the trades or VueWeekly, Canada Gazette, etc.
I can give you accurate Miracle Channel webstats.
Daily average unique 319
Weekly average unique 2,206
Monthly average uniques 9,533
Far from millions. You’d have to add in every TV show website from every show off Sky Angel, millions would be a stretch.:^) Add in all the shows off Miracle Channel broadcasting elsewhere and millions is still a stretch.
The Miracle Channel is a member of the NRB I’d looked for an Arbitron rating, but there isn’t one.
I agree with you replacement management needs a chance, they have decisions to wait for from the CRTC.
The results will be out soon.
There will likely be more legitimate complaints filed with the CRTC if management isn’t able or willing to comply with the regulatory determinations and decisions.
Religious broadcasters are on a level playing field in Canada despite complaints you read from The Miracle Channel, Canadians are well served. There are only so many licences for repeaters or new stations available, and affinity fraud is a very legitimate concern. Even with the recent complaint, the channel only received a determination, not a ruling.
The numbers (potential audience of millions) are in joint US promo material, and is a common sale/marketing technique. If you aren’t a media management employee, I understand you wouldn’t know that.
I agree, innocents are hurt, last I read The Miracle Channel employed about 53 people. Their shock, sorrow and uncertainty is real, as is harm to colleagues.
Hopefully some employees will be able to move into steadier media jobs in stations that follow regulations with due diligence.
I haven’t gone to forums to see audience react.
Viewers are innocents too.
Ok well to be honest I was immediately tempted to ‘lol’ a bit when I first heard the news from some of my Miracle-channel devotee friends. One of them would defend MC by pointing out Dewart was the most reasonable, almost ‘anglican’ of the bunch over there, not prone to fanciful charismania or over-emotional pleas.
He does strike me as a sincere man but even still Im just disgusted by the nonsense being attributed to these people as if they are Prophets, Apostles and apparently have annointings, transference annointings, annointing powers and all sorts of.. annointings which can be activated by ‘tithing’ or some nonsense.
Anyways, Im not entirely surprised that a truly normal flawed Christian might spend three years engaging in an affair with another married woman.
Judging from my MC Devotee friends they actually are SHOCKED and seemingly ‘wrestling with faith’ over this - and its because they started with the unrealistic belief that these people were ‘Annointed Prophets’ having all sorts of ‘Annointed Power’ and were somehow Apostolic Annoint-Givers over their Spiritual Realms.
Seriously, I cannot take any satisfaction in this but yet Im actually ‘relieved’ if it does remind MC devotees that these people are NOT some sort of ‘Gods Annointed Prophets’ over their Christian lives.
Trust JC and not Miracle Channellers.
‘Miracle Channelers’.. hmmm, can I work that into some sort of pun?
Seriously again.. prayers and thoughts going to Mrs. Dewart and their family because this really is terrible.
As someone who’s gone from mainline Protestant to Evangelical to Pentecostal(ish), I was never as worried as some about the comments made by Dewart or others for fundraising. I thought the effort to shut him down and pile up CRTC complaints against him was, well, the most innocuous of the crap that permeates our airwaves.
In Pentecostal circles, there’s some hype, flakeyness, and perhaps misused attitudes towards spiritual principles like sowing and reaping, tithing, etc. There may have been some of that at the Miracle Channel, yet nothing so blatant as the comment made by one U.S. leader some years back: “The Lord said if I don’t raise a million dollars I’ll meet my Maker.”
When your spiritual reality fails, hype sometimes rises to fill the void. At a Miracle Channel conference a year ago, I noticed how Dick Dewart ALWAYS said, “I just feel we should sing that song again.” It got annoyingly predictable. The last time he felt so led, he couldn’t get a single thing done because the worship team had already left. So much for ‘leading’!
I don’t feel particularly shattered at this time. The most ‘anointed’ of people are full of imperfections and succeptible to moral failures. Often those bent on building ministry are most vulnerable because the devil’s after them AND because they lose their intimacy with God (and their spouse). They can also get the illusion of immunity because they’ve been Christians for so long.
After their moral failure, the rationalizations on why they should continue on in ministry keep going. However, Jesus’ words hold true: “There is nothing hidden that will not be brought out in the open.” For some, judgment day comes early. And for the Dewarts, this inevitable but painful time will be the beginning of recovery and restoration.
Now for some credit. Dick Dewart DID have to pioneer and break ground (and CRTC regulations) to get his channel going. They never allowed all-Christian channels, so Dewart put up a pirate TV channel and shamed the CRTC out of their discriminatory policy. He was a leader of tenacity and vision and he got the job done. But, in the words of Phil Collins, “Something happened on the way to heaven.”
My wife and I agreed to make a significant donation to the channel a few months ago. I asked her if she regretted the decision and she did not. She still appreciates the children’s programming and other stuff on there. For us who gave, God is our reward. But I do hope that the channel will continue on and rise to even greater heights.
Lee you know where you’ve been, thanks for commenting.
And thank you for the link, I see you are listed as a none-profit journalist.
Tough road.
I’ve done religious programming. I’m not proud of it, don’t care to talk about it, not going to justify it. I learned my lessons. Hopefully because of the grace of God, I can help others learn theirs.
Do me a favour?
Tell your wife I respect her desicion to be a responsible parent. I applaud her.
Please tell her to keep your money, spend it tangibly on the kids, or give it to your local food bank. The Miracle Channel is not Pentecostal, it’s word-faith, and it’s a bloody licence to print money.
They are not hurting, the people they have ripped off in God’s name are.
The CRTC has given a charitable licence, as archaic as they are, we cannot fall into the trap of thinking the Cdn government pokes it’s nose into religion in this country. It does not. It takes a lot before they’ll act.
Because The Miracle Channel has been given a religious exemption, accountability is our responsibility.
http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/tax/charities/policy/cps/cps-022-e.html#P162_15960
CTS, The Vision Channel, EWTN. It was coming, the entreprenuers of the religious world merely gave it the push. As you wisely say, it does not mean they deserve to stay and play.
And let’s not repeat the lie Dewart did this on his own. That’s his delusion, not yours. He had plenty of help, and the boys were very well paid on both sides of the border. Please, tell your wife to be at peace, they don’t need her gifts, gratitude or sacrifice.
You have to wonder what Mr. Dewart prayed about before, during and after each liaison with his affair partner. Did he thank God for getting them together? Or did he just feel blessed and lucky like Abraham in Genesis 16?
(1) Upon learning of this depressing news, I prayed. Although I don’t know anything more than what we are being told through the media releases, I heard God say there was “more to this than meets the eye.” My thoughts are that this unfortunate situation was used to undermine and usurp the Dewarts. This is not to condone what Dick Dewart has done.
(2) Having supported this ministry with tithes, offerings, prayers and faithful viewing for years, we now withdraw our support, as will most likely many others. This can’t be good for the future of this tremendous global outreach.
(3) Sin is sin, and any sin can be repented of. Jim Bakker repented and went on and so did Jimmy Swaggart. I believe in my heart so will Dick Dewart. My husband and I pray for their marriage to be restored and that Dick Dewart will break off his adulterous relationship with this “other woman” whoever she is.
(4) This was an ideal set-up by Satan to take this ministry away from its founders. While I’m disappointed in what Dick Dewart has done, I’m more concerned about what is going to be done by those who will try to take his place in order to keep The Miracle Channel going. Again, I believe what God told me… there is more here than meets the eye.
I enjoyed the teachings of Dick on Miracle Channel. I think its most important that we believe in God and not people, because once again, people will fail us, but does that mean that we back-slide ! No, we pray for our leaders and those in these positions because just like us, they are flawed too.
This is very upsetting to me. I have never meet Joan or Dick bit really felt like this was a wonderful calling from God on thier lives. I have supported them and will keep doing so if only in Prayer.
I pray that jesus will help him with his wife, after all a good lordy wife would give into all a mans desire less she be stoned. Glory be to the lady who let him give it to her, she knows how her bible.
I pray that we may rise up and smite those who do not worship jesus from the earth and their blood will flow like a river.
Glory to god amen.
As a daily watcher of the Miracle Channel on CTS, I am saddened by this news. It ruins the reputation of followers of Jesus by association, especially to those who are not strong believers and those who don’t believe at all.
It seems that satan attacks and tempts most those who can have an impact on the destruction of his evil works. Before you judge as I did initially, remember the woman who was being stoned. David a “man after God’s own heart” had an affair with a married woman too and also had her husband killed, yet we are blessed by his Psalms even today.
I pray for Joan and the healing of her heart, and for the healing of the Miracle Channel to move to greater heights, for the “other hurt woman”, and for Dick himself as he repents for his sins and allows himself to be washed in the Blood of the Lamb.
I do not share in the necessity to pray for the Deewerts. The anointing they professed to have is not biblically supported, and neither are the 4 to 6 annual begathons they call fundraisers. A careful review of the history of The Miracle Channel will show even the most hardened devotee of The Word Of faith movement that CJIL-TV is rooted in controversy from it’s inception, and Dick Deewert went against his own vow never to allow the station to require support from anything except donations. It was strictly a business, carried on in the name of religion, and what little benefit it is to the Christian community is grossly outweighed by the damage it does to the name of God, and to the saints of Christ. Want to pray for Dick and Joan - pray for mercy.
Well, this situation is quite obviously a play on the scripture, ‘Man looks at the outward appearance and God looks at the heart.’
Given the movement’s need for moral and fiscal accountability, it was excellent to see that management was swift to act — a credit to their profession. The incident should remind us all that each of us has the potential for good or evil (perhaps an inappropriate word choice) and we should seek to strengthen our faith not in the things of wo/men but in God or our spiritual quest.
We should also not forget that power relations form church doctrine and what we observe reflects many of the cultural practices of the day. As long as people continue to gain meaning from this system, let he who is without sin, cast the first stone.
girlie