Ike and Tina Turn— … uh … I mean, Thomas Weeks and Juanita Bynum, the love/hate evangelist couple out of Atlanta, have both been ratcheting up the “ewwwww” factor as Bynum appeared on Divorce Court yesterday and Weeks returned to the pulpit and pimped his book, What Love Taught Me, which reportedly has details of her drinking and drug use. The couple were married in 2002 in one of the most lavish televised weddings since Princess Di’s, but have been lashing out at each other, then forgiving each other, ever since Weeks beat her up in a hotel parking lot last August. Divorce Court Judge Lynn Toler admitted she hadn’t heard of Bynum until producers, seeking ratings gold, suggested her as a guest on the show. They tried to get Weeks as well, but he declined, and added a few vague threats through his lawyer. Despite previous reports that she was on the verge of forgiving him again and seeking reconciliation, the former flight attendant and hairdresser told Toler the marriage is “done.” The Maury Povich Moment came when Bynum described her decision to leave: “I said to myself, ‘I love him, but I love me more.’” I think that’s just the way Jesus wrote it down, too.

Copeland Continues to Beg IRS for Briar Patch

The Grassley Six televangelists keep making this distinction between a) turning over documents to the Senate Finance Committee, as requested, and b) turning information over to the Internal Revenue Service instead. In several speeches, they’ve made the point that the IRS does have the right to audit them but that Congress does not, because of “our First Amendment rights,” in the words of John Copeland of Kenneth Copeland Ministries. I can’t imagine why anyone would go around daring the IRS to do an audit—has anyone noticed the dogged determination of, for example, the IRS agent who went after Barry Bonds?—but the distinction is specious anyway, because the Senate Finance Committee has oversight of the IRS. That’s their job, to check up on the IRS and make sure everyone who should be audited is being audited. Of the six ministries, it’s only Copeland and Creflo Dollar who have refused to cooperate. (Copeland answered 17 of 42 questions. Dollar answered zero.) Dollar was howling last week about “rendering unto Caesar” and suggesting that Grassley is on a witch hunt against “Word Faith” teaching, better known as prosperity gospel, better known as “Jesus wants us all to be rich.” The more likely reason Copeland Ministries doesn’t want to cooperate is that they believe an IRS audit will be secret—unlike anything they send to Congress—so they alerted the media on April 7th as they marched to the downtown Dallas federal courthouse, home of the IRS regional office, carrying a letter requesting an audit. (They apparently trust the IRS more than they trust the United States Postal Service.) Even the Dallas Morning News, not known for its consumer activism, said that enough is enough, and that Grassley should “lean even harder” on the ministries that resist.

Ben Stein Gets a B-Plus

Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, the Ben Stein documentary on the Intelligent Design movement and the Darwinists who supposedly don’t play fair, grossed $3.2 million on 1,052 screens its opening weekend. Compared to a Hollywood blockbuster, this is nothing. Compared to a Michael Moore documentary, it’s respectable. Compared to a heavily promoted documentary like March of the Penguins, it sucks. Compared to what they spent on it, it’s a home run. That’s because Ben Stein, among many other things, is an economist and an investment advisor.

Communion Will Be Delayed in Southern Brazil

A Catholic priest attempting to set the world record for the longest party-balloon flight so he could make money to be used for a spiritual truck stop was missing off the southern coast of Brazil less than a day after taking off, even though his party balloons were found by rescuers, who assumed the priest would be able to stay alive because he was a trained survivalist with a GPS tracking device and a “buoyant chair.” Now. If you read that opening sentence again, you may understand why three people had to send this item to me before I stopped mistaking it for either a) a belated April Fool’s submission, b) a parody of Liberation Theology written by one of our satirists, or c) a fake email from any of the 30 or so people who just like to mess with me. It is, in fact, true. The Reverend Adelir Antonio di Carli had already done this once before, on January 13th, when he party-ballooned for four hours at 17,000 feet, but this time he wanted to go for 19 hours at 20,000 feet so that he could raise money for a “spiritual rest stop for truckers” in Paranagua, Brazil’s largest grain port. I’m not sure how extreme-sport party-ballooning translates into reals for church projects, but let’s hope the padre is okay because whatever priest might have to officiate at his funeral would be constantly flashing on the “Chuckles the Clown” episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show.