Now living in separate homes more than 60 miles apart, Suzanne Hinn, the wife of controversial prosperity preacher and televangelist Benny Hinn, filed for divorce from her estranged husband last Friday, court records show.
The filing in the Hillsborough County Court in Tampa, Florida, and first reported by the Trinity Foundation, shows the televangelist having an address in Palm Coast, Florida, while his wife listed a home in Longwood, Florida, valued at more than $1 million.
Matthew Wilson, Suzanne Hinn’s attorney, who works with Anton Garcia Law in Tampa, was not available for comment when his office was contacted by The Christian Post on Tuesday. It was unclear how long the couple have been living apart or why Suzanne Hinn has filed for divorce from the 71-year-old. This isn’t her first time to split up with Hinn, however.
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In February 2010, Suzanne Hinn served her husband with divorce papers in California’s Orange County Superior Court, citing “irreconcilable differences” after 30 years of marriage. They were first married on Aug. 4, 1979, and have four children together.
The summer of that year, the National Enquirer photographed Hinn leaving a hotel room with fellow televangelist Paula White, according to Charisma. Hinn would later reveal that he and White had a “friendship” which was over and not an “affair,” as alleged by the National Enquirer. The Enquirer report claimed that Hinn and White had spent three nights in a five-star hotel that the televangelist booked under an alias.
“No immorality whatsoever. These people out there are making it sound like we had an affair. That’s a lie,” Hinn told followers at a crusade in California.
Hinn said the Vatican had made him a Patron of the Arts, and he had taken White to Rome because he wanted her to become a donor to help maintain the Vatican’s art collections.
“I let her come with me to Rome so she can donate money,” Hinn said. “That was stupid on my part. And for that, I do ask forgiveness.”
Hinn and his wife would eventually divorce, but in 2012, he announced their reconciliation. He also claimed that their divorce was triggered by Suzanne Hinn’s addiction to prescription drugs.
“Suzanne started taking certain prescription medications to help her cope with some of her personal struggles. She became dependent on those for nearly 15 years, and those medications made her behave erratically at times,” Hinn wrote in a message on his ministry’s website. “As her husband, I did not know the extent of her reliance on these medications, nor did I fully understand just how much harm they were causing to her, physically and emotionally.”
The couple remarried in 2013 at the Holyland Experience in Orlando, Florida, before an audience of 1,000.
Hinn, who claimed to have renounced the prosperity gospel some five years ago, declaring that the “Holy Ghost is just fed up with it,” recently warned that the world is on a collision course with its darkest days ever, and only those who give money to the Lord’s work, particularly to his ministry, will be protected financially.
The prosperity gospel teaches, among other things, that believers have a right to the blessings of health and wealth, and they can obtain these blessings through positive confessions of faith and the “sowing of seeds” through the faithful payments of tithes and offerings. Many, like the Lausanne Movement, have said such teachings are “false and gravely distorting of the Bible” and “unethical and unChristlike.”
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