Former televangelist Jim Bakker dies at 86

Jim Bakker, who built a nationwide evangelical television ministry with his first wife Tammy Faye, died on Monday at the age of 86, his second wife Lori Bakker said in a statement. The cause of death was not immediately released.

Bakker and Tammy Faye launched the PTL Satellite Network in the 1970s, and "The PTL Club" became a flagship program that attracted up to 13 million nightly viewers in the mid-1980s. The ministry also operated the Heritage USA theme park and hotel in South Carolina. After a 1987 admission of an extramarital encounter, Bakker resigned and the enterprise was taken over by Jerry Falwell. He was later convicted of mail and wire fraud and sentenced to prison, a term later reduced to eight years.

Following his release on parole in 1994, Bakker married Lori Bakker in 1998 and revived his broadcasting career with "The Jim Bakker Show," filmed near Branson, Missouri, beginning in 2003. He suffered a stroke in 2020. In 2021, Bakker settled a lawsuit alleging false claims that a health supplement could cure COVID-19, agreeing to refund $156,000 to purchasers.

"He was a pioneer of Christian television, but to me, he was my husband, my best friend, and the man I was honored to walk beside through so many seasons of life and ministry," Lori Bakker said.

Bakker was born in Muskegon, Michigan, and began his ministry as a traveling preacher with Tammy Faye after they left college in 1961. The couple had two biological children; Bakker and Lori later adopted five children in 2002. Tammy Faye Bakker died of colon cancer in 2007.