The couple showed a united front on TV but were privately unravelling
Tammy Faye’s effusiveness and Jim’s calm faith were endearing, as was her unpredictability which could result in tearful outbursts about life’s struggles and successes, her own included. Rev. Mel White, a former ghostwriter for preacher Jerry Falwell, described her appeal as combination Martha Stewart , Dr. Joyce Brothers and Carol Burnett . “She talked about sex, and flirted with Jimmy,” White said. “She took on the caricature of an obedient wife, and blasted it. You have never seen Pat Robertson’s wife, or Jerry Falwell’s wife. They stay at home, doing what those wives do.”
In private, the Bakkers were beginning to grow apart. Jim poured all his energies into building the PTL Network, expanding the studios and office buildings — which became known as Heritage Village — and developing and appearing on new Christian programming. Though she cohosted the network’s most popular show, Tammy Faye often felt alone at home, looking after their young children with little or no help from Jim.
Soon other people “began to notice rising tension between Jim and me,” Tammy Faye wrote in Telling it My Way . “You could feel it on the set, you could feel it when visiting our home. Jim became so preoccupied with the development of Heritage Village that there was little energy left over for deepening our relationship. While I encouraged his efforts, I began to feel more distant from him than ever.” Intimacy between the couple had become rare, according to Tammy Faye.
Jim Bakker (R) and Tammy Faye (middle) sit with Edwin Louis Cole (L), a guest on their program, ‘People That Love,’ on April 28, 1986.
Photo: Bettmann/Contributor
Their world came crashing down when Jim was involved in a sexual assault scandal
In 1978, the Bakkers used $200 million of PTL funds to finance the building of Heritage USA, a 2,300-acre Christian-themed experience park and residential complex in Fort Mill, South Carolina. At the height of its popularity Heritage USA billed itself as the country’s third-largest theme park in attendance with an estimated 4.9 million visitors a year. By the mid-1980s, the couple was at the helm of a multi-million dollar evangelical empire, but their lavish lifestyle was drawing detractors in the mainstream media. Tammy Faye’s appearance and love of shopping had become a punchline for comics. Shopping, Tammy Faye often publicly declared, was cheaper than a psychiatrist, and she said she hoped heaven would include a shopping center “where there’s no limit on your charge card.”
But no amount of shopping eased the pain of the 1987 revelation that her husband had used $279,000 of PTL money in an attempt to buy the silence of 21-year-old church secretary Jessica Hahn, who claimed Jim had sexually assaulted her in a Florida hotel room in 1980. Though Jim insisted the sex was consensual, his — and by association Tammy Faye’s — fall from televised grace was swift.
Jim reluctantly stepped down from his position at PTL, handing control to fellow televangelist Jerry Falwell. Worse for the Bakkers was the revelation by a Charlotte Observer investigation that Jim had mismanaged funds and that PTL was leveraged to the point of financial collapse. According to Time
Tammy Faye initially stood by her husband’s side but eventually divorced him
Publicly Tammy Faye stood by her man, even appearing alongside Jim in a now infamous 1987 interview with Ted Koppel for Nightline , defending their actions. She was present as he was indicted in 1988 on eight counts of mail fraud, 15 counts of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy, then sentenced to 45 years in federal prison, with the sentence eventually reduced to eight years. When Jim was found guilty, Tammy Faye — who was never indicted — appeared at a news conference and tearfully sang, “On Christ the solid rock I stand/All other ground is sinking sand.”
Three years later they divorced. Criticized for initiating the divorce while her husband was behind bars, Tammy Faye stated in her memoir: “How cruel would it have been for me to have waited until he walked through those prison doors, happy and filled with dreams and plans for Jim and Tammy.” In a 1992 letter to her Florida church, she explained her reasons behind the divorce. “For years I have been pretending that everything is all right, when in fact I hurt all the time,” she wrote. “I cannot pretend anymore.”
A year after the divorce, Tammy Faye married property developer and former family friend Roe Messner, who had helped build much of Heritage USA. Messner was convicted of bankruptcy fraud in 1994 and served 27 months in prison. Tammy Faye remaining married to Messner until her death in 2007 at age 65, following an 11-year battle with colon cancer. Asked in 2002 if she still had a relationship with her ex-husband, Tammy Faye replied , “Oh yes. We have a very nice relationship. I say I like being Jim Bakker’s friend and I love being Roe Messner’s wife.”
Paroled in 1994, Jim returned Christian broadcasting in 2003 with The Jim Bakker Show , co-hosting alongside his second wife Lori, whom he married in 1998. In a statement at the time of Tammy Faye’s death, Jim said that his ex-wife “lived her life like the song she sang, ‘If Life Hands You a Lemon, Make Lemonade.’”
