Rodney Howard-Browne

His father, Frank Mervyn Derric Howard-Browne (1924–2005), was a cleric.

Howard-Browne became a Christian at age five.

Rodney Morgan Howard-Browne (born June 12, 1961 ) is a South African-born American evangelist and conspiracy theorist.

In the 1980s, he volunteered to work for Youth for Christ before doing a teaching stint with Rhema Bible School in Johannesburg.

In 1981, he met and married his wife Adonica (née Weyers).

In December 1989, the family emigrated from South Africa to the United States, Howard-Browne opened his first U.S. church in Clifton Park, New York, in April 1989.

Investigative journalists in his home town of Tampa reported at the time that since arriving from South Africa almost penniless in December 1989, his sudden wealth included a boat, a Harley Davidson motorcycle, a home in one of Tampa's exclusive gated communities and access to a private jet; however, they were unable to find evidence of financial wrongdoing.

He has resided in Tampa, Florida since the mid-1990s and is pastor of The River Church in Tampa Bay.

The River is considered both Pentecostal and Charismatic with revival meetings, led by Howard-Browne, known for those in the audience breaking into "holy laughter" and experiencing other phenomena similar to the Great Awakenings and Azusa Street Revival.

In 1991, he moved to Louisville, Kentucky where he began holding revival meetings.

The Rodney Howard-Browne Evangelistic Association was incorporated in November 1993 and the family moved to the Tampa Bay, Florida area in 1994.

Rodney's eldest brother Gil went on to operate Times of Refreshing Ministries, an online evangelical ministry.

Howard-Browne is credited with introducing holy laughter to Carpenter's Home Church in Lakeland, Florida during a series of revival services with Karl Strader in 1993.

The holy laughter revivals later spread to nearby churches in Melbourne, Titusville, Stuart and Vero Beach, Florida.

Likewise, his youngest brother Bazil established an eponymous evangelical ministry on 1 January 1994 with the professed aim of people achieving financial freedom through the special anointing of God.

Prior to this he had worked alongside his brother Rodney for a year.

Howard-Browne is credited with bringing holy laughter to the charismatic Toronto Airport Vineyard Church (soon after expelled by its parent Vineyard Church) at a 1994 revival in Toronto, Canada with evangelist Randy Clark, known as the "Toronto Blessing," and then a year later, to Assemblies of God (AOG) Brownsville Church in Pensacola, Florida with evangelist Steve Hill.

The event became known in Christian circles as the Brownsville Revival.

Howard-Browne also ministered under pastor Mike Rose at the Juneau Christian Center (formerly known as the Bethel Assembly of God) in Juneau, Alaska, an AOG church that Sarah Palin later attended after becoming governor of Alaska.

In 1996, Howard-Browne founded a church he named "The River" at Tampa Bay Church in Tampa, Florida, serving as its pastor ever since.

Howard-Browne is the head of Revival Ministries International, a ministry he and his wife founded in 1997.

Howard-Browne and his three brothers (Mervyn, Bazil, and Gil) were raised in a Pentecostal family in the cities of Port Elizabeth and East London, South Africa.

Howard-Browne and his wife also founded Revival Ministries International in 1997, as well as River Bible Institute and River School of Worship.

Howard-Browne's services are characterized by laying on of hands with worshipers giggling in apparent spiritual drunkenness, speaking in tongues, breaking into uncontrollable holy laughter, shaking, dancing in the aisles, or falling to the ground.

He refers to himself as "God's bartender" and the "holy ghost bartender".

Howard-Browne first came to national prominence in the US in 1999 when his Revival Ministries organization rented Madison Square Garden in New York City for six weeks.

The event, called Good News New York, was described as "an effort to achieve a Billy Graham-style faith uprising", but was "derided in local media as a giant flop".

It was estimated to cost up to $10 million but only 3,000 people were counted in attendance at the 19,000-seat arena.

Howard-Browne's daughter Kelly died of cystic fibrosis on Christmas Day 2002, at the age of 18.

He then vowed to "to win 100 million souls to Jesus and to put $1 billion into world missions".

In 2012, it was reported that Howard-Browne's River Church had hosted political meetings for the Florida chapter of the Republican Party during the preceding two years, including a rally for then presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, at which Howard-Browne called for a national "rising" of Christian Americans "that will not sit idly by and allow the killing of unborn babies and allow Islam to take over this country".

Howard-Browne published The Killing of Uncle Sam: The Demise of the United States of America, which was scheduled to be released in May 2018, and announced that proceeds from sales of the book would go to the River School of Government, a degree granting program, operated by Howard-Browne and his wife under the auspices of Revival Ministries, that funds training for people seeking to run for political office.

Howard-Browne's evangelical movement has been described by some as "a combination of brimstone and fire about God's power, sprinkled with hipster references and a conviction that church—like Disneyland—should be 'the happiest place on earth'."

The Christian Research Institute labelled his operation a "cult" and called him "a good stage hypnotist" who has made millions from vulnerable believers.

"Yet Howard-Browne is also widely credited with having one of the most racially and economically diverse congregations in Florida. It feeds hundreds of poor Tampa families weekly and at his televised Sunday services dishes out huge checks to members facing financial crises."

According to The Tampa Tribune, critics have described him as "a manipulator leading followers into a cult; a circus ring leader making a good living."

On the other hand B.J. Oropeza (Ph.D., Durham University) concludes in his book A Time to Laugh (reviewed by Lloyd K. Pietersen, University of Sheffield and also by "The Pneuma Review. Journal of Ministry Resources and Theology for Pentecostal and Charismatic Ministries & Leaders" which stated that it is "well-documented and well-researched book") that he is not 'a mass-hypnotist, charlatan or a cultist'.

Dr. Oropeza (Professor of Biblical and Religious Studies at Azusa Pacific University and Seminary, Azusa, CA) further states about Howard-Browne that "Having read RHB's writings on financial stewardship and prosperity, I have concluded that he does not believe in a prosperity that promotes greed, materialism, or using God as a means to get rich. He denounces ministers who fleece the church through clever gimmicks."

At the same event, he described Mormonism as a "cult" that, in the 19th century, "had death squads that would go around killing everybody that was not a Mormon".

He later recanted, saying Mormons were "honourable people".