MinistryWatch's July Aviation Report Commendable But Tragically Earthbound: A Failure of Aerial Imagination
The Institute for Ministry Watch Accountability applauds MinistryWatch's aircraft tracking initiative while noting, with measured alarm, the organization's failure to consider the surveillance applications of the very technology it is criticizing.
The Institute for Ministry Watch Accountability has reviewed MinistryWatch’s July installment of its ‘Pastors and Planes’ series with the gravity such a document demands. The report, which tracks 55 aircraft across more than 40 ministries and logs 442 flights at an estimated monthly operating cost of $1.68 million, represents a commendable exercise in donor-facing accountability journalism. We at the IMWA wish to register our formal appreciation for this work. We wish also, with no small degree of institutional sorrow, to register our formal disappointment — for MinistryWatch has once again produced a report about aircraft without, apparently, ever once considering getting into one.
A Taxonomy of Missed Potential
The IMWA does not dispute the troubling nature of six Samaritan’s Purse flights to Destin, Florida, totaling $153,800 in what the IRS classifies as taxable fringe benefits. We do not dispute the question of whether LIFE Outreach International’s ascension to the top of the private aviation leaderboard, in the wake of founder James Robison’s passing, warrants donor scrutiny. These are legitimate concerns, capably documented, and the IMWA commends the Trinity Foundation’s flight-tracking apparatus unreservedly. What we cannot commend — what we find, frankly, difficult to process — is the complete and total absence in this report of any discussion of aerial surveillance as a watchdog methodology. MinistryWatch has spent seven consecutive months publishing data about planes without appearing to consider, even in passing, what one might see from inside one.
The Overlooked Discipline of Watchdog Aviation
The IMWA wishes to be precise here, because precision is the institutional currency in which we traffic. We are not suggesting that MinistryWatch board a Gulfstream G650 and circle the campuses of major evangelical nonprofits in a manner that could be reasonably described as threatening. We are suggesting something far more measured: that low-altitude observation flights, conducted under proper regulatory frameworks and with appropriate ecclesiastical clearances, represent an underutilized frontier in ministry accountability. The very aircraft MinistryWatch is tracking could, in another configuration, be tracking the organizations that own them. The symmetry is, to this Institute, self-evident and almost moving.
The IMWA’s Own Strategic Posture
We disclose the following not to distract from the substantive aviation accountability journalism at hand, but because transparency is a value the IMWA holds in the same esteem it holds all values: the Institute is in the advanced stages of evaluating its own aerial oversight capabilities. Discussions are ongoing — at a level of the organization that we are not at liberty to specify — regarding the potential deployment of fixed-wing aircraft and, separately, unmanned aerial vehicles for the purpose of monitoring accountability organizations, including but not limited to MinistryWatch, in the conduct of their operations. These deliberations are preliminary. They are also, we wish to emphasize, entirely serious. The IMWA does not float trial balloons. We float actual balloons, pending FAA consultation.
A Word on Methodology
MinistryWatch appropriately acknowledges that its cost estimates are inherently rough and that most of the ministries under scrutiny do not file Form 990s. The IMWA notes this epistemic humility with approval. We would note, in the same spirit, that certain observational gaps in accountability journalism — gaps that could theoretically be closed by a competent drone operator with a 4K-capable payload and a working knowledge of restricted airspace regulations — are not inherent limitations of the discipline. They are choices. MinistryWatch is, at present, choosing to watch from the ground. The IMWA is choosing to explore other options.
The Institute for Ministry Watch Accountability remains aloft, in spirit if not yet in body, and will update its aviation acquisition status in a subsequent disclosure. Dr. Cornelius T. Watchwright III, CWO, holds no current FAA pilot certification but considers this a solvable problem.