Televangelist Pat Robertson explained on Wednesday that God had empowered him to create the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) “to reaffirm His claim over this land.”

In a speech marking CBN’s annual “Week of Prayer,” the network founder told a group of followers about how the Jamestown settlers had claimed the land for God by planting a cross at Cape Henry — and then God later transferred that “holiness” to him to build CBN.

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“I don’t care what the liberals have to say about this, America started as a Christian nation, it didn’t start as a heathen nation, it belongs to Jesus Christ, it’s his, it’s his country,” Robertson opined. “What we need to do on a day like this is to reaffirm his claim over this land.”

“We went down and had a celebration some years ago and we had folks dressed in costumes of various countries and areas of the world and they symbolically brought from a ship a 7-foot oak cross and we laid our hands on it and prayed, and I have experienced the anointing of the Lord on a number of occasions with miracles and thousands of people coming to the Lord, but I never had anything like what I experienced that day.”

Robertson continued: “God was saying, ‘You asked for it and I’m going to give it to you. We’re going to transfer the holiness that was here to this cross. You’re going to take it down to that new place you’re building and this is going to be a fulfillment of the prayers of those people. You’re going to take the Gospel all around the world.’ God had a plan, he saw CBN here.”

Watch this video from CBN via Right Wing Watch, broadcast May 3, 2012.

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(h/t: Right Wing Watch)