Hulk Hogan dead at 71, 18 months after ‘total surrender’ to Jesus

One of professional wrestling’s biggest icons, Hulk Hogan, died unexpectedly on Thursday at the age of 71, less than two years after he announced publicly he was dedicating his life to Jesus.

Florida authorities responded to a “morning call about a cardiac arrest,” the AP reported, and Hogan, whose real name is Terry Gene Bollea, was reportedly pronounced dead at a hospital.

Just before Christmas in 2023, Hogan made a public profession of Christ, as reported by The Lion.

“Total surrender and dedication to Jesus is the greatest day of my life. No worries, no hate, no judgment… only love!”

https://twitter.com/HulkHogan/status/1737549921052405910

Hogan’s iconic persona rose to fame in the 1980s as professional wrestling grew in popularity. Though he officially retired from the sport in 2012, he’s remained an icon decades after his initial rise to fame. 

“You can’t possibly overrate his significance in the history of the business, and he sold more tickets to wrestling shows than any man who ever lived and I don’t expect anyone to ever sell more tickets than he did,” sports historian Dave Meltzer wrote on X a few years ago.

His public profession of faith was the latest in a series of bold statements by the star, who came back to the faith in the last few years. In August 2023, Hogan appeared on Joe Rogan’s podcast, donning a T-shirt with the famous John 3:16 passage across the chest. 

Hogan explained in the podcast how he came to faith at 14 but strayed from God as he entered adulthood. After reaching unprecedented fame in the world of wrestling, the cultural icon realized that even reaching the absolute peak of his profession didn’t satisfy the true longing of his heart.  

Witnessing the vanity of having everything the world has to offer led Hogan to be “locked back in” to the faith he came to know as a boy.

“As the years went by, I started seeing how things went. It’s got me to the point now where I’m locked back in. … Everything else is a distant second to what happens around me,” Hogan said, after quoting John 3:16 on Rogan’s podcast and plainly stating that Jesus was his Lord and Savior.