By Larry Jones
Recently John McCain met with Franklin Graham and his father Billy Graham
on the grounds of Little Piney Cove in the Blue Ridge Mountains in western
North Carolina. The support McCain had previously gained from evangelists
John Hagee and Rod Parsley backfired, forcing him to
denounce the former’s comments about how God led Hitler to drive the
Jews to Palestine, and the latter’s remarks against Islam.
McCain’s not going to do much better as he strikes up a friendship
with William Franklin Graham III. Both McCain and Franklin Graham claim
the visit was purely non-political. However, note that McCain took time
out in the midst of his campaign for president after religious conservatives
urged him to reach out to the conservative religious base. If he just
wanted a new friend, or perhaps a spiritual advisor, he could have been
met the Grahams after the general elections.
After the visit, Franklin Graham said: “I was impressed by his personal
faith and his moral clarity on important social issues.” That would
include McCain’s opposition to abortion. But many conservative Republicans
don’t like McCain’s caveat about allowing exceptions for rape, incest,
or the health of the mother
.
FRANKLIN GRAHAM’s REJECTION OF ISLAM AS EVIL
McCain spoke about how Franklin Graham and his family are so respected.
First he should have vetted Billy Graham’s fourth son Franklin more
thoroughly. Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, Franklin referred to Islam
as “a very evil and wicked religion.” And he has repeated this comment
a number of times over the years. He elaborated in 2006 when he incorrectly
said, “The God of Islam is not the same God of the Christian faith
or the Judeo-Christian faith. It is a different god, and I believe Islam
is a very evil and very wicked religion.”
Franklin Graham has spoken about passages in the Qur”an which encourage
violence against non-Muslims. His constant exclusiveness message is
that “No one comes to the Father except through me,” allegedly quoting
Jesus. And the New Testament’s apocalyptic book, Revelation, ends
with the destruction of all of the enemies of the Bible’s God. So
let’s not have a debate about whose religion is the most violent.
If you read either scripture literally, they are both a horror. Franklin
Graham continued on his anti-Islam harangue even when his friend George
W.
Bush, after declaring that the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were
a “crusade” 1 , unsuccessfully tried to convince Muslims
around the world that the U.S. was not on a war against Islam.
Before that, at Bush’s 2001 swearing in ceremony Franklin said a prayer
that probably offended every liberal Christian, as well as every Muslim,
Jew, Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Wiccan, Jain, Zoroastrian, agnostic, and
atheist in the country. Here’s what he said: “Now, O Lord, we dedicate
this presidential inaugural ceremony to you. May this be the beginning
of a new dawn for America as we humble ourselves before you and acknowledge
you alone as our Lord, our Savior, and our Redeemer. We pray this in
the name of the Father, and of the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and of
the Holy Spirit. Amen.” No mention of any other religions practiced
in the U.S.
Well, as “W” took the reins it surely was “a new dawn for America,”
as he soon plunged the world headlong into two murderous wars which
have alienated huge swaths of the world from this country. Do I hear
any Amens?
GRAHAM’s WORK IN IRAQ
“Franklin Graham obviously thinks it is a war against Islam,” said
Ibrahim Hooper, of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. ” “And
he’s going to go to Iraq in the wake of an invading army and convert
people to Christianity. Nothing good is coming out of that.” Hooper
was referring to Franklin’s plans soon after the war began to take
humanitarian aid to Iraq by his charity, Samaritan’s Purse, which
does a great deal of aid work throughout the world, but always with
the
“Let me lead you to Christ” message as the most important part of
the package.
Franklin admits that the charity’s work always includes attempts to
convert people to his version of Christianity. Hooper believes that
the humanitarian work obscures the evangelizing program. “They go
after them when they”re most vulnerable and hope they can get them
to leave their faith,” he says. “It’s a very despicable practice.”
In the early days of Christian missionaries to China, such converts
were called rice Christians. “You convert to Christ and we”ll give
you some rice.”
In 2003 Graham met with Sudan’s Muslim president Omar Hassan al-Bashir.
Graham told al-Bashir that he wanted to lead him to Christ. The Sudanese
president said he wanted to convert Graham to Islam.
FRANKLIN ON IRAQ WAR
Franklin Graham seems to have an over-supply of testosterone. As a young
man he went wild on his motorcycle and in his plane. Defiant, he smoked,
drank, and seemed anything but a future minister. After his conversion
in a hotel room in Jerusalem, he still kept his aggressiveness as he
developed Samaritan’s Purse and eventually took over this father’s
ministry. He never developed Billy Graham’s “softness”. He more
reflected his mother’s ideology of never backing down.
Perhaps this is what’s behind his jingoistic attitude toward the Iraq
war. In a CNN interview with Judy Woodruff three days after 9/11, he
said “”[W]e need to use every weapon in our arsenal that need be
to defeat this enemy. And I don’t think we should hold back. ” [L]et’s
use the weapons we have, the weapons of mass destruction if need be
to destroy the enemy.”
This spirit seems to manifest itself in his penchant for black, including
his leather jacket, his jeans and his pickup. Despite his anti-elite
appearance, he is far from taking vows of poverty. Last
year he was paid salary and housing from Samaritan’s Purse and another
salary from the ministry, for a total of $413,597.
On last year’s second anniversary of the Katrina disaster, Franklin’s
theology revealed what may be called “subliminal racism,” given
the fact that the Black population suffered so horrifically. He explained
the disaster by saying, “There’s been satanic worship. There’s
been sexual perversion. God is going to use that storm to bring revival.
God has a plan. God has a purpose.” Racism or not, it shows that Graham’s
first priority in everything he does is not compassion, but
converting people to his form of right wing religion.
William Martin, Rice University sociologist and biographer of Billy
Graham, says: “[T]heologically, Franklin is more conservative, more
outspoken and, frankly, blunt. He”ll say more provocative things and
feels no need to apologize.
It just may be that we can best know John McCain by the friends he seeks.
Larry Jones is a long time political
activist and former United Church of Christ minister who lives in Honolulu.
______________________________
1. The Crusades were murderous forays by Christians in the Middle Ages
against Muslims, who were forced to either convert or be slaughtered.
When Bush called for a crusade in the Middle East, he forgot his
history lesson about why Muslims hate the word “crusade.”.”