Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)

Subject: BS: RIP Billy Graham
From: Greg F.
Date: 21 Feb 18 - 06:45 PM

And not a moment too soon.

One of the major players of the 20th & 21'st Centuries giving "Christianity"[sic] a bad name.

The world will be a better place without him.

Subject: RE: BS: RIP Billy Graham
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Feb 18 - 06:55 PM

Agreed wholeheartedly. True, he apparently kept his nose clean. But he chimed in with the US penchant for appealing to God and Jesus to solve all their problems and eschewing reality and rationality. He did the world no favours and his baleful influence went beyond US borders. True, he opposed racism in the South. But don't let that kid you into thinking that he was somehow inclusive. Far from it. In one of his most infamous speeches he claimed that the problems of the world couldn't be solved without Jesus. Exclusive, and exclusive bollocks. I suppose his estate is rather large.

Subject: RE: BS: RIP Billy Graham
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 21 Feb 18 - 06:56 PM

I fear that that post says a lot more about GregF than it does about Billy Graham.

Subject: RE: BS: RIP Billy Graham
From: Greg F.
Date: 21 Feb 18 - 07:07 PM

So apparently you know bugger-all about the career and pronouncements and political intrigues of Mr Graham, eh Nige?

Educate yourself.

Subject: RE: BS: RIP Billy Graham
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Feb 18 - 07:10 PM

Nope. It says an awful lot about a man who did the world no good whatsoever and who quite likely did a good deal of harm by diverting millions of people away from the real solutions to the problems of the world.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 12:59 AM

He was a conservative Christian, no doubt about it - but he certainly seemed to be a well-meaning person. He was not mean-spirited and judgmental like many of the mega-preachers like Falwell and Swaggart and Bakker and Robertson and even Graham's own son, Franklin.

For the most part, he seemed like a voice of kindness and compassion, and a strong opponent of segregation. I think he led a lot of conservative Christians away from the evils of the mega-preachers.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 02:44 AM

And no doubt extracted money from stadiums full of people - he certainly fooled Cliff Richard!!!

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Senoufou
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 03:26 AM

I wondered the same thing Steve - how much is his estate worth? Millions I'd bet. And I'd also bet it will never be disclosed.
Much of his type of preaching is big business.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 05:04 AM

I went to one of his Crusades once, just to satisfy my curiosity. It was not my kind of thing, so I never went again. However, I was surprised at how low - key it was. There was no pressure for money, or for conversion - but they did have an altar call and welcomed anyone who wanted to come forward. In general, the tone was very relaxed and positive - not at all what I expected. I'm sure they made lots of money, but they didn't push for it.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 05:12 AM

I was always taught not to speak ill of the dead. It is always possible to say nothing.
To open an obituary thread merely to kick the dead person seems to me to be wrong.

As for 'political intrigues', anyone can make a mistake. It takes more to admit that it was the wrong thing to do:
evangelist Billy Graham told Christianity Today in January that he wishes he hadn't been so pol?itical during parts of his career

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 05:31 AM

It wasn't posted as an obituary thread at the outset. And he was a controversial figure about whom both positive and negative things may be said. They are being said here and I see no reason to hold back on the negatives. It's my view that his impact on the world, on America in particular, was overwhelmingly negative, in spite of his anti-segregationalist stance (which has not been overlooked in this thread). He was responsible for adding to and exploiting that over-simplistic religious fervour, imbued with fake certainties, that looks for easy false solutions to the problems of the world.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Senoufou
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 06:01 AM

I see that he supported 'tithing' (giving a tenth of whatever one earns to the church) and most of these evangelical organisations do the same. (Joyce Meyer Ministries for example)

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 07:17 AM

My brother in law is a full time evangelical preacher with his own church and congregation.
I only see him once every so many years for family weddings/funerals.
He seems like a decent bloke I'd get on with as a friend.

Whatever he earns from the church, he's managed to raise 4 kids
and send 2 so far through university.

I have noticed that the middle aged men in his congregation I've met and converesed with socially at these family occasions,
seem to be quite well off
and ambitious in their businesses and professions...

Is it a religious personality trait that makes them very driven individuals...????

.. and their kids seem to inter-marry with other families within the church...

Some kind of insular godbotherer mafia...?????

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: gillymor
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 07:34 AM

He was cozy to varying degrees with all with all U.S. Presidents
(Truman called him a "counterfeit") but was especially chummy with the odious,amoral Nixon whom he carried water for on occasion and they bonded over their antisemitism as noted in that Americans United article above. He lied about his remarks when they were revealed in Haldeman's book and didn't "repent" until they were proven true with the release of the White House recording. Truman had him pegged.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Jackaroodave
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 07:37 AM

Nigel: "As for 'political intrigues', anyone can make a mistake. It takes more to admit that it was the wrong thing to do:"

Thank you, Nigel, for posting the "apology" link. I recommend it to anyone trying to get at what lay beneath Graham's surface. He certainly had a lot to apologize for. I especially savor the bit about breaking the Jews' stranglehold on the media.

It confirms my impression that every fookin ' time Nixon stepped in the $#!7, he'd holler to Rose Mary Woods, "Get me a golf date with Billy Graham!" and soon, there they'd be on the front page.

I couldn't care less that he believed in the existence of phenomena that I don't, or even that his notion of "inclusiveness" = "Jesus welcomes all with open arms." Atheist though I am, I'd rather hang out with, say, Thomas Merton, than some atheist Ayn Randian objectivist jack-off (with apologies to all jack-offs).

Wilberforce, Garrison, John Brown, Eugene Debs, the Berrigan Brothers, Sister Helen Prejean, Joe Offer, are all Christians who've done a lot more than I have for causes I admire.

Billy Graham isn't in that group.

Like a lot of ambitious clerics, he sincerely believed that he had a calling to minister to the spiritual needs of the rich and powerful--and, granted, those needs are enormous. I imagine he saw himself as a latter-day Protestant Thomas More, but without the baggage--the funny hat, those executions for heresy, the martyrdom. Graham played with fire and was lucky not to get badly burned.

Look above in this thread to see how low the bar got set in the late 20th Century: Graham was actually AGAINST segregation! He's NOT a hate-filled, hypocritical serial adulterer like Jerry Falwell! He's no inquisitor like Cardinal Fang!

He was probably a nice guy when he wasn't being antisemitic. I'm sure he was a nicer guy than I am. But he's got his legacy, and he's stuck with it.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Jack Campin
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 07:40 AM

Billy Graham the genocide advocate:

https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/09/27/the-preacher-and-vietnam-when-billy-graham-urged-nixon-to-kill-one-million-people/

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Jackaroodave
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 07:41 AM

Gillymor: I was composing my screed when you posted a much more succinct and compendious account.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Janie
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 08:11 AM

Billy Graham Was On the Wrong Side of History

Excerpted from the above commentary.

Graham had the opportunity to lead fundamentalists into a new era. He could have pushed them to take social reform seriously as a God-given mandate to save the world from environmental destruction. He could have tackled racism, America’s original sin, by championing the federal government’s aggressive civil rights policies.

But he squandered it. He could not overcome the speculative end-times schemes of his cohort of evangelicals, with their anti-government hostilities.

Graham had good intentions, as his work desegregating his crusades demonstrated. But when his influence really would have counted, when he could have effected real change, real social transformation, he was too locked into last-days fearmongering to recognize the potential of the state to do good. We are all paying the price.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Greg F.
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 08:40 AM

He was a conservative Christian, no doubt about it - but he certainly seemed to be a well-meaning person. He was not mean-spirited and judgmental...

HUNH????

Read ahead for some facts on how "well-meaning" and "not mean-spirited" he was, Joe & then get back to us, OK?

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 08:41 AM

The last time I saw Billy was on TV immediately following the George W Bush announcement of warning Iraq for the last time. There was not even a commercial break when George stopped ...the Billy Graham singer dancers started up celebrating patriotism and the zeal to go enlist.

sickening

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 03:54 PM

I'm the one who re-titled the thread as an obit. We've had a long-standing policy of not having two threads on the same subject at the same time, so it didn't make sense to have a second thread for the obit. I know that some of you have a taboo against "speaking ill of the dead" in an obituary thread, but why?

If you're publishing a person's one-and-only official obituary and funeral announcement in a newspaper, then it's probably a civilized idea not to speak ill of the deceased. But in a forum like this, I think it's certainly appropriate to both mark the death and have an honest discussion of the deceased - all in the same thread.

But then I'm not into this demonization stuff, so I think it's important to maintain a certain amount of respect for every person, living or dead, no matter how vehemently one might disagree with that person.

So, there should be something at Mudcat to mark the death of this historically important person, and there should be an honest discussion of both good and bad about them. Why can't we do both in the same thread? Now, when the deceased is somebody that some of us have known and loved personally, that's a different matter. I would think it inappropriate to speak ill of that person in any thread (e.g., the Ruebsaat thread)

Please note that the thread originator put RIP on the thread title. How is that different from an obituary? I added "Obit" simply because "obit" is the word we use to index threads marking the death of notable people.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: bobad
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 04:07 PM

What he said about Jews is not much different than what some our (less than) illustrious posters have too.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 04:09 PM

Greg_F says: Read ahead for some facts on how "well-meaning" and "not mean-spirited" he was, Joe & then get back to us, OK?

Like I say, Greg, he was a conservative man with conservative politics. And he was certainly more "well-meaning" and "not mean-spirited" than some who post here in the name of liberalism.

He had his faults, and I generally disagreed with both his religious views and his politics, but I do think he meant well. And while his religion and politics were not my cup of tea, I think he was able to communicate with conservatives in a way I'm not able to to. He was able to temper the anger and prejudice and mean-spiritedness of Christian conservatives in the face of hateful people like Falwell and so many other televangelists.

I actually believe that people I disagree with can do a lot of good that I cannot do myself. I don't see people with ideas that conflict with mine, as necessarily being evil.

But then, I'm not an ideologue. I see a lot more grey, than I see black-and-white. I know that born-again people think that you have to believe things correctly or you won't be saved, but I don't buy that. Interestingly, those people I call "born-again atheists" seem to have that same basic belief held by the "born-again Christians" - that you won't be saved unless you have the correct ideology.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Greg F.
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 04:16 PM

OK, Joe -

He was able to temper the anger and prejudice and mean-spiritedness of Christian conservatives in the face of hateful people like Falwell...

Oh really? He was a good showman, I'll grant him that. And he sucked in thaousands who didn'y pay attention to the man behind the curtain. Looks like he bamboozled you as well.

So let me save you the trouble of looking it up. I apologize for the length.



He did incalculable harm. You like Trump? Thank Billy.

--------------------

World-famous evangelist Billy Graham died on Feb. 21, 2018. In the wake of his passing, there will be a grappling with and a whitewashing of his legacy ? his spiritual advisement to every president from Eisenhower to Obama and his loathsome attitudes toward LGBTQ people, for instance. But it’s also worth noting that the toxic brand of evangelicalism that has kneecapped American politics, the full merging of patriotism and Christianity, would not have been possible without Graham’s relentless pursuit of civil religion.

Graham’s rise came hand-in-hand with the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower. Both men had one mission: get people into pews. For Eisenhower, it was pragmatic. America was now at war with communism, which was perpetuated by atheists. Americans could differentiate themselves from the godless hordes by exercising their freedom of religion. In a speech given after the testing of the first H-bomb, Eisenhower exhorted Americans, “If there is no religious faith whatsoever, then there is little defense you can make of a free system.” Right before taking office, Eisenhower declared, “Our form of government has no sense unless it is founded deeply in religious faith, and I don’t care what it is.” Eisenhower’s dictum was taken up by Graham, and soon going to church was more than just something for the religious, it was part of being a good American.

On Labor Day, 1957, Graham preached to a crowd in Times Square that stretched up Broadway, “Let us tell the whole world tonight that we Americans believe in God … that we are morally and spiritually strong as well as militarily and economically.”
New York Daily News Archive via Getty Images
The crowd gathered in Times Square to hear Billy Graham preach, Sept. 3, 1957.

His sermons often blended the military might of America with its spiritual strength. And in Graham, political power and spiritual power became one. He prayed with presidents and advised them. Graham encouraged Lyndon B. Johnson to pick Hubert Humphrey as a running mate. He was so devoted to Nixon that he once famously and wrongly insisted, “[Nixon’s] moral and ethical principles wouldn’t allow him to do anything illegal.” Graham was in the White House on Jan. 19, 1991, the night America launched an attack on Iraq.

America has always been a land run rampant with the fervency of faith. But prior to the 1950s, church and state were strictly divided in the lives and minds of Americans. Graham’s words and actions wove together Christian faith with economics and politics, creating in effect a civil religion, which became less about actual faith and more about defining “American values.”

In 1955, he preached to an American Legion, “Recognition of a Supreme Being is the first and most basic expression of Americanism.”

And because Graham learned early on that speaking on current events would draw a bigger crowd, his sermons were rife with political commentary. He filled stadiums wherever he preached, wrote a weekly newspaper column and had a weekly radio message. The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association estimates that throughout his lifetime, Graham had preached the gospel to more than 215 million people in more than 185 countries and territories — even more when including video and film recordings. During these sermons, Graham was relentlessly political. He called Truman “cowardly.” In 1952 he told a crowd that the Korean War had been fought because Alger Hiss had never been East. He complimented the McCarthy committee, noting, “I thank God for the men and women who, in the face of public denouncement and ridicule, go loyally on in their work of exposing the pinks, the lavenders and the reds who have sought refuges beneath the wings of the American eagle.”

It’s not hard to see why politicians loved him. Graham’s brand of Christianity kept Americans hardworking and preoccupied with values. In her book, The Evangelicals, Frances Fitzgerald recounts the words of the Earl of Shaftesbury, an evangelical Tory, who in the mid-19th century noted that to deprive “‘the masses’ of ‘the checks and restraints of religion’ would be to invite Communism, anarchy, and mob rule.”

Those same words spoken by Shaftesbury about religion in the mid-19th century were echoed by Graham in the 20th. Faith wasn’t about souls or good works, it was about patriotism and politics. And the result was that American Christianity became just as American as apple pie. In the middle of the country, church became the primary social outlet for farm wives and their children. Schools didn’t hold activities on Wednesday nights, reserving that for midweek services and youth groups. Churches were the center for softball leagues and Saturday night dances. Church attendance soared, peaking in the 1960s at 75 percent.

This is significant, because while many Americans were religious, the stories of America being founded as a Christian nation have been largely oversold. The truth is that the early settlers hardly fit the image of the pious family bootstrapping it on the prairie. Rather they were men with few family attachments, hewing out a living in a strange land in order to escape jail time, debts and abusive families. In their book The Churching of America, Roger Finke and Rodney Stark argue that in 1850, religious adherence on the frontier was weak at best. Iowa had the lowest rates with 138 religious adherents per 1,000 inhabitants. Maryland, Indiana and Ohio were the highest with respectively 422, 420, and 416 adherents per 1,000.

Additionally, before Graham, Christianity ? specifically white Christian fundamentalism ? had been fractured. Fitzgerald argues that under Graham’s charisma and popularity, he was able to “bring the great variety of conservative white Protestants, North and South, into his capacious revival tent under the name ‘evangelicals.’” In sum, creating the very voting bloc that overwhelmingly voted for Donald Trump. That plus his penchant for political power meant that Graham tied a slipknot of faith and politics that is now strangling American society.

When we look at the legacy of Billy Graham, we need to see it for what it was ? the very beginnings of a capitalist, conservative Christianity, less concerned with the soul than the voting booth.

In conflating faith with patriotism, Graham created a perniciously political civil religion that is more about virtue-signaling than any actual service to God or country.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Senoufou
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 04:38 PM

That's most interesting Greg. And I would sum it up as:-

He strove to declare to millions exactly what people wanted to hear.
He did this to achieve power.
He sought power because with it came enormous wealth.

None of the above are in my view particularly Christian.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 05:32 PM

Good start, Greg. This is so unlike you, posting something that has actual substance.

So, what's your source, Greg?

I'll help out there, although it is information you should have been able to furnish.

It's an opinion piece by guest writer Lyz Lenz in Huffington Post (click).

It's well-written, and I generally agree with it. It's one-sided - but for the most part, it's my side of the argument.

Billy Graham lived 99 years. I think that the high point of his mixing faith with political conservatism was during the Nixon Administration. But Nixon left office a long time ago, in 1974. I think that Billy Graham learned a lot in the years since then, and moderated his stance greatly. No, he still wasn't my cup of tea at the end of his life, but I do think he did a lot to lead conservative Christians away from the worst of the televangelists.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Greg F.
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 06:17 PM

So Joe -

Good start, Greg. This is so unlike you, posting something that has actual substance.

Fuck off.

It's an opinion piece by guest writer Lyz Lenz in Huffington Post (click).

Good Job! Atta boy! I knew you could source it by yourself if I showed you the way. Many more such facts available at the click of a Google, Joe.

Can you supply any evidence to refute anything Lenz wrote?

But I do think he did a lot to lead conservative Christians away from the worst of the televangelists.

So he was only two-thirds of a 24 karat piece of shit. Wonderful.

Of course, by your standards, no-one is ENTIRELY bad- they all have some mitigating factor. Hitler loved dogs. Pol Pot's favourite author was Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier was a physician active in a campaign to fight typhus, yaws, malaria and other tropical diseases that ravaged Haiti. And on and on.

Fatuous in the extreme, my friend. Reality beckons.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 07:41 PM

I have no opinion as to whether Mr. Graham's influence on US society was a net positive or net negative. I'll leave it to others to hash that one out.

However, I am a firm believer in the separation of Church and State and I'm really pissed off that Graham's body is to lie in repose under the Rotunda of the US Capitol for a week. That is an honor which should only be given to public servants, not preachers. Having Graham's body so honored stinks of governmental recognition of his evangelical world view.

If his friends and followers think his body needs to lie in state, there are plenty of churches and cathedrals that can do the job with no cost to US taxpayers.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 07:56 PM

Lots of politicians have made lots of political "hay" from their relationships with Billy Graham and with their efforts to make him an icon.

I suppose that instead of calling Graham "America's Pastor," it would be better to call him "The Politicians' Pastor." And politicians on both sides of the aisle will insist that Billy Graham be honored at the U.S. Capitol.

That being said, we could have done a whole lot worse. The respect government officials paid to Jerry Falwell was frightening to me. While I disagreed with his politics and his religion, Billy Graham seemed to be a good man. And he served to bridge the gap between Democrats and Republicans.

I realize there are many people here who insist that only one point of view can be correct. I disagree with them.

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 08:02 PM

You need to stop being a little patronising, Joe. If you wish to defeat us sceptics/cynics/atheists, do it by engaging in rational argument, not via piss-take. If you persist with that approach, it will make your defensive pro-faith stance look just a little desperate.

"And I didn't even call Steve a bigot!"

I have a long memory, Joe. Ask Keith some time.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Janie
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 08:04 PM

Agree, BWL.

Agree, Joe.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Greg F.
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 08:14 PM

I realize there are many people here who insist that only one point of view can be correct. I disagree with them.

No, Joe - you disagree with those who can actually document that fact and reality are contrary to your point of view. Enjoy your fantasy world.

On balance, Graham was many times more a negative influence than a positive one. Period.

"we could have done a whole lot worse"

You can't be serious. Suppose we could have done a whole lot worse than Mengele too eh?

Jesus wept.
.

You like Trump? Thank Billy.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Greg F.
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 08:20 PM

Oh,. and Joe -

Billy Graham seemed to be a good man.

Good in what regard? That he didn't send 6 million to the gas chambers? (that would have been a whole lot worse)

Evidence, please.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 09:09 PM

For one thing, Greg, Graham did his best to be inclusive in his campaigns. He also avoided hateful, angry approaches, and did his best to inspire people to be constructive and peaceful and inclusive. Yes, he was conservative and a Christian and made no bones about that - but that was exactly who he was.

For another thing, Graham was a close friend of Martin Luther King, Jr., and was a strong supporter of racial integration as early as 1953.

But he was a conservative, and that's enough in your book and that of Mr. Shaw, to call him kin of the devil. He didn't have an ideology that meets your standards, so you revile him. You see things only in black and white. I don't.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 10:05 PM

I haven't called him or anyone else the kin of the devil, as there is no devil. And he may have started off being a buddy of Martin Luther King but it didn't last. Look it up, Joe. As for his being a conservative, whatever that means in yank-speak, I don't give a damn. I respect people of good will even if I vehemently disagree with their stance. In this case, I strongly suspect that he was not entirely a person of good will. And do stop being so defensive. Be secure in your beliefs.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 10:26 PM

Sorry, Steve, I just don't see things in absolutes like you do. And I refuse to let the absolutists have complete control of this forum.

I'm quite secure in my beliefs; and a major part of that, is that there are many valid answers to most questions.

I detest the intolerance that you and Greg_F and others express so vehemently and so often.

Yes, there was a falling-out between Graham and King at one time, but it was not permanent.

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Greg F.
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 10:30 PM

For another thing, Graham was a close friend of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Ah yes -some of his best friends were Negroes. Gimmie a fuckin' break, Joe. See Phil Ochs, Talking Birmingham Jam.

But he was a conservative, and that's enough in your book and that of Mr. Shaw, to call him kin of the devil.

No, Joe - has nothing to do with conservative/liberal. He wasn't a"conservative" - he was a retrograde, intolerant, bible-thumping bigot. Re-read the Lenz article - and the article Janie referenced - and refute them point by pint where/if you can instead of bloviating and pontificating.

It has to do with looking at what he did, and said, and caused, and promoted, and supported----and the record is clear, even if you choose to disregard it.

WHY you would choose to disregard it is beyond me; I had thought you were an intelligent gent able to tell fact from fiction/ propaganda/whitewash.

Next thing you'll be telling us what a Great American good old Tailgunner Joe McCarthy was.

But by all means defend and suport Billy- as long asyou realize that by so doing you are supporting Trump and the Trumpist agenda, and flushing the U.S. down the toilet by so doing.

Shame on you.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Greg F.
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 10:40 PM

I detest the intolerance that you and Greg_F

And I destest the mewling sycophancy and apologist nonsense and willingness to compromise with and overlook - for lack of a better term, evil - that you spew, Joe, in the face of all evidence to the contrary.

Shame on you.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 11:00 PM

So, Greg, why don't you speak for yourself and give us some Billy Graham statements that you object to. I was aghast at things said by the likes of Falwell, Bakker, Robertson, Swaggart - and so many others. But when Billy Graham spoke he spoke in peaceful terms, never in hate. The two articles you cite are both very good, and both express a point of view that is very compatible with mine. But neither one gives information to support your intolerant condemnation of the man.

It's good to espouse a political philsophy, but not so good if your philosophy drives you to the absolute condemnation of others. If you are absolute in your political philosophy, you condemn yourself to always being in the minority, never able to accomplish anything other than to continue to insist that you're right and others are wrong.

Billy Graham's positions represent the thinking of a huge number of good people in the United States. If you can learn to tolerate and respect these people and work with them, you can accomplish great things. Without them, you will accomplish nothing - but you can still feel very righteous about your correct ideology.

So, what I'm insisting on is tolerance and respect. You and Mr. Shaw have neither.

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 11:04 PM

If you and Mr. Shaw continue to insist on being intolerant and unfair, then you can expect me to speak up every time to oppose your intolerance. I think your positions are unfair, unjust, and intolerant. Even liberals can be bigots.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Feb 18 - 11:20 PM

So, my brother in law the full time pro evangelical preacher [with his own church and congregation..]

I asked my wife how much loss she thinks her brother will feel about Billy Graham's death..

She bluntly responded.."Not much.. he doesn't care too much for him or his style of evangelism"...


Some years ago when my brother in law was invited to visit American ministers and preachers,
apparently one of the first things they did on his social itinerary
was take him out to learn to use guns...

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Feb 18 - 01:00 AM

"he doesn't care too much for him or his style of evangelism"

That's about what I think. But I see no need to demonize the guy. I generally don't trust anyone who talks about religion with a twang or a southern accent, but that's probably a bit prejudiced on my part.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 23 Feb 18 - 03:31 AM

Billy Graham's legacy is mixed, as the link posted by Janie, and Joe's balanced posts point out. I struggle to see the positive side to Franklin though, he comes across as a real bigot.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Feb 18 - 03:59 AM

I think there's no doubt that Franklin Graham was a serious embarrassment to his father. Billy Graham did his best to bridge the gaps, although there's no doubt he failed at times. Franklin Graham seems to be the antithesis of his father. Franklin seeks to gain power by sowing discord and deceit. But then, some of our Mudcat absolutists on both sides of the issue, are like that, too.
-Joe

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Iains
Date: 23 Feb 18 - 04:33 AM

Rather than slag off the man, what is his legacy? Were his achievements positive, negative, or some of both. Was he there to spread the christian message, or fund a very comfortable lifestyle, or both.
I did not trust him, or his message and the style of evangelism seems peculiarto America.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 23 Feb 18 - 07:16 AM

"why don't you speak for yourself and give us some Billy Graham statements that you object to. "
It's not so much what Graham said Joe - you can hear his 'message' in fundamentalist churches in any part of the world
It's more what he was and why he stood above his fellow fundamentalists
Fow me, he epitomised the toxic mix of POLITICS and RELIGION
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Greg F.
Date: 23 Feb 18 - 08:12 AM

So, Greg, why don't you speak for yourself and give us some Billy Graham statements that you object to...

To what end, Joe? Been adequately documented elsewhere & you choose to disregard it. why should I waste my time?

I think your positions are unfair, unjust, and intolerant.

Joe, I can't understand your problem then. Those three adjectives succinctly sum up your man Billy.

But when Billy Graham spoke he spoke in peaceful terms, never in hate

Absolute nonsense, Joe - as an example, Do look up what he said about Jews and LGBT folks.

Billy Graham's positions represent the thinking of a huge number of good people in the United States.

"Good people" like the "good Nazis" in Charlottesville, perhaps?

That "thinking" - or rather LACK of thought - is exactly xactly why we have Trump as President Shithole.

then you can expect me to speak up

Knock yourself out, Joe. As your next project , try rehabilitating Goebbels.

Trty rehabilitating Goebbels.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 23 Feb 18 - 08:18 AM

Iains,

"Was he there to spread the christian message, or fund a very comfortable lifestyle, or both."


I would say for Billy, both. For Franklin, overwhelmingly the second. As evidenced from his drawing simultaneous comfortable full time salaries from purportedly Christian organisations.

"I did not trust him, or his message and the style of evangelism seems peculiarto America."

Sadly, not entirely, that worldview and those methods hold sway over large parts of western Sydney for example. And pockets in south east Asia (Korea, Singapore). Its almost absent in Europe, but not quite.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Feb 18 - 08:27 AM

Joe, absolutists don't go around simply asking for evidence to calm their scepticism. I should think that a bloke who predicates his life on the unsupportable belief in a superior being who can exist only by breaking every law of nature and for whose existence there is not a single scrap of evidence, and who exacerbates that stance by claiming that his God is the one and only true God, and who bitterly attacks anyone who dares to ask penetrating questions or express scepticism about that belief, represents the epitome of the perfect absolutist. It's a word you tend to bandy around rather unwisely, I feel. And you sound far more bitter about it all than the bitterest of those fallen ex-Catholics that some of you steadier Catholics seem to worry about so much.

Subject: RE: Obit: RIP Billy Graham (1918-2018)
From: Senoufou
Date: 23 Feb 18 - 09:28 AM

There is a huge 'Christian' evangelistic movement in Nigeria, with massive meetings in stadia. Tons of money can be (and is) made. They prey on superstition and fear of 'possession by the devil' causing terrified adherents to pay for quite violent exorcisms. If they don't subscribe, they risk being excluded/persecuted by their neighbours. Some of the wealthiest Nigerian 'ministers' drive around in luxurious new cars and are actually expected to look opulent.
I'm not by any means saying that Billy Graham worked in this way, but it isn't just in the USA that these type of movements exist.