Billy Graham
William Franklin Graham Jr. (/ˈɡreɪəm/; November 7, 1918 – February 21, 2018) was an American evangelist, an ordained Southern Baptist minister, and a civil rights advocate[1][2] whose broadcast and live sermons became well known internationally in the mid-to-late 20th century. During a career spanning six decades, Graham was a prominent evangelical Christian figure in the United States.
For other people with similar names, see Bill Graham.
Billy Graham
According to a biographer, Graham was considered "among the most influential Christian leaders" of the 20th century.[3] Graham held large indoor and outdoor rallies with sermons that were broadcast on radio and television, with some still being re-broadcast into the 21st century.[4] In his six decades on television, Graham hosted annual crusades, evangelistic campaigns that ran from 1947 until his retirement in 2005. He also hosted the radio show Hour of Decision from 1950 to 1954. He repudiated racial segregation[5] and insisted on racial integration for his revivals and crusades, starting in 1953. He later invited Martin Luther King Jr. to preach jointly at a revival in New York City in 1957. In addition to his religious aims, he helped shape the worldview of a huge number of people who came from different backgrounds, leading them to find a relationship between the Bible and contemporary secular viewpoints. According to his website, Graham preached to live audiences of 210 million people in more than 185 countries and territories through various meetings, including BMS World Mission and Global Mission event.[6]
Graham was particularly close to Dwight D. Eisenhower, Lyndon B. Johnson (one of Graham's closest friends),[7] and Richard Nixon.[8] He was also lifelong friends with Robert Schuller, another televangelist and the founding pastor of the Crystal Cathedral, whom Graham talked into starting his own television ministry.[9] Graham's evangelism was appreciated by mainline Protestant denominations, as he encouraged those mainline Protestants who were converted to his evangelical message to remain within or return to their mainline churches.[10][11] Despite his early suspicions and apprehension, common among contemporaneous evangelical Protestants towards Catholicism, Graham eventually developed amicable ties with many American Catholic Church figures and later encouraged unity between Catholics and Protestants.[12]
Graham operated a variety of media and publishing outlets.[13] According to his staff, more than 3.2 million people have responded to the invitation at Billy Graham Crusades to "accept Jesus Christ as their personal savior".
Graham's estimated lifetime audience, including radio and television broadcasts, topped billions of people.[14] As a result of his crusades, Graham preached the gospel to more people in person than anyone in the history of Christianity.[13] Graham was on Gallup's list of most admired men and women a record 61 times.[15] Grant Wacker writes that by the mid-1960s, he had become the "Great Legitimator": "By then his presence conferred status on presidents, acceptability on wars, shame on racial prejudice, desirability on decency, dishonor on indecency, and prestige on civic events."[16]
Later life
Graham said that his planned retirement was a result of his failing health; he had suffered from hydrocephalus from 1992 on.[100] In August 2005, Graham appeared at the groundbreaking for his library in Charlotte, North Carolina. Then 86, he used a walker during the ceremony. On July 9, 2006, he spoke at the Metro Maryland Franklin Graham Festival, held in Baltimore, Maryland, at Oriole Park at Camden Yards.
In April 2010, Graham was 91 and experiencing substantial vision, hearing, and balance loss when he made a rare public appearance at the re-dedication of the renovated Billy Graham Library.[101]
There was controversy within his family over Graham's proposed burial place. He announced in June 2007 that he and his wife would be buried alongside each other at the Billy Graham Library in his hometown of Charlotte. Graham's younger son Ned argued with older son Franklin about whether burial at a library would be appropriate. Ruth Graham had said that she wanted to be buried in the mountains at the Billy Graham Training Center at The Cove near Asheville, North Carolina, where she had lived for many years; Ned supported his mother's choice.[102][103] Novelist Patricia Cornwell, a family friend, also opposed burial at the library, calling it a tourist attraction. Franklin wanted his parents to be buried at the library site.[102] When Ruth Graham died, it was announced that they would be buried at the library site.[103]
In 2011, when asked if he would have done things differently, he said he would have spent more time at home with his family, studied more, and preached less.[104] Additionally, he said he would have participated in fewer conferences. He also said he had a habit of advising evangelists to save their time and avoid having too many commitments.
Controversial views
Discussion of Jews with President Nixon
During the Watergate affair, there were suggestions that Graham had expressed antisemitic opinions in private discussions with Richard Nixon; he denied this, stressing his efforts to build bridges to the Jewish community. In 2002, the controversy was renewed when declassified "Richard Nixon tapes" confirmed remarks made by Graham to Nixon three decades earlier.[140] Captured on the tapes, Graham agreed with Nixon that Jews control the American media, calling it a "stranglehold" during a 1972 conversation with Nixon, and suggesting that if Nixon was re-elected that they might be able to do something about it.[141]
When the tapes were made public, Graham apologized[142][143] and said, "Although I have no memory of the occasion, I deeply regret comments I apparently made in an Oval Office conversation with President Nixon ... some 30 years ago. ... They do not reflect my views and I sincerely apologize for any offense caused by the remarks."[144] According to Newsweek magazine, "[T]he shock of the revelation was magnified because of Graham's longtime support of Israel and his refusal to join in calls for conversion of the Jews."[143]
In 2009, more Nixon tapes were released, in which Graham is heard in a 1973 conversation with Nixon referring to a group of Jewish journalists as "the synagogue of Satan". A spokesman for Graham said that Graham has never been an antisemite and that the comparison (in accord with the context of the quotation in the Book of Revelation[145]) was directed specifically at those claiming to be Jews, but not holding to traditional Jewish values.[146]
Ecumenism
After a 1957 crusade in New York, some more fundamentalist Protestant Christians criticized Graham for his ecumenism, even calling him "Antichrist".[147]
Graham expressed inclusivist views, suggesting that people without explicit faith in Jesus can be saved. In a 1997 interview with Robert Schuller, Graham said: