Someone I know well, whom I will not name for privacy’s sake, once had the experience of answering an altar call at one of Graham’s crusades. It is not a fond memory for him, since his spiritual life has since departed from the evangelicalism that Graham preached, but I envy him for the experience. I would love to be able to say that I had been saved by The Man himself. It would be the ultimate street cred in evangelical circles and possibly an unimpeachable credential to pass through the Pearly Gates. Alas, it was not to be.
It was only later in life that I learned that Graham’s career was more complicated. He was often willing to bow to unsavory politics, such as his refusal to condemn apartheid, if he felt that he could thereby further his ministry. His relationship with Richard Nixon proved even more damaging to his reputation, due to Nixon’s Watergate tapes catching Graham expressing some unguarded anti-Semitism in the Oval Office. To Graham’s credit, he didn’t equivocate when the recording was revealed but made many public apologies for his statements, and he expressed regret later in life of his pursuit of access to the White House, recognizing the often unsavory motives behind his hosts. His humility in those instances may be one of the most endearing aspects of his legacy, revealing a person acutely aware of his own failings and unafraid to atone for them publicly. It is a lesson unfortunately lost on his son Franklin, who now runs the Graham ministry and is one of President Trump’s most vocal supporters. I suspect that Franklin’s following of those unfortunate footsteps caused his father much grief in his last years and may indeed disturb his eternal rest.
Regardless of your religious persuasion, I would recommend a visit to Graham’s library and museum if you happen to be in the neighborhood of Charlotte, NC. You may find the hell, fire and brimstone approach of its messaging a little extreme, but it’s a fitting memorial to Graham’s career and to an evangelicalism that, for all of its faults, was genuinely dedicated to a higher spiritual calling. In these times, such a notion seems almost quaint.
