“I don't want to see religious bigotry in any form. It would disturb me if there was a wedding between the religious fundamentalists and the political right. The hard right has no interest in religion except to manipulate it.” ― Billy Graham
Billy Graham was right about the hard right. But he was so religiously blinded he thought that the Bible — not civil rights legislation or a social safety net — would “cure” racism and poverty. He was a science denier. He was an anti-statist whose philosophy was grounded in apocalyptic prophecy. And he was mates with Richard Nixon. In addition, his embrace of Reagan opened the door for the hard right's takeover of Republican politics.
But compared to his son, he was a mensch.
I grew up in the Anglian Church. I went to Anglican boarding schools. I performed religious calisthenics in church several times a week. And I was required to take Divinity (aka Bible Studies). It did not stick. But it did leave me with the clear idea that sin was a bad thing.
Conservative evangelicals say they agree. They will not stop bleating about the 10 Commandments, moral absolutism, family values, and leading a ‘good Christian life.’
So when Franklin Graham implores his tribe to pray for Trump, I would expect the rest of the message to demand that Trump repent his sins — and take time away from public life to work on his faith and his relationship with his Savior to become born again into God’s grace in the expectation of eternal salvation.
Just kidding. This sanctimonious hypocrite has no shame.
Graham wants his fellow Christian nationalists to piss on everything they claim to hold religiously dear. In a tweet, he blames Trump’s political enemies for Trump’s legal peril. He seems to think it was the prosecutors, the judge, and the grand jury who paid off a pornstar to hide the candidate’s adultery from the electorate and his third wife, the new mother of his youngest child.
“Pray for former President @realDonaldTrump. His enemies want to do everything they can to destroy him, to put him in jail, or to drag out this trial to prevent him from campaigning. I’m not telling you to vote for him—I’m asking you to pray for him.”
Graham is a liar. The law has criminally indicted Trump because four different grand juries, in four different venues, charged him with 88 crimes. There is no evidence of Biden or any other Democratic politician influencing any of those charges — because they did not. Nor is there any evidence that the judges, trial and appellate, are biased — because they are not.
What we do know is that Trump has been found civilly liable for rape and defamation (x2), for business fraud, for charity fraud, for educational fraud. In addition, he has a decades-long record of stiffing his sub-contractors, despite the Bible’s position on paying your workers.
Because you owe them: "Now to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation” — Romans 4:4
You should pay them on time: “Do not defraud or rob your neighbor. Do not hold back the wages of a hired worker overnight” — Leviticus 19:13
And you should pay them even if they are an immigrant: ”Do not take advantage of a hired worker who is poor and needy, whether that worker is a fellow Israelite or a foreigner residing in one of your towns. Pay them their wages each day before sunset, because they are poor and are counting on it. Otherwise they may cry to the Lord against you, and you will be guilty of sin” — Deuteronomy 24:14-15
Where is Graham’s concern for the regular guy? Who the feck knows?
While I am doing Bible verses, let me also add this — from the same chapter that evangelicals use to call gay marriage a sin.
”If a man commits adultery with another man’s wife—with the wife of his neighbor — both the adulterer and the adulteress are to be put to death” — Leviticus 20:10
Where is their consistency? (Rhetorical question)
I will grant you that Stormy Daniels was not married when Trump broke his church-sworn marriage vows with her. But I am confident that he has committed adultery with a married woman. This sinning raises the question, should I bring my own stones, or are they supplied? Or does God allow for an updated execution method?
There was no shortage of feedback on Graham’s prayer request. Here is a sampling.
Leighton: “A primary reason people are leaving the church in droves is because of charlatans like you, @Franklin_Graham. You claim to be a follower of Jesus as you lift up this rich, greedy, dishonest man as a false idol?”
Tom Santos: “It's bad form for a notable Christian like yourself to back a lying, grifting, cheating unrepentant adulterer like you're doing. You're going to have a very uncomfortable discussion with your maker one day.”
Impiety: “This is what religion is all about in America: politics. And you prove it again and again. Did you ever ask people to pray for Biden? You’re not a man of god, you’re a dirty politician. If Biblical Jesus existed, he’d be deeply ashamed of those conmen speaking in his name.
Jae Watson: “He's selling Bibles to pay his legal fees for screwing a porn actress. Do better evangelicals.”
Di: “You want us to pray for a criminal? A man who has not set a good example for anything his entire life. Wow Franklin! How far you have lowered yourself. You should be praying for him to repent his evil ways, not take his side.”
Stacey Dunn: “I am sorry that you consider criminals your friends, and justice, your enemy. Decent Americans, and decent Christians, do not.”
Graham did have his defenders. But in my unscientific estimation, they were outnumbered at least 20 — 1. Here’s one:
Philip Anderson: “You should tell everyone to vote for Trump. At this point that’s what every preacher should be doing. Because Biden is leading a satanic communist death cult.”
Phil, I feel your pain, mate. It must be terrifying to get out of bed in the morning. Buck up, sunshine. Biden’s death squad has not found you yet. Good luck.
The people who tried to convince me to be a Christian were generally decent people. They did not fight crusades against their political enemies. And when I chose a different path they did not promise me hell-fire. It was all very civilized.
Graham on the other hand is a ravening wolf, in it for the power and money. Or, in layman’s terms, an arsehole.