美国国家公共电台 NPR 'America's Pastor' Billy Graham Dies At 99

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RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

Over six decades, the Reverend Billy Graham electrified¹ audiences around the world. He counseled American presidents, and he transformed evangelical Christianity. Today, the man known as America's pastor² passed away at the age of 99. He spent his final days in North Carolina, where he had lived in relative seclusion³ since his last major public appearance in 2005. NPR's Tom Gjelten has this remembrance.

TOM GJELTEN, BYLINE⁴: Billy Graham was raised in a pious⁵ Presbyterian family, but it was in North Carolina and while still a teenager he decided⁶ his calling was to be a Bible-waving preacher like the ones who showed up in his hometown to lead raucous⁷ outdoor revival⁸ meetings. He learned to imitate them by delivering sermons alone in a toolshed, calling on the shovels⁹ and rakes to repent¹⁰ of their sins and accept Jesus. The practice paid off. He believed in himself and in his Gospel message. He had enormous energy, and within a few years, he had a national platform.

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BILLY GRAHAM: Tonight, I'm glad to tell you as we close that the Lord Jesus Christ can be received, your sins forgiven.

GJELTEN: His break came in 1949 with a series of revival meetings Graham held under a circus tent in Los Angeles.

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GRAHAM: ...Repenting¹¹ of your sin and turning to Jesus Christ to save you. Shall we pray?

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GJELTEN: More than 300,000 people came to hear Graham preach at these rallies in LA. He called them crusades. His wife thought he was too loud and too theatrical¹², but in 1950s America, it was a style that worked. Here was a handsome, blue-eyed man who had grown up milking cows and pitching hay. He was wholesome¹³ and charismatic. He could command the stage, and his delivery was perfect for radio and television. Graham led these crusades in one American city after another. At the end, he would urge people to come forward and dedicate their lives to Christ.

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GRAHAM: You come right now - quickly. Just get up out of your seat and come. And while you come, the choir¹⁴'s going to sing "Just As I Am, Without One Plea (ph)" (Singing) Oh, lamb of God, I come.

GJELTEN: This was in 1957 at Madison Square Garden in New York.

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UNIDENTIFIED CHOIR: (Singing) Just as I am, without one plea...

GJELTEN: Billy Graham was hardly the first of the big-time evangelical preachers in America, but he was more inclusive in his outreach than the fiery¹⁵ fundamentalists who preceded him. His Madison Square Garden rally, for example, was coordinated¹⁶ with some liberal New York churches. Grant Wacker from the Duke University Divinity School has long studied Graham's career.

GRANT WACKER: His determination to cooperate with mainline Protestants and with Roman Catholics alienated¹⁷ his fundamentalist friends. They took great offense¹⁸ that Graham was willing to cooperate with the enemy.

GJELTEN: Graham was soon one of the most famous and admired men in America. He became a regular White House visitor, a friend and counselor¹⁹ to presidents - Eisenhower, Nixon, LBJ.

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UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Dr. Graham on nine one.

GRAHAM: Mr. President?

LYNDON B. JOHNSON: Hello, Billy. How are you, my friend?

GRAHAM: Well, God bless you. I was telling Bill last night, I couldn't sleep, and I got on my knees and prayed for you that the Lord would just give you strength.

GJELTEN: Graham met with all the post-war presidents up to and including Barack Obama. He was probably closest to Richard Nixon, but that friendship was hurt by the Watergate scandal. Graham refused to believe Nixon was involved, but then came the Watergate tapes showing otherwise. His biographer William Martin says Graham was devastated²⁰.

WILLIAM MARTIN: He recognized then that he probably had been used, that he had misunderstood something of the president's character. That was a terrible blow to him and caused him to withdraw from the political arena²¹.

GJELTEN: Graham, in fact, had moved steadily²² in a more moderate direction. Having once tolerated separate black and white seeding sections at his rallies, he later insisted that everyone be treated equally. As a Southern Baptist minister, he supported his church's ban on women becoming pastors²³, but he later said he was prepared to accept their ordination²⁴. His daughter Anne Graham Lotz saw firsthand how her father's views evolved. In an interview, she said her dad and her mother were initially²⁵ opposed when she told them she intended to teach her own Bible class.

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ANNE GRAHAM LOTZ: The traditional role of women in my family had been that the mother stayed at home, reared the children, kept the house so that the husband - father - could go out and do ministry²⁶, which was my mother and father's case. And so they just felt that my role was to stay at home and be that traditional type of wife and mother.

GJELTEN: As Billy Graham's daughter, Anne Graham faced a lot of pressure, but she went ahead with her Bible class anyway without her parents' backing. And then one day, they showed up at her class unannounced. From then on, she had their full support. Later, Billy Graham said Anne was the best preacher in the Graham family. She is speaking here with NPR in 2011.

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LOTZ: And I'll tell you what, I love my daddy, and he is so special. He's meant so much to me, so it's not a thorn in my side to be known as Billy Graham's daughter. It's a privilege.

GJELTEN: It was his son Franklin that Billy Graham designated as his successor, however, and as the younger Graham took a larger role in the family ministry, he associated it increasingly with conservative causes. He called Islam an evil religion, the kind of judgment²⁷ his father was always careful not to make. Two years later, in fact, when a reporter asked Billy Graham whether he agreed with his son that a global clash between Christianity and Islam was inevitable²⁸, Graham said, I think the big conflict is with hunger, and starvation and poverty. Whereas his father had counseled presidents of both parties, Franklin Graham aligned²⁹ squarely with Republicans. When Donald Trump³⁰ was elected, Franklin Graham saw it as divine providence³¹.

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FRANKLIN GRAHAM: I just think it was the hand of God. I think God intervened and put his hand on Donald Trump for some reason. It's obvious that there was something behind this, and I just think it was God.

GJELTEN: That from an interview with Lou Dobbs on the Fox Business Network shortly after the 2016 election. During the time Billy Graham was making his mark, the country wasn't so polarized. It may be hard now to recall the role he played. By the time of his death, he'd been out of sight for many years and was largely a stranger to the younger evangelical generation. But as America's pastor, Billy Graham was able to bring U.S. Christians³² together at a moment in history when that was still possible. It was an achievement others will have a hard time matching. Tom Gjelten, NPR News.

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