Evangelical leader admires Rev. Graham less now that he knows he is a Dem.

[Bluebear]

Contact: Reverend Rob Schenck, Faith and Action, 703-447-7686, 202-494-2092.

WASHINGTON, June 24 /Christian Wire Service/ -- The Reverend Rob Schenck, a minister and former board member of the Evangelical Church Alliance, and now president of the National Clergy Council, a politically conservative activist group in Washington, DC., is a longtime admirer of Billy Graham. But when the soon to retire evangelist announced to NBC's Katie Couric in a recent interview that he is a life-long Democrat, it took a few points away from that admiration.

Mr. Schenck has met Dr. Graham personally and has attended his schools of evangelism and conferences for itinerant evangelists.

"I'm disappointed that my role model of 25 years retained his membership in a party that promotes the expansion of abortion and homosexual marriage," said Mr. Schenck, who will attend Graham's last crusade this weekend. "Whoever replaces him will need to hold unequivocal stands on these two paramount moral issues."

Mr. Schenck will be available for further comment, including from the crusade site, at 703-447-7686 or 202-494-2092.

http://www.earnedmedia.org/ncc0624.htm

[PATRICK]

1. Is Mr. Schenck a voting Protestant Cardinal?

Or does an Islamic style Caliphate rule entitle Graham's son to disfigure the ministry?

Unique leaders who do not provide for the future of their work will often see it die before they do.

[sasquatch]

2. Hmm...Perhaps I can let bygoes be bygones as well

I'll have to take back all the bad shit I said about him though.

[sundancekid]

3. signed, sealed and delivered hypocrisy ... what a schenck or is it skank?

[Cha]

4. Aw Fuck you , you hypocritical asshole.

No, you'd rather be with the "party" that kills innocent people for greed and have a resident in white house who lies to go to War On Iraq.

Greedy monster.

THis is so weird cause I just thought Graham bought into all that bushit. And now that I know he's much smarter than that..I have a whole different opinion of him.

[Bluebear]

9. I love your spunk :)

[lumpy]

5. Schenck attended Graham's schools

I guess Billy Graham is one preacher who never used politics in the pulpit. Bully for Billy! Sneers fo Schenck.

[Jack Rabbit]

6. Dr. Graham is worthy of respect

I say that as one who almost never agrees with him, either when he expressed a political view (I'm sure he voted for Nixon three times) or a religious one.

However, Dr. Graham has always separated church and state. I don't just mean when he refused Ronald Reagan, who asked for his endorsement in 1980, "That would hurt us both." He has always seen it his mission to persuade sinners to mend their ways, not to ask politicians to try to legislate morality. Whether one agrees with his idea of sin or not, at least that doesn't make one feel threatened that the government is going to tell people how to worship or even how to behave. Dr. Graham believed that a higher authority told us how to behave and that it was his job, not the government's, to convey that message.

Dr. Graham also deserves respect for the way he has run his ministries. When he says he's raising money for missionaries in some far corner of the world and one contributes, one can be sure that the money will be spent as Dr. Graham says. He never turned around and sank that money into a shady real estate deal.

I'm going to miss Billy Graham in an odd way. As he makes his farewell tour, this freethinker salutes him.

[American in Asia]

7. I knew there was a reason that I retained some respect

for Billy Graham!

Mr. Schenck seems to have missed the teachings of Jesus somewhere along the way!

As I recall, when Jesus was asked about the "paramount moral issues", He said they were to "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind and strength - and that the second comes out of this - to love your neighbors as yourself." When asked who would be saved, He told the parable of the sheep and the goats - and the ONLY criteria he listed were who fed the poor, clothed the naked, visited the sick and imprisoned. Seems like He was saying THOSE were the "paramount moral issues", doncha think??? I seem to recall the same parable talks about those who cry "Lord, Lord" and don't do these things are the worst offenders.

Schenck is a jerk. Think I'll write and remind him. And forward it to my fundie relatives as well.

[PsN2Wind]

8. For someone that claims to be a Democrat

he has done a helluva lot to support a string of Republican presidential candidates. I have no faith in anyone that has gotten very rich preaching about the poor and down-trodden. He might not be a Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell but we know he ain't no Gandhi either.

[immoderate]

10. I saw Schenck on C-SPAN last week.

He appeared with some liberal rabbi on Washington Journal, ostensibly to help point out where we all have agreements on various subjects.

Well, IMO, he didn't do so well. It was something like, "I wouldn't allow abortions, but let us all rejoice in the fact that we all cross the "t" in abortions. That is something that we have in common." And so on...

As for Mr. Graham, I remember my mother, who was Jewish extolling Billy Graham as "a brilliant man." So I listened intently to one of his "Crusades" when I was a kid. His personal ethics notwithstanding, what I got was a load of nonsense and double talk. Sometimes I'd like to think that I'm hearing a real Charlatan rather than a self deluded quack.
--IMM

[NewJeffCT]

11. Umm, didn't abortion go down under Clinton & back up under Bush?

at least that is how I remember the statistics?

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

12. Wow, how many heads have exploded since this news came out?

Are these people trying to say that it's not possible to be a good Xtian and be a Dem at the same time? :shrug:

[Vickers]

13. "promotes the expansion of abortion and homosexual marriage"

:rofl:

Seriously dude, doesn't all of that seem a little TRIVIAL with all the horrible shit going on in the world?

[woodsprite]

14. That proves it's not the "message" but the "messenger" to this dufus

and ALOT of other repubs - general public, clergy AND politicians.

The dems historically look at issues where the repubs historically look at what earned or paid alliances can do for them. It's a freakin' Survivor episode. I wanna vote the repubs off the island.