Evangelism, Outside Politics

This is an editorial from today's "USA Today" about Billy Graham. I think that the editorial writer is "on to something" about Graham, that perhaps many Christians have lost sight of.

Evangelism, Outside Politics

On his mountaintop retreat in North Carolina, Billy Graham sits apart from his brethren of the Christian Right. The world's most famous evangelist is not a combatant in their culture wars. Nor does he join in their politicking over judgeships, filibusters, gay marriage or other issues. Graham's principal message is simple: God loves all his children and will never forsake them, not even the sinners.

But as he prepares for his 417th crusade, his style of evangelizing is not as in vogue as it once was. Many of today's evangelists are more strident and less inclusive than he — and more likely to blur the lines between religion and politics.

At 86 and in failing health, it's perhaps inevitable that Graham's influence wouldn't be what it once was, when he filled arenas around the world day after day. Still, it is hard to read the vivid portrait of him in Monday's USA TODAY without feeling a sense of loss.

These days it's often difficult to see where religion ends and politics begin. Take, for instance, the effort by religious groups to confirm conservative judges. The zeal they expressed in a recent nationwide televised event from a church in Louisville is the type that once would have been reserved for spreading the gospel or tending to the needy.

Political engagement is, of course, their right and not unique to any single faith, but it comes with a cost. As religious leaders become more involved in politics, they risk making religion more a vehicle for exerting power over non-believers than for persuading skeptics to join the faith.

They also invite a sullied image. Politics is inherently messy, controversial, full of awkward compromises and sometimes corrupt. Religion strives for something higher and more permanent.

Graham, who has been associated with every president of recent decades and was once criticized for his closeness to Richard Nixon, seems keenly aware of the dangers. "If I took sides in all these different divisive areas, I would cut off a great part of the people that I really want to reach," he says now.

Next month, Graham will take his brand of preaching to New York for the first time since he packed Central Park in 1991. His event will be sponsored by more than 1,300 Protestant and Catholic churches with different views on a number of issues.

It will not be tied to any specific event in Washington. It will not be strident. In other words, it will be a refreshing change.