Here is his recent interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBtYPpXb0yk&w=560&h=315]
Commentary
- Franklin Graham suggests that Christianity Today is moving to the Left. I assume he thinks this because CT has not endorsed Donald Trump and disagrees with Trump’s policies on matters related to poverty relief, immigration, and the environment, to name a few. CT also does not believe that political power is the best way to bear witness to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Graham sounds a lot a like evangelical critics of social justice such as John MacArthur and Founders Ministries. (It is worth noting that CT was critical of MacArthur’s critique of social justice). One might make an argument that the debate over the social implications of the Gospel, and not Donald Trump, is what is really dividing evangelicals right now. Let’s remember that this was also part of what brought division to Protestantism during the fundamentalist-modernist controversy of the early 20th-century.
- Franklin says that his father, Billy Graham, the founder of Christianity Today, “stopped reading the magazine a long time ago.” It is fascinating to watch how both CT and Franklin are trying to claim Billy Graham. (Franklin is doing this much more than CT–Galli just referenced Graham at the start of his editorial). Graham’s life and ministry offers a usable past. This is not unlike the way everyone in American politics today invokes the founding fathers or Abraham Lincoln to advance their agendas.
- Graham says “Christianity Today has changed, and that’s unfortunate.” Graham raises an interesting historical problem here. Who has really changed? Has Christianity Today changed or has white evangelicalism changed since the time the magazine was founded? I am guessing such a question would elicit fierce debate, even among historians.
- Graham condemns Christianity Today for taking sides in something that is “so obviously partisan.” Wow, that’s rich coming from a court evangelical.
- The host asks, “Rev. Graham…do you think that this article [the CT editorial] has any kernel of truth or any merit of all?” Graham answers: “No, I really don’t. None.” Wow! This speaks volumes. Graham seems to suggest that everything Mark Galli wrote in his editorial is wrong. This is fundamentalism.
- Graham criticizes CT and Mark Galli for offering a moral criticism of Donald Trump and calling for his removal from office. Then he says, “They should have stayed out of this completely, in my opinion.” Again, wow! Franklin Graham has used his pulpit and platform as a GOP and Donald Trump propaganda machine for years and now he has the nerve to tell Christianity Today shut-up and stay out of politics!
