Franklin Graham’s Nascent McCarthyism

The head of Samaritan's Purse is collecting aid for the people of Japan devastated by the earthquake and tsunami, while at the same time hurling McCarthyist charges accusing the Obama administration of being in league with the Muslim Brotherhood.

He's the son of the Rev. Billy Graham and he'd love to inherit his father's unofficial mantle as "America's Pastor." The organizations he heads have relief projects galore, aimed at both helping those in need and proselytizing the suffering and vulnerable. He sees Christians as victims, and he appears to be flirting with a twenty-first century brand of McCarthyism, epitomized by claims that the Obama administration has been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood.

Is Franklin Graham delusional or is he merely uninformed? He heads up Samaritan's Purse (http://www.samaritanspurse.org/) and is the president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association (http://www.billygraham.org/). Samaritan's Purse does important charity work around the world. These days, the organization is gathering and delivering relief supplies to the people of Japan devastated by the massive earthquake and tsunami which destroyed a good chunk of the northeastern part of the country several weeks back.

In addition to his significant charitable work, Graham delivers controversial comments pretty regularly. For example, in August 2010, he told CNN's John King that he thought "the president's problem" stems from the fact that "he was born a Muslim, his father was a Muslim. The seed of Islam is passed through the father like the seed of Judaism is passed through the mother. He was born a Muslim, his father gave him an Islamic name."

Graham added that "the president has renounced the prophet Mohammed and he has renounced Islam and he has accepted Jesus Christ. That is what he says he has done, I cannot say that he hasn't. So I just have to believe that the president is what he has said."

Obama administration and Muslim Brotherhood

In a recent interview with the conservative website Newsmax.com (http://www.newsmax.com/InsideCover/franklin-graham-christians-muslims/2011/03/18/id/389992), Graham pulled a page from Senator Joseph McCarthy's playbook and accused the Obama administration of being in cahoots with the Muslim Brotherhood: "The Muslim Brotherhood is very strong and active here in our country," Graham said. "It's infiltrated every level of our government. Right now we have many of these people that are advising the US military and State Department on how to respond in the Middle East, and it's like asking a fox, like a farmer asking a fox, 'How do I protect my hen house?' We've brought in Muslims to tell us how to make policy toward Muslim countries. And many of these people we've brought in, I'm afraid, are under the Muslim Brotherhood."

Asked if President Barack Obama was doing enough to protect Christians at home and abroad, Graham said, "No. If anything it's the opposite."

"Muslims are protected more in this country than Christians," he said. "The president has made many statements but he doesn't back them up. We have to do more to protect the Christians in the Muslim world. Their lives are in danger."

Graham has been ticked off at Obama since he claimed that the administration played a role in revoking his invitation to speak at the Pentagon's National Day of Prayer event last year.

In the Newsmax interview, Graham also praised the leadership of former Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak and Jordan's King Hussein, saying that under their rule "Christians had been protected."

'Gospel message at the core' of' relief work, says Graham

Graham recently told students at John Brown University -- a private Christian university in Siloam Springs, Ark. -- "to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ in spite of persecution and challenges," the Christian Post reported.

According to the Christian Post, Graham "shared about his ministry's relief response in the aftermath of the Haiti earthquake, telling the audience that the Gospel message has always been at the core of their work. He said that they prayed with every patient before an operation and gave a Bible to every patient."

"I don't care how much good work you do. If you fail to prepare a person to stand before eternity, if you fail to prepare a person to stand before God, you're just wasting your time. So we take every opportunity to tell a person about Jesus," he said.

Franklin Graham plays the Christian victim card to the max. He told the students that, "Even in our government today, you can't pray to Jesus in many public meetings. You can pray to God or a god. You can mention Buddha or the name of Muhammad but you can't pray to Jesus Christ." Graham was "once disinvited from a National Day of Prayer event at the Pentagon over his comments on Islam."

Graham added: "We know that we are going to be persecuted for standing up for the name of Christ."

He also complained about the way the memorial service for those killed in Tucson, Arizona was handled; it wasn't Christy enough for Graham. "There was no call for God to put His loving arms around those who were hurting," he observed. "Why did they leave him out? They scoff at the name of Jesus Christ."

Graham then delivered the coup de grace: his take on the anti-Christ. "The spirit of anti-Christ is everywhere," stated Graham. "We're being secularized so quickly. Anything that has to do with Christian faith is slowly being taking out of society."

The Christian Post recently reported that Samaritan's Purse "chartered a Boeing 747 that airlifted 93 tons of aid, which arrived in Yokota Air Base near Tokyo on Saturday. The emergency airlift included 1,000 rolls of heavy-duty plastic, 16,860 blankets, 14,304 hygiene kits, 21,408 bars of soap, 1,111 buckets, and 18,432 jerry cans. Upon the 747's arrival in Japan, the U.S. military and the Japan Self-Defense Force assisted with offloading the emergency supplies."

Graham recently told NewsMax TV that the Japanese disaster could be a signal of the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. "Maybe this is it, I don't know. We should pray and be vigilant," Graham said. "The Bible teaches us Jesus is going to return someday. Many of us we believe that day is sooner rather than later."

In a piece called "God's Ambulance Chasers Rush To Japan's Aid, But Lady Gaga May Have Gotten There First," Rev. Dan Vojir recently wrote that a few years back he coined the term "God's Ambulance Chasers," which referred to those religious organizations, that after a disaster, rush to help the needy with food and clothing in one hand and Bibles in the other.

"Disasters. They really do bring out the best in people, in humanity. But rushing to evangelize after a tragedy can be akin to circling vultures. It's no secret that I'm against proselytizing, but inundating people who have been devastated by a cataclysm, a people who are of a different faith, with pleas to convert is ...wrong," Vojir wrote in mid-March.

Originally published at http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/12523

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