The religious right’s Donald Trump moment: What Franklin Graham’s xenophobic grandstanding reveals

[cbayer]

The religious right’s Donald Trump moment: What Franklin Graham’s xenophobic grandstanding reveals about American politics

http://www.salon.com/2015/07/21/every_muslim_has_the_potential_to_be_radicalized_how_franklin_graham_became_the_religious_rights_donald_trump/

Tuesday, Jul 21, 2015 05:57 AM EDT

Graham responded to the Chattanooga shooting last week in the most crass & offensive way possible. Sound familiar?

Steve Neumann


Franklin Graham (Credit: AP/Peter Morgan)

Though I’ve been an atheist for about 15 years now, I was born into born-again Christianity 43 years ago. I was raised in a church called Grace Gospel Chapel, a no-frills, non-denominational church in the Plymouth Brethren tradition. We didn’t call ourselves fundamentalists or even Evangelicals back then, but we were both. We were biblical literalists and inerrantists, and we were encouraged to “witness” — if not actively, then at least passively — for Christ in every aspect of our lives. But my experience of Christianity is far different from what goes by that name today. And while I’m certainly happier and healthier for leaving it all behind, it still pains me to see what it has become.

There’s probably no more important symbol of this for me than Franklin Graham, whose father was an icon of the Christianity in which I grew up. It was one of his TV specials that allegedly convinced my grandmother — a chain-smoking, man-chasing alcoholic for most of her life — to decide to accept Christ as her savior. Yet ever since the awakening of the self-proclaimed Moral Majority in the late ’70s, the insidious, corrosive, corrupting nature of politics has infected the tree of Christianity — and Franklin Graham is arguably its most emblematic fruit. He’s become the Donald Trump of the Christian religion.

In my church’s understanding of the Bible, Christians were supposed to be new creations, in the world but separate from it, categorically different from it — and that meant politics, too. My politically and socially formative years — my middle school and high school years — occurred during the Cold War of the Reagan era. There was no “war on terror” back then, so the topic of Islam never came up in Sunday School, the Sunday evening sermons, or our Wednesday night Bible studies. The issue of immigration, illegal or otherwise, wasn’t on our radar either. Iran was briefly mentioned in our church at the beginning of the Reagan years, but not because of any concern over nuclear weapons — we were implored to pray for the safe return of the hostages.

The main concern of my generation was the Soviet Union and the nuclear arms race. Movies like “The Day After” and “Red Dawn” kept me up at night. Still, there was no talk of politics from the pulpit or in the pews, no praise or condemnation for Reagan’s handling of our relationship with Gorbachev and the U.S.S.R. There were only references to cultural forces like Heavy Metal music and illicit drugs. Most of my church experience centered around one’s personal relationship with the Lord, making sure you were saved, and acting like it. I don’t remember any sermon in my church centered around the need to be politically active. I do, however, remember every service ending in an admonition to pray for our leaders, that they be imbued with the wisdom of God.

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[guillaumeb]

1. An interesting article.

My own feeling is that many leaders, whether religious or political, use fear as a means of control. It is necessary to make people afraid so that the fear can be used as a means of control and manipulation.

Standard in US politics for many years was the fear of Communism. This fear was the reason that the US military budget had to be so high.

Another fear, dating almost from the founding of the country, was the fear of black people and the associated fear of a slave rebellion. This fear was the main reason that a police force was inaugurated, as well as the reason that every white citizen was required to be armed.

Now of course, Muslims, gays, Latinos, atheists, and liberals have been added to the list of people that must be feared and hated. And the government itself, of course. (A particularly American phenomenon?)

So Franklin Graham is simply behaving as people like him have always behaved. Frighten people and then control them. (And ask for tax free donations to allow him to live very well.)

[cbayer]

2. Glad you enjoyed it and agree with much of your analysis.

Fear of the "other" is some powerful stuff and triggers tribalism and pre-emptive attacks, no matter what it's source. This is true for the religious who foment fear of people with different religious and the non-religious who foment fear of all religion. And, as you point out, communism and racial fears played right into this narrative, as had sexual orientation.

I do not think fear of the government is a particularly American phenomenon, as evidenced by the frequent revolutions around the planet.

Franklin Graham is, I hope, too much on the extreme to gather much of a following.

[guillaumeb]

3. to use your words: Franklin Graham is, I hope, too much on the extreme to gather much of a following

Sarah Palin, Donald Trump, and many assorted extreme political and religious figures do receive a lot of media attention, but the politicians among them rarely get elected to more than statewide office.

I should have said: "fear of the concept of government".

[mmonk]

4. Good article.