Evangelist Graham takes out advertisement on marriage amendment

[shawn703]

Source: WXII Channel 12 (Winston-Salem)

WINSTON-SALEM - Billy Graham on Wednesday released a statement on the proposed marriage amendment in North Carolina.

The 93-year-old Graham has a full-page advertisement scheduled to run in 14 state newspapers.

From his home in Montreat, Graham said, "Watching the moral decline of our country causes me great concern. I believe the home and marriage is the foundation of our society and must be protected."

Voters will take to the polls on "Amendment One" on May 8, though early voting has already started.


Read more: http://www.wxii12.com/news/local-news/north-carolina/Evangelist-Graham-takes-out-advertisement-on-marriage-amendment/-/10622650/12528692/-/qtwil2/-/

[HockeyMom]

1. Too bad straight men and women

don't agree with you on "sacred, holy matrimony".

[sakabatou]

2. They said the same damn things before interracial marriage was made into law

[sarcasmo]

3. One more religious douche bag who needs to shut his cake hole.

[The Magistrate]

4. This Fella, Sir, Has Been A Turd All His Life, And Looks To Die One....

[trumad]

6. Yes indeed Sir.

[flpoljunkie]

12. Wonder if he's as concerned about income equality and a Republican party who would cut taxes for 1%-

on the backs of low income people (62% of Ryan's budget cuts would come from programs that serve low income folks).

I kinda doubt it.

[AlbertCat]

5. Watching the moral decline of our country causes me great concern.

Me too! Like when the government legislates religious dogma that should have no bearing on any kind of legal status. This intrusion by religion into everyone's, religious or not, personal life via government documents and laws has got to stop now! It's turning this country into a 3rd world dystopia.

[Angry Dragon]

7. Watching the moral decline of religious leaders causes me great concern

[freshwest]

8. +1.

[byeya]

9. Billy Graham seems to exist to absolve politicians of their ethical lapses

and scold the rest of us.
Billy emerged from a meeting with Nixon during Watergate and said that we're all at fault.
I said it then and I'll say it now: Billy, I had nothing to do with it and it was not my fault.

Jesus jockeys like you are a blight on the body politic and aid and abet corruption.

[Iliyah]

10. Loving v. Commonwealth of Virgina

NC senator's wife which I believe many people feel the same way, said marriage equality goes against the preservation of the "white race". Oh my GAWD, the same damn thing that was said about Blacks and Whites marrying during the Loving case.

I thought GOD made us in his image? He/she is not one race but all races combined as one? Oh well, I guess White Christians also have a cap on that tooooooooo.

[kenfrequed]

11. "Watching the continual decline of my relevance..."

Really? Billy? This is the most important issue on your plate?

But I suppose he has made a career out of selling snakeoil, afterlife insurance, and 'pie in the sky when you die.' What a tool.

[JoePhilly]

13. "If gay marriage threatens your straight marriage, well, maybe you are gay."

I think that is what we should be saying.

btw ... I'm straight.

I'm a straight man, married to the same woman for over 20 years. And honestly, I can't figure out how gays getting married threatens my marriage. I mean I've tried to figure out how it threatens my marriage, but I could not find a reason.

But then, as I thought about it ... it occurred to me that if I were a gay man married to the same woman for over 20 years, pretending to be straight ... THEN gay marriage would threaten my straight marriage.

I'd have been pretending for all these years, and now if gays could marry ... that would open a new door for me. It would create a conflict. A future in which I could be myself.

And that would threaten my marriage.

So maybe that's what's scaring Billy.

[awoke_in_2003]

16. Lewis Black explains it...

do a youtube search for "gay banditos" (I can't do youtube at work)

Lewis does a good job of pointing out the ridiculous by being equally ridiculous.

[JoePhilly]

23. I saw Lewis Black a couple weeks ago in Durham NC ... hilarious.

[azurnoir]

14. nearly 40 years ago I had the dubious privilege of actually seeing him speak

what I remember is him asking for donations and adding that it had to be bills no change could be accepted-said it all for me moral decline my arse Grahams morals seem linked to his bank account

[nobodyspecial]

15. How do these groups maintain their tax-exempt status?

Seriously. They are NOT using the money to help children, poor and elderly. They are taking sides in politics. Big difference.

[Swede Atlanta]

17. Unfortunately.......

while his days on this earth are numbered, his son is even worse than he is.

I don't mean in any way to say I welcome his death but he is up in years and in fairly bad health.

I am a gay man and I have a very hard time understanding how allowing me to marry a man I love or for a lesbian to marry a woman she loves "threatens" traditional marriage.

First of all it must be pretty weak if my getting married can threaten it. And on that point I suggest traditional marriage is under severe attack. I haven't checked the statistics recently but I believe there is now more than a 50/50 chance your marriage will end in divorce. I see how divorcing couples claw at one another, use children as trading pieces in divorce proceedings, etc.

Second point, the majority of Americans live in non-traditional households. They may be straight couples living together "in sin" - I doubt they just hold hands in bed. They may be gay couples. They may be single parent households. They may be households with multiple generations with or without marriages.

Thirdly, if our society is strengthened by stable, loving households, I suggest that a gay or lesbian couple that is bound by the same contract of marriage as a straight couple, furthers that goal. There are both benefits and responsibilities to marriage. You can't just walk away from it. The vows of marriage should create an understanding of sincerity and gravitas (not that it really does).

As other posters have noted, the only threat gay marriage poses to heterosexual marriage is when one partner in a heterosexual marriage is bisexual or gay and the freedom to marry a person of a gender to which they are primarily attracted tears at the fabric of the sham marriage.

[yardwork]

21. All those straight unmarried couples and their kids will lose rights if this amendment passes.

I'm a lesbian and I live in North Carolina. Marriage for gay people is already very illegal here, and that isn't going to change anytime soon. This amendment is very broad and sweeping. If it passes, it will make marriage between a man and a woman the only legally recognized union in the state. This could mean the loss of health insurance coverage, housing, retirement benefits, domestic violence protections, child custody protections, and a lot of other rights that are currently according to unmarried couples and their families in North Carolina, gay and straight.

Billy Graham has just come out in support of an amendment that will likely hurt hundreds of thousands of people in his state, including many of his parishioners.

[neovente]

18. I always wonder..

protected from WHAT!? How does a gay couple next door being married affect MY hetro marriage? Are they going to "infect" my husband and I with their gay-ness? Someone explain how gay marriage is a threat to hetros?

[Ian David]

19. I thought this asshole was supposed to be the "apolitical" one. Fuck him. n/t

[Mz Pip]

20. God doesn't make mistakes

It isn't the fault of gay people that this country is in such moral decline.

[jerseyjack]

24. God does make mistakes. His name is Franklin.

Now there is a real fuck-tard.

[NCarolinawoman]

26. I have a feeling Franklin wrote this, and kind of pushed his father

into signing on to this statement. Franklin has a history of doing this. His father at this point in time, is medically frail and not as "aware" as he use to be.

[Mz Pip]

34. Franklin had a lot of help

to get to the place he's in today - his father, his associates, the rw fundy community that indocrinated him since birth.

I can pretty much guarrantee that if he had been my child he would not have ended up the judgmental virulent twit that he is today.

[Duncan Grant]

22. Selective morality is big business. Billy is just looking out for his bottom line.

Keep those checks and pledges coming in folks. "The Jesus Industry" don't come cheap.

[beac]

25. Dear Mr. Graham,

I have great concern that old, dried-up, infertile, half-dead "men of god" such as yourself are still trying to foist your antiquated, bigoted opinions on the modern world.

But hey, thanks for stimulating the economy with the mega ad buy!

Hope you live long enough to see gay marriage legalized in all 50 states, you pathetic waste of skin.

Sincerely,
Married, Straight Americans Everywhere Who Want the Same Rights for All Citizens

[spiderpig]

27. He was only too happy to accept regular donations from my grandmother

who survived on Social Security and lived with us for the last ten years of her life.

Greedy, bloodsucking jerk.

[guitar man]

28. Luke 20: 46-47

46 “Beware of the teachers of the law. They like to walk around in flowing robes and love to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets.

47 They devour widows’ houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. These men will be punished most severely.”

[spiderpig]

29. Thank you for this!

I've been burning over the exploitation of the innocent and trusting elderly for decades. Ugh! I swear these hypocrites get on my last nerve.

Maybe Luke 20 will be right

[guitar man]

31. Yw

The same passage is also in Mark 12:38-40

[benld74]

30. Well I see he STILL has the ability to SPEND his congregations' donations

[Blue Owl]

32. another verse of "Just As I Am..."

[blkmusclmachine]

33. Bearing false witness

eom

[JoePhilly]

35. I wonder how many poor people that money could feed.