Billy Graham & Co. push the values voters

The television talking heads all agreed that the election was over, which ignited celebrations among the staff and supporters of winner Richard Nixon – including the world's most famous evangelist. "We did it," proclaimed the Rev. Billy Graham, according to iconoclastic journalist Joe McGinniss in "The Selling of the President 1968." Graham, he added, went "directly into Nixon's room, without explaining whether 'we' meant Billy Graham and Richard Nixon or Billy Graham and God or perhaps all three together."

Years later, a repentant Graham said he wept and became ill when he heard Nixon's paranoid, profanity-laced chatter on the Watergate tapes. While "America's pastor" kept meeting with presidents – as he has with every Oval Office occupant since Harry Truman – he vowed never again to become that attached to a candidate.

The question, for Graham's critics and even some supporters, is whether the national advertising campaign launched on Oct. 18th by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association – now led by son Franklin Graham – has crossed that line. The target audience: Readers of USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, key swing-state newspapers and church bulletins nationwide.

"The legacy we leave behind for our children, grandchildren and this great nation is crucial," proclaims one ad. "As I approach my 94th birthday, I realize this election could be my last. I believe it is vitally important that we cast our ballots for candidates who base their decisions on biblical principles and support the nation of Israel.

"I urge you to vote for those who protect the sanctity of life and support the biblical definition of marriage between a man and a woman."

It's easy to read between those lines, noted sociologist William Martin, author of "A Prophet With Honor: The Billy Graham Story."

"Billy Graham representatives note that the ads do not mention a specific candidate or party – an observation intended more for the IRS than for the target audience," wrote Martin, at Christianity Today online. "Given that former Gov. Mitt Romney opposes same-sex marriage and President Barack Obama supports it (and by doing so, has – to use Franklin Graham's words – "shaken his fist" at God), the ads leave no doubt about their intent."

There's more. Romney aides claim that, at the end of a recent meeting with the candidate, the evangelist promised: "I'll do all I can to help you. And you can quote me on that."

Months earlier, the Graham organization also released statements urging North Carolina voters to back a state constitutional amendment on marriage and an appeal for support of "Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day," after the company's president drew fire for defending traditional Christian doctrines on sex and marriage.

Meanwhile, former Graham-organization webmaster Steve Knight has said – in a much-circulated Huffington Post essay – that enough is enough. It's significant that Knight now works with a denomination on the religious left, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ).

"My concern is that here's how things like this continue to work," warned Knight. "Franklin Graham (or Franklin and his sister Anne Graham Lotz) have an agenda (in all ... of these cases, "traditional marriage"), they get a BGEA copywriter to draft the text, ... Franklin approves the copy and-or design, then Franklin drives out to Little Piney Cove (Billy's cabin home outside of Asheville, N.C.) and holds the piece of paper in front of Billy and asks, 'Daddy, can we publish this?' And Billy nods (or whatever he's capable of doing at this point in his life), and Franklin goes back and publishes this stuff with his good father's name all over it."

Veteran Graham spokesman A. Larry Ross has vehemently denied this and other claims that Graham has, in effect, become a puppet used and abused by Franklin Graham and others.

"In the years since his last public crusade, Billy Graham has been increasingly burdened by society's moral decline and the need for renewal in our culture and revival in the church," noted Ross, in the Christianity Today forum. "Because he considers the institution of marriage as the cornerstone of society, he is opposed to any redefinition of marriage – which he sees not as a political issue but rather a matter of religious freedom."

Thus, Ross added, Graham personally approved the use of these quotations in which he is heard "challenging citizens – particularly the faith community – on how to vote, rather than for whom to vote."

Stalking the anti-Mormon voters of 2012

With the White House race nearing an end, it's time for America's political pundits to face that fact that millions of voters will in fact be worried about Mitt Romney's Mormon faith on Election Day. Many will be offended by what they believe are the intolerant, narrow teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on marriage. Others will be worried about Mormonism's history of opposing abortion rights.

"There really is a large group of people in America who won't vote for Mitt Romney for president because he is a Mormon," noted Weekly Standard editor Fred Barnes, in a recent Institute on Religion and Democracy lecture.

"It's a very large group and there is a name for them – liberals."

This isn't the God-and-politics story most media insiders wanted to talk about during the 2012 campaign, said Barnes, who also works as a commentator for Fox News. The religion hook this time around was supposed to be clashes between Romney and Trinitarian Christians who consider Mormonism, at best, a sect or, at the worst, a "theological cult" with its own prophet, scriptures and unorthodox doctrines on the nature of God and other eternal matters.

But a strange thing happened somewhere during the campaign. According to a number of political polls, the overwhelming majority of Christian conservatives quietly decided they could vote for the Republican nominee without endorsing his views on heaven, hell and the mysteries of the Godhead.

In one Gallup survey this past summer, potential voters were asked: "If your party nominated a generally well-qualified person for president who happened to be a Mormon, would you vote for that person?" While 10 percent of Republicans answered "no," this negative stance toward Mormon candidates rose to 18 percent among self-declared "independents" and 24 percent among Democrats.

Another piece of pre-election research – the American National Election Studies (.pdf), by a scholar at the University of Sydney – found that anxieties among evangelical Protestants have actually declined somewhat in recent years, with 36 percent expressing an "aversion" to Mormon candidates in 2007 and 33 percent feeling the same way in 2012.

Meanwhile, anti-Mormon attitudes among non-religious voters rose from 21 percent in 2007 to 41 percent in 2012. Among voters who called themselves "liberals," this aversion to Mormons rose from 28 percent to 43 percent during that same period. Political and religious liberals, according to this study, are now 10 percent more likely than evangelical Protestants to harshly prejudge Mormon candidates.

The key for many Protestants is that, after decades of trying to Christianize American history, it has become very hard for them not to think of the president as a kind of "religious mascot" instead of as a politician, said the Rev. Russell D. Moore, speaking at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky. A recording of this forum, entitled "The Mormon Moment: Religious Conviction and the 2012 Election," was later posted on the Internet.

"I heard someone in recent days say, 'I would never vote for anyone who is not an authentically professing evangelical Christian,' " said Moore, who leads the seminary's school of theology. "If that's the case, then as far as I can see, you have about three candidates in the last 100 years or so ... that you could possibly vote for: William Jennings Bryan, Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush."

Instead of focusing on a shopping list of doctrines, religious voters will need to focus on a more practical question when they enter voting booths, said Moore. They should ask: "Between these two people – President Obama and Gov. Romney – who is going to do the best for the common good and in protecting the United States of America and all the other questions that we've got to keep in mind?"

Meanwhile, admitted Barnes, there are "small pockets" of evangelicals in the Bible Belt who remain convinced that members of their flocks must not compromise by voting for a Mormon. However, most religious conservatives have concluded that they fear Romney's faith less than they fear a second term for Barack Obama.

The experts also know that, "just as a matter of political geography, the few holdouts, if you want to call them that, tend to be in states where Mitt Romney probably doesn't need their votes," said Barnes. "He will carry states like Tennessee and South Carolina and Georgia … very easily."

Fewer Protestants, but better Protestants?

After decades of sobering statistics about rising intermarriage rates, falling birthrates and their declining flocks, eventually Jewish clergy began talking about a future in which there would be "fewer Jews, but better Jews." Faced with sobering evidence that the number of priests was falling, along with statistics for Confession and weekly Mass, many Catholic leaders started talking about a future in which there would be "fewer Catholics, but better Catholics."

Now, according to a new survey by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, Protestant leaders should start preparing for a future in which there will be "fewer Protestants, but better Protestants."

For the first time, America lacks a Protestant majority, with only 48 percent of the population claiming ties to Protestant denominations. Meanwhile, the surging tide of Americans rejecting ties specific religious groups – the so-called "Nones" – appears to pose a new threat to the declining "seven sisters" of liberal Protestantism. These churches, in descending order by size, are the United Methodist Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the Episcopal Church, the American Baptist Churches USA, the United Church of Christ and the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ).

This survey shows that "it's going to be much more difficult for mainline churches to turn things around simply by focusing on higher levels of commitment," said political scientist John C. Green of the University of Akron, after a briefing at the annual meeting of the Religion Newswriters Association of America. This research was a cooperative effort with the PBS program Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly.

Part of the problem is that fewer Americans remain committed to supporting religious institutions and a high percentage of those who do seem to favor faiths that embrace the very doctrines and traditions the unaffiliated often reject. It also appears that young people who are rejecting traditional faiths – during the past five years in particular – are quitting organized religion altogether, rather than joining progressive institutions.

"It's going to be hard for something like a 'fewer Methodists, but better Methodists' approach to work because these mainline churches are already so small and there are so many of them," said Green. "The mainliners will have to find their niche. But who are they? What do they believe? Do they know?"

Meanwhile, increasing numbers of Americans – especially the young – are now willing to say that they do not believe. The Pew Research Center numbers indicate that millions of Americans are no longer willing, as was common in the past, to remain lukewarm members of religious bodies in which they were raised. Other key survey findings include:

* One-fifth of the U.S. public – a third of those under 30 – are now religiously unaffiliated, for a total of 46 million Americans. The unaffiliated have risen from just over 15 percent of the adult population to nearly 20 percent in five years. More than 70 percent of the unaffiliated called themselves "nothing in particular," as opposed to being either atheists or agnostics.

* Many "Nones" fit the "spiritual, but not religious" label used by many researchers, with more than two-thirds – including some self-proclaimed atheists and agnostics – saying they believe in God or a "higher power." More than half claim a deep connection with nature.

* In 2007, 60 percent of those who said they "seldom or never" attend worship services continued to claim some tie to a religious tradition. But today, only 50 percent in this camp retain such a tie – a 10 percent drop in only five years. At the same time, 88 percent of the "Nones" said they are not interested in considering future to ties to religious institutions, either liberal or conservative.

* The unaffiliated overwhelmingly reject ancient doctrines on sexuality with 73 percent backing same-sex marriage and 72 percent saying abortion should be legal in all, or most, cases. Thus, the "Nones" skew heavily Democratic as voters – with 75 percent supporting Barack Obama in 2008. The unaffiliated are now a stronger presence in the Democratic Party than African-American Protestants, white mainline Protestants or white Catholics.

"It may very well be that in the future the unaffiliated vote will be as important to the Democrats as the traditionally religious are to the Republican Party,” said Green, addressing the religion reporters. "If these trends continue, we are likely to see even sharper divisions between the political parties."

Apocalyptic visions about Chernobyl

KIEV -- The apocalyptic visions begin just inside the doors of the Ukrainian National Chernobyl Museum and many of them lead straight into the Book of Revelation. The final pages of Christian scripture are full of angels, trumpets, flames, thunder, lighting, earthquakes and catastrophes that shake heaven and earth.

In this museum, the key is in the eighth chapter: "And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters. And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter."

When Ukrainians translate "wormwood" into their own language it becomes "chernobyl." It's easy to connect the two when discussing the legacy of pain that followed the 1986 disaster at the Chernobyl Power Station north of Kiev, when explosions and fires at the reactor core released a plume of radioactive debris that drifted over Russian and into Europe.

Soviet officials claim a mere 31 died. Ukrainians mock this number, saying it's impossible to calculate the long-term fallout in cancers, birth defects and other forms of human suffering.

"The catastrophe at Chernobyl station took its victims before their time," said Archpriest Andrei Tkachev of St. Agapit of Pechersk Orthodox Church in Kiev. "Man is supposed to meet death in his own time, when he has a chance to prepare to meet God. That kind of death is a gift from God – a good death.

"That is not what happened for many of the victims of Chernobyl."

The museum opened on April 26, 1992, the fifth anniversary of the disaster and soon after the Soviet Union's collapse. The exhibits include 7,000 artifacts from the 76 towns and villages – with 76 churches, in this historically Orthodox culture – that were razed in the radiation-tainted resettlement zone.

The door into a large chamber dedicated to the families and children of Chernobyl leads to the church iconostasis, with a radiation suit hanging in place of the Archangel Michael and barbed wire and a contamination sign blocking the way to the altar. High overhead is an icon of St. Nicholas, the patron saint of endangered children.

The altar is gone, replaced by a boat – to carry souls over the waters of death – full of children's toys. Under the boat, the blackness is full of the icons of saints.

The Chernobyl disaster was especially poignant, said Tkachev, because it struck a region that for many symbolized the innocence and safety of the past.

"The people here were simple people. They didn't have writers and journalists to tell their stories," he said. "This is an attempt to tell their story, using what they left behind when they were forced to flee the homes, their schools and their churches. ...

"Modern life separates a man who has deep faith from a man who has little. In these villages, life and faith was simply combined and you can see that here."

In one of the starkest images – over a map of the stricken region – the melting reactor literally shatters a famous icon of the Virgin Mary holding the Christ child, while an apocalyptic storm swirls around her.

"We are tempted to think that fire and water and all the elements of nature are at our command, but that is not true," said Tkachev, outside the final exhibit hall. "We can become victims. ... The more technologies are in our lives, the more danger there is that we become their servants, even their slaves."

The archpriest stroked his beard, thinking of another way of stating the ultimate message of this sobering tribute to lessons learned at Chernobyl.

Finally he offered a litany of simple images.

If a man builds a bicycle and it breaks while he is riding it, then he will be hurt when he falls, said Tkachev. If he builds an airplane and it breaks, this man will almost certainly die when it crashes.

"Now, if we build a nuclear reactor in our back yard and it breaks, then the catastrophe will kill many and it may last into future generations," he said. "What this teaches us is that we must fear God and try to be humble about the things that we build with our own hands."