In death as in life, Graham service draws varied throng
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Standing at the simple wooden pulpit that the Rev. Billy Graham once used to preach his global crusades, his five children and evangelists from around the world gave tribute Friday to a man who for half a century was the world’s best-known living apostle of evangelical Christianity.
Mr. Graham, who died last week at 99, was eulogized in front of the Billy Graham Library in Charlotte under an enormous white tent reminiscent of the “canvas cathedral” where Mr. Graham conducted his breakout crusade in Los Angeles in 1949.
President Donald Trump, Vice
President Mike Pence and their wives attended the funeral, but were given no speaking role. The funeral gave the platform instead to the disciples who carry on Billy Graham’s ministry — including evangelists from India, Lebanon and South Korea — and his children.
Ruth Graham, one of his daughters, spoke of how she returned home to her father fearing harsh judgment after her second marriage ended.
“He wrapped his arms around me and said welcome home,” she recalled through tears. “There was no shame. There was no blame. Just unconditional love. My father was not God. But he showed me what God was like that day.”
The expectation was that the funeral would draw all or most of the living presidents who were healthy enough to attend. Three spoke at the opening of the Billy Graham Library in 2007 and former Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton came to Charlotte earlier this week to pay their respects to the Graham family.
But in the end, the only president who attended the funeral was Mr. Trump. In remarks on Wednesday when Mr. Graham’s coffin was laid in honor at the Capitol Rotunda, the president did what so many have done in the days since Mr. Graham died: he shared his own Billy Graham story, about seeing him in 1957.
“My father said to me, ‘ Come on son,’ “the president said. “‘Let’s go see Billy Graham at Yankee Stadium.’ And it was something very special.”
Mr. Graham died at his mountain home in Montreat, N.C., on Feb. 21. His body was carried in a motorcade down the mountain and 130 miles east to Charlotte, as thousands waved farewell from over passes along the interstate.
The funeral, under a 28,000-squarefoot tent that shuddered in a stiff wind, drew other political dignitaries including Ben Carson, the housing secretary, the former New York City mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina and his predecessor, Pat McCrory.
Franklin Graham, Mr. Graham’s eldest son and designated heir of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, did not veer into politics, though he has served as a frequent champion of Mr. Trump in the media. But he did include the kind of explicit, exclusivist claim of Christian faith that he has consistently used in his public appearances, including presidential inaugurations, when he insisted on giving his prayer “in the nameof Jesus.”
“The world with all its political correctness would want you to believe that there are many roads to God. It’s just not true,” Mr. Graham said. “My father would want me to share this with you today.”
He delivered a sermon that included the kind of direct appeals to Christian conversion that were his father’s trademark: “Are you saved? Are you forgiven? Are you trusting in your Lord as your savior? If you’re not sure, there is no better time than at Billy Graham’s funeral.”
In his later years, Billy Graham forged relationships with leaders of other Christian denominations, and his funeral reflected those efforts, with Roman Catholic, Russian Orthodox and Greek Orthodox leaders among those in attendance.
Mr. Graham was buried in the prayer garden at his library next to his wife, Ruth Bell Graham, who died in 2007.