My Meeting With Billy Graham

By JACK KENNY

God and nature and the weatherman all cooperated on the day Billy Graham came to Manchester, N.H., a city of about 100,000 people in the southern end of the state, about an hour’s drive north of Boston. Vermonters and New Hampshirites like to say the other state is upside down, since the one is shaped like the inverted image of the other.
And in a way, Manchester and the slightly smaller city of Nashua, about 18 miles further south, are inverted demographic images of the Granite State. For the state as a whole is about two-thirds Protestant and roughly one-third Catholic. In Manchester and Nashua, it is the reverse.
So in coming to Manchester, Graham, the Protestant evangelist, was entering what previous generations of Protestants might have called enemy territory. But the days of sectarianism and denominational wars had long been over before that bright and pleasingly spring day in 1982.
While a number of Protestant churches were helping to organize and prepare the populace for the Graham crusade, the statewide Roman Catholic Diocese of Manchester remained aloof, neither helping nor hindering the effort. It would not do to be seen joining a number of denominations to prepare the city for a visit by a “Bible only” evangelist preacher.
Also, the event would serve as a recruiting opportunity for the various faith communities to enroll new members. Gill Stadium, our largest outdoor venue at the time, would become an ecclesiastical shopping mall, with converts and cradle Christians alike having the opportunity to find a new “church home.” Such church shopping is an anathema to true Catholics who believe there is only one Church — “one Lord, one faith, one Baptism,” as the Apostle Paul wrote in his Epistle to the Ephesians.
So the nonparticipation by the Catholic churches was duly noted, though not much was made of it. A controversy did precede Graham’s visit, though, as he had made a trip to Russia and made nice with the rulers of the “Evil Empire.” Recall that this was in the early days of the Reagan presidency and the Cold War was, despite occasional thaws, still frozen. And Graham not only spoke in the great citadels of state-sponsored and rigidly controlled atheism, but he quoted the passage from the thirteenth chapter of Romans that exhorts subject to be obedient to their rulers, who execute justice for the common good.
Such talk in the heart of the Soviet Union made the world-famous evangelist sound like a Bible-spouting Henry Wallace. George Will wrote a bitter column in which he noted that Western capitalist businessmen sold police equipment to the rulers of the notorious Soviet police state. But the handcuffs and other restraints sold to the Communist dictators were not, Will insisted, our greatest “national embarrassment.” That would be the Rev. Dr. Graham.
Graham’s trip was controversial with people concerned that he would be meeting and rubbing shoulders with KGB agents. At a press conference preceding the stadium event in Manchester, I asked Graham more than once if he had, in fact, met with KGB agents. He patiently explained each time that he did not know, since KGB agents are far too clever to announce when they approach a foreign dignitary, “I am a KGB agent.” That made sense and I hoped that by my questioning I did not embarrass myself or unduly annoy the esteemed preacher.
The famous visitor appeared unruffled by all the publicity and the event went smoothly. Before it started, one of his team talked with press people and said we would be welcome to station ourselves in front of and around the platform during the hymns that preceded Dr. Graham’s appearance and even during the preacher’s opening remarks about how good it was to be in Manchester, and so forth.
We might go on taking pictures during that little prelude, but we should fade away as soon as the Reverend began the lesson which the reading of the verse of Scripture that would be the foundation for the lesson of the day.
It was impressive to see the famous preacher close-up. He was handsome and still youthful in appearance. His features were sharp and well defined, his chin strong, his smile radiant and his clear blue eyes sparkling. I don’t remember now, 36 years later, if his hair was still gold or was gray or silver. But he looked the part of a preacher, a governor, or a middle-aged movie star.
I was impressed the way the program began. You had to be there. There was something important that I had missed when watching Billy Graham crusades on television. When the hymn singing ended, Graham was already at the lectern, thumbing through the Bible, making his opening remarks. There was no trumpet, no drum roll, no cantor or choir director announcing, Ed McMahon style, “H-e-e-e-re’s Billy!” He was just there.
And after a few get acquainted remarks, he was reciting John 3:16: “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten so that whosoever believes in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life.” He paused for a moment to recall that people often asked him, “When are you going to stop peaching on John 3:16?” His answer, he said, was very simple: “When everybody is saved.”
I was by then familiar with the verse, but I could not recall that it was central in the catechetical teaching I received in my formative years as a “cradle Catholic” growing up in the 1950s and early 1960s. It was, I’m sure paraphrased, but not quoted, chapter and verse.
I silently wished that some of Graham’s evangelical zeal had been present and the central message of the Gospel better emphasized in the Catholic churches I attended. It too often seemed that we Catholics could leave church thinking the central requirement of the Gospel was that we be “nice,” that we “have a good day” and wish the same for others.
I don’t recall the rest of the preacher’s message, only that when it ended there was the usual altar call and hundreds, if not thousands, of us surged forward to be near the stage. As a Catholic, I often reflected on the irony of having an altar call where there was no altar, because there is no sacrifice to be offered. The present time, in most Protestant theologies, is not included in the “once and for all” sacrifice Christ made on Calvary. Still, we stood in front of the stage and the Rev. Graham observed us with a warm smile.
“What a great day this is for Manchester,” he said with his soft Southern accent pronouncing Manchester as “Manchestuh.”
And church emissaries were already moving through the crowd, talking to people and beginning the process of recruiting. One approached me, since I had come forward as a participant, even though, as my visitor/councilor noted, I was covering the event as a reporter.
“Are you saved?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said.
“How do you know?”
I said something about Christ paying for my sins on the cross, which my interrogator accepted though he seemed to think it inadequate. It is always awkward and difficult for a Catholic to discuss salvation within the narrow confines of Protestant evangelical theology. Their system knows nothing of sacraments, priesthood, sacred Tradition, church hierarchy, Magisterium, the Church as the Mystical Body of Christ.
Suddenly it was all over and Billy Graham was gone. I probably could have followed him, as I had given, when asked, a recommendation to a member of the evangelical team as to where they might stop for a bite to eat on their way out of town.
I liked Billy Graham and was glad to have met him. Throughout his long and stellar career, he had remained above every scent of scandal. His peaching was, like the “Mere Christianity” of C.S. Lewis, free of both anti-Semitism and anti-Catholicism. Concerning the latter, he neither affirmed nor denied any specifically Catholic doctrines, leaving my dear grandmother, at hearing one of his sermons, complaining that he had said nothing about the Blessed Mother.
Unlike the prominent Catholic William F. Buckley Jr., Graham refused to be interviewed for Playboy magazine, unless the editors agreed to publish no girly pictures in the issue in which his “Candid Conversation” would appear. That was a deal killer.
He preached Salvation, with a capital “S.” Let us pray that one who labored so hard and traveled so far to bring salvation to others and others to it, has found for himself “the fullness of joy in His presence.”