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Sometimes, I know an uncomfortable truth. The truth being that if I ask a certain question, I know that I won't get the answer that I want to hear. Despite that, I still go ahead and ask the question as if I've convinced myself that I'll somehow hear the answer that I want. This leads to disappointment even though I knew that I'd get that answer. Should this stop me from asking the questions?

Remember that time where the entire country called for a witch burning for The Dixie Chicks because they were anti-war? Remember as well how the rest of the country kind of became anti-war since them too, but we still hate them?

For me, when I respect somebody, there are certain things that I don't say, don't think about and don't do because of that respect. The other night, I did something that I don't normally do to someone I respect. I would normally be horrified by that, but it felt... liberating.

I wrote this letter to the editor which was printed in The Threefold Advocate, my alma mater's campus newspaper, on 2011 February 3.¹

My senior year of college, I had the privilege of listening to Rev. Franklin Graham speak at a chapel service at JBU. Graham delivered an inspiring sermon concerning God's call and plan for our lives. However, after reading in the Advocate and other news sources after Graham spoke again at JBU on 2011 January 18, the thought going through my head is something along the lines of “Did he really just say that?”.

Graham spoke of people being “persecuted for standing up for the name of Christ”. Specifically, he was referring to the lack of a mention of the name of Christ at the memorial service for the victims of the senseless act of violence in Tucson, Arizona on 2011 January 8. My question is how can the lack of mention of Jesus be considered persecution?

I'm sorry, but calling American Christians persecuted is an utter insult to Christians in other parts of the world who serve as the real contemporary martyrs. I'm sure that Graham knows this as he is intimately involved with missions projects around the world. In some of these places, Christians actually are a marginalized population. Consider Iran where many Christians have to present a membership card in order to enter a church service along with having to be registered with the government with their address. Here in America, we whine and complain when Christianity isn't front and center in the spotlight. This culture-war hissy fit is doing a greater disservice to the name of Christ than the mere lack of mention of that name.

Rev. Graham's talk only reinforced the persecution complex that American Christians seem to possess. Our generation grew up hearing time and time again that, some day, some lunatic was going to burst into our church service, divide the congregation into people would denounce Christ and those who wouldn't and kill everyone who wouldn't. We grew up believing that the rest of the world had it in for us Christians, so we treated the rest of the world accordingly with an unreasonable spirit of fear. Shame on us!

I also found it odd that Graham would be one to talk of persecution. It is no secret that Franklin Graham has been one of the few high-profile religious leaders who has denounced the building of Park51, the proposed Islamic community center in Lower Manhattan. When Mr. Graham spoke at JBU in the spring of 2008, he spoke passionately of his efforts to rebuild churches in war-ravaged Sudan, a country with a majority Muslim population. His denunciation of Muslims building a mosque in New York City while enthusiastically leading efforts to build churches in Sudan is pure, unadulterated hypocrisy. If the Sudanese government stepped in and tried to prevent Graham from continuing his church-building efforts, no one would think twice before using the term persecution.

Rev. Franklin Graham is a true humanitarian, and I admire the man for his organization's extensive commitment towards evangelical and humanitarian missions across the globe especially his organization's efforts to provide clean water to people in developing countries and to respond to the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Still, efforts to show Christ's love for the world can be easily undone by senseless acts of hostility.

1. http://advocate.jbu.edu/site_files/2011/02-03/FULL_EDITION.pdf