Religion: And Then There Was Billy

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Jim and Tammy, Jimmy, Jerry, Oral, Pat. With other evangelistic stars beset by scandal, political controversy or organizational woe, the untainted Billy Graham remains America's most admired religious leader. And the most durable. "My schedule is just as heavy as when I was 40," says Graham, who this week reached 70. His 1988 itinerary has featured revival meetings, drop-ins at both U.S. political conventions and breakthrough tours in two Communist lands.

It was 50 years ago that a rawboned young Billy delivered his first sermon one cold night before 36 Baptists in Bostwick, Fla. Since then, he has preached in person to upwards of 100 million people, more than any other clergyman in history except perhaps Pope John Paul. With recent appearances in Buffalo, Rochester and Hamilton, Ont., Graham has achieved a remarkable four- decade run of 375 carefully choreographed revival meetings along a civilized sawdust trail.

When Graham preaches nowadays, those piercing blue eyes flash from behind bifocals, the honey-brown mane of hair is fringed with white, and it takes a half-second longer to uncoil his 6-ft. 2-in. frame when he stands up to preach. But the lilting Carolina voice, firm as ever, still stirs the stadiums. Graham's simple messages always conclude with words like these: "I'm going to ask you to get up out of your seat and come forward to say, 'I open my heart to Jesus as Lord and Saviour.' " To date, say the Graham computers, 2.2 million people have responded.

In Graham's twilight years, the 1950s Red baiter has been targeting the Communist world. Over the past decade, Graham has managed to preach salvation and world peace in Poland, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Rumania, Hungary and -- three times -- the Soviet Union. Last April he conducted his first tour of mainland China, where his wife Ruth was raised by missionary parents. Prior to the arduous three-week visit, he was briefed by Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger; during it, he was the second foreign dignitary (after Corazon Aquino) to be received by new Premier Li Peng.

On a 1982 Soviet visit, Graham was lambasted for downplaying religious repression; he contends he was more effective by raising the problem in private. When the post-glasnost Graham preached last June at Orthodox and Baptist churches in Kiev, the authorities allowed outdoor loudspeakers for the overflow crowds, numbering in the thousands. During the Soviet adventures, he added admiration for the Eastern Orthodox to his longtime friendliness toward Roman Catholics. "I find the Lord's people among all these groups," remarks Graham, whose toleration infuriates Fundamentalists.

Relaxing at his elegant mountainside log house at Montreat, N.C., Graham recalled his ten-day Soviet marathon with wonderment: "You couldn't believe that human beings could live through it at any age." How long will this keep up? In 1989 there will be a London mission, linked by satellite to hundreds of sites in Britain and Africa. Graham is mulling bids from Hong Kong for 1990, and after that Barcelona, Buenos Aires and Kinshasa. His doctor hopes he can persist till age 75, but Graham wonders. "To try to hold the attention of a crowd of ten, twenty, thirty thousand people takes a tremendous amount of energy. In the next year I'll know how much it takes out of me."