My picture of truth-telling as exemplified in great prophets of God such as Jesus Christ is that it is spoken with heroic love and kindness -- confronting the sinner, comforting the saint, offering healing for all.

Tremendous courage is demanded from those who speak for God. Moses, for example, received an unlimited stream of encouragement from el Shaddai to be bold, not to give in to his fear of the all-powerful Pharaoh or even of his inability to speak. God assured him of the support of angels and of heaven's power to be a spokesperson for an oppressed people.

How could Moses refuse?

Likewise, how could Billy Graham have refused the power of God -- which he claimed to have won for saving millions of souls from damnation -- by sucking up to one of the most bigoted presidents in U.S. history?

As reported in the U.K.'s The Guardian, one of the few reliable news sources available these days, Graham was advising Richard Nixon on campaign strategy during a 90-minute conversation after a prayer breakfast on Feb. 1, 1972. There he tells a delighted Nixon that Jews have a stranglehold on America "that has got to be broken or this country's going down the drain."

Then, again addressing Nixon, the revered evangelist turned toady says: "But if you get elected a second time, then maybe we might be able to do something." The Nazis did something; they called it the "Final Solution." Such talk is usually attributed to fascists or whacked-out religious fanatics and hate groups, not esteemed clergymen.

Was this a momentary indiscretion? Sycophancy at its religious worst? A failure of character? Unfortunately, Billy Graham, ill in his advanced age of 83, after offering his apologies, says he doesn't remember advising the president on the undesirability of Jews.

But there it is -- on tape. Released in early March by the National Archives and Records Administration, the tapes disclose the shadow side of the otherwise impeccable Graham.

In some religious circles, children and naïve adults believe that when they get to heaven God will replay their lives on a big TV screen before all of the saints and sinners. There they'll witness in excruciating detail all of the dirty deeds they've ever committed.

This twisted scare tactic reminds believers that nothing escapes the notice of God. Sooner or later, the saying goes, "your sin will find you out." Indeed, as most of us have learned throughout our lives, it does.

I've always believed that Billy Graham represented what was best in religion, even if I didn't agree with his message or his style: Rock solid, morally impeccable and upright, fearless in telling the truth. He always seemed to be one of the few irreproachable religious icons of our era, capable of standing his ground even in the presence of the most powerful figures in the world.

Unlike Moses, however, Billy Graham choked. Had he gone to Pharaoh as God's spokesperson, the Jews would still be making bricks in Egypt. What a pity, and a huge disappointment.

Of course, we all have skeletons in our closet.

Therefore, it's risky to be too hard on those who sin. Jesus himself said it best: "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone."

Nonetheless, it's right, in fact, more important than ever in this insane time of fear and violence, to call upon our religious leaders for something far better and more courageous than what Billy Graham offered inside the White House 30 years ago.

We need men and women of courage, who have the heart to stand bravely before God and the heads of state and demand that they feed the poor and the hungry, release the captives, forgive debts, and follow the way of love.

As Isaiah once cried: "Your rulers are rebels, and companions of thieves; everyone loves a bribe, and chases after rewards. They do not defend the orphan, nor does the widow's plea come before them." These are the real reasons why this country, as Graham reasoned in 1972, "is going down the drain."

In fact, the whole world is becoming unlivable, not because there are terrorists (or Jews, for that matter), as we've been told recently, but because our leaders themselves have turned the world into a place of terror.

For the love of money and power, they've ravaged the planet, destroyed habitats and natural resources, displaced families and the poor, declared war on everything that is good.

They've done this through the several deadly sins against which the Church and so many other religious organizations have warned us: greed, pride, murder, blasphemy, lying and stealing. And they've gotten away with it because we, and our religious leaders, have let them.

Where are the voices of integrity now? Where are the courageous and outraged defenders of virtue and righteousness? If Billy Graham shied away from his duty as a spokesperson for God to tell it straight to a paranoid bigot, who will stand in the gap and be heard now, when the world is so much more of a hornets' nest and our rulers are still the companions of thieves?

Don't look for the great prophets of today to come out of organized religion. You won't find them sitting piously in church pews, throwing a few coins in the collection plate to salve their conscience. And you're even less likely to find them sitting with the troubled leaders of this or any other nation calling them to account for their neglect of the poor and the environment, for their terrible waste of our natural resources.

Look behind the rocks in deserts, in the wastelands the West has created where so many in the Third World eke out their existence, in the streets of the cities where the displaced rummage through waste bins for sustenance. They'll tell you plainly what's ahead. They prophesy every day in their distress and in the inequities they suffer as a result of corporate greed and excess, supported by the policies of corrupt politicians.

"Your rulers are rebels," they say, "and the companions of thieves."

A popular saying in pious circles is: "Forgive the sinner but not the sin."

"Perhaps we can forgive Billy Graham for his serious lapse in moral courage and judgment in the presence of near-psychotic and paranoid heads of state. One would think, however, that we could depend on our models of conscience, particularly those who have access to powerful yet morally corrupt leaders, to have more backbone, to plainly state that racism -- and all unrighteousness -- is evil and wrong.

Stacey Warde is an editor of HopeDance Magazine (hopedance.org) and has written extensively on religious issues. He can be reached at upanatom@thegrid.net

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