The body of evangelist Billy Graham will lie in honor under the US Capitol Rotunda next week as Congress pays tribute to a clergyman who counseled presidents and preached the Gospel to millions worldwide, House Speaker Paul Ryan said Thursday.
The body of evangelist Billy Graham will lie in honour under the US Capitol Rotunda next week as Congress pays tribute to a clergyman who counselled presidents and preached the Gospel to millions worldwide, House Speaker Paul Ryan said Thursday.
The body of evangelist Billy Graham will lie in honor under the US Capitol Rotunda next week as Congress pays tribute to a clergyman who counseled presidents and preached the Gospel to millions worldwide, House Speaker Paul Ryan said Thursday.
Graham, who died at his home near Asheville, North Carolina, on Wednesday at age 99, will arrive at the white-domed Capitol on Feb. 28 and lie in honor there until the following day, Ryan said in a statement.
“Members of the public and Capitol Hill community are invited to pay their respects to the late reverend while he lies in rest,” the speaker said.
Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell will take part in a bicameral service when Graham’s casket arrives, the statement said.
A spokeswoman for the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association in Charlotte, North Carolina, said by phone that the family had approved a request from McConnell and Ryan for the public tribute.
His casket will lie in honor in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, Feb. 28, and Thursday, March 1.
The public viewing for the internationally famous spiritual leader who is credited with changing the face of evangelical Christianity in America, was arranged by House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., and Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. Both Republican leaders will deliver remarks.
It is a rare privilege for civilians to be honored in this way, a distinction that usually is reserved for presidents or members of Congress, although they technically lie “in state.” The practice changed in 1998 when Congress voted to recognize two Capitol Police officers who died in the line of duty.
In 2005, Americans got the chance to pay their respects to civil rights leader Rosa Parks, the first woman to lie in honor in the rotunda.
Graham preached Christianity to more people than anyone else in history during his 70-year career, reaching hundreds of millions of people either in person or via TV and satellite links, his ministry said.
Graham became the de facto White House chaplain to several US presidents, most famously Richard Nixon. He also met with scores of world leaders and was the first noted evangelist to take his message behind the so-called Iron Curtain, the term used for the Communist bloc countries of East Europe and the Soviet Union in the decades after World War II.
The US Capitol tribute will follow Graham’s remains lying in repose at the family home, which is at the Billy Graham Library in Charlotte, his organization said.
he made comment on Gay :
Let’s consider for a moment his attitude towards gay people, illustrated rather well by an exchange of letters in 1974. A woman wrote to Graham, asking him about the love she felt for another woman. He began by quoting Paul’s letter to the Corinthians: “Make no mistake: no fornicator or idolator, none who are guilty either of adultery or of homosexual perversion … will possess the kingdom of God” (1 Corinthians 6:9).
He added that homosexuality was an “ungodly spirit of self-gratification” and famously went on to say “we traffic in homosexuality at the peril of our spiritual welfare. Your affection for another of your own sex is misdirected and will be judged by God’s holy standards.
His funeral is planned for March 2 at a venue that holds about 2,300 people in front of the library. He will be buried on library premises next to his wife, Ruth, who died in 2007.
Graham will be only the fourth person to lie in honor at the Rotunda since the tribute began in 1998 for two US Capitol Police officers slain in the line of duty. Civil rights figure Rosa Parks was the last person to receive the honor following her death in 2005.
Lying in honor at the Capitol is granted for private citizens. It is distinct from lying in state, a tribute normally reserved for elected US officials or military figures.