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I have read a little about Billy Sunday on the internet lately, mostly on Wikipedia. I find it interesting that for things Billy Graham has been labeled by some a "liberal" Sunday did the same but is a hero to the same people.
Sunday avoided criticizing the Catholic Church.
Cards for converts were sent back to the churches of their choice including Catholic and Unitarian. (I sincerely doubt Graham did the latter).
Juiced altar calls. His 20 year associate song leader, Homer Rodeheaver, claimed in later years the invitations (altar calls) had become so general they were meaningless.
Hanging out with the "Hollywood crowd".
And some things Graham wasn't criticized for:
Was as much entertainer as preacher.
As bad if not worse than Mark Driscoll in contemporary times for course talk on sex.*
I'm not being critical of either here...just looking at contrast and comparison and how both men are viewed differently for some of the same things by the same people. Why does Sunday get a pass?
* ")...[a friend] says that Mr. Sunday's sermon on the sex question was raw and disgusting. He also heard the famous sermons on amusements and booze. [He] says that all in all they were the ugliest, nastiest, most disgusting addresses he ever listened to from a religious platform or a preacher of religion. He saw people carried out who had fainted under that awful definition of sensuality and depravity. Homer Rodeheaver (Sunday's twenty-year associate song leader) said that "One of these sermons, until he tempered it down a little, had one ten-minute period in it where from two to twelve men fainted and had to be carried out every time I heard him preach it."Martin, Robert Francis (2002). Hero of the Heartland: Billy Sunday and the Transformation of American Society, 1862-1935. Indiana University Press. ISBN 0-253-34129-9., p. 87[/i][/i]
Sunday avoided criticizing the Catholic Church.
Cards for converts were sent back to the churches of their choice including Catholic and Unitarian. (I sincerely doubt Graham did the latter).
Juiced altar calls. His 20 year associate song leader, Homer Rodeheaver, claimed in later years the invitations (altar calls) had become so general they were meaningless.
Hanging out with the "Hollywood crowd".
And some things Graham wasn't criticized for:
Was as much entertainer as preacher.
As bad if not worse than Mark Driscoll in contemporary times for course talk on sex.*
I'm not being critical of either here...just looking at contrast and comparison and how both men are viewed differently for some of the same things by the same people. Why does Sunday get a pass?
* ")...[a friend] says that Mr. Sunday's sermon on the sex question was raw and disgusting. He also heard the famous sermons on amusements and booze. [He] says that all in all they were the ugliest, nastiest, most disgusting addresses he ever listened to from a religious platform or a preacher of religion. He saw people carried out who had fainted under that awful definition of sensuality and depravity. Homer Rodeheaver (Sunday's twenty-year associate song leader) said that "One of these sermons, until he tempered it down a little, had one ten-minute period in it where from two to twelve men fainted and had to be carried out every time I heard him preach it."Martin, Robert Francis (2002). Hero of the Heartland: Billy Sunday and the Transformation of American Society, 1862-1935. Indiana University Press. ISBN 0-253-34129-9., p. 87[/i][/i]
