The Death of Jerry Falwell

by Mohammad Azraq (Jordan)

The conservative and quite very controversial Evangelical American leader Reverend Jerry Falwell passed away yesterday at a hospital in Virginia.

Throughout his life, he was considered the father of the political evangelical movement in the United States, he founded the Road Thomas Baptist Church and later Liberty University, which grew up to be very influencial organizations in the political arena in the U.S. His influence in U.S politics was very apparent during the presidential elections in 1980, as the succession of President Reagan was attributed to the campaigning that Mr.Falwell had done for him through his church and followers.

In 1972, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) launched an investigation of bonds issued by Falwell’s organizations. The SEC charged Falwell’s church with “fraud and deceit” in the issuance of $6.5 million in unsecured church bonds The church won a federal court case prosecuted at the behest of the SEC, in which the Court exonerated the Church and ruled that there had been no intentional wrong-doing.

Mr. Falwell, was known to be very controversial by many in and out of the United States. One of his most controversial statements was the one he made after the events of September 11, 2001, in which he blamed gays, lesbians and feminists for what happened!!!, he also called Prophet Mohammad a “terrorist” , yet apologized later.

According to BBC news,he denounced the British children’s show The Teletubbies, because he believed one character, Tinky Winky, was homosexual!!.