A couple of Billy Graham's quotes from the article referenced in the previous posting

Yeh, yeh ... I know; two postings in a row on the very same subject (more or less) ... totally out of synch with good Blogoshere etiquette ... not Blogospherically correct, I suppose. But the quotes and statements (paraphrased in a couple of cases) from the Newsweek article were just too good not to pass on.

One is almost from the Book of Proverbs--or should be! His son, Franklin, referred to Islam as "a very evil and wicked religion."

Billy Graham, when asked whether he agreed with his son on this, said, "I would not say Islam is wicked and evil ... I have a lot of friends who are Islamic. There are many wonderful people among them." Further, when asked whether he thought heaven would be closed to Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus or secular people, Graham said, "Those are decisions only the Lord will make. It would be foolish for me to speculate on who will be there and who won't ... I believe the love of God is absolute ... He said he gave His son for the whole world, and I think he loves everybody regardless of the label they have."

President Bush will probably have a cat fit over that statement, but age brings with it wisdom and even GWB might wizen as he ages.

Having lived almost a full decade in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (Dubai), I fully agree with the Reverend Billy Graham on that last statement.

One other remark that is pertinent today, as regards the US accidentally getting in the middle of the civil war between the Sunnis and Shiites in Iraq is when he (Billy Graham) told the Newsweek interviewer that he was tempted to call President Bush in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq to "advise him on the difference between Sunnis and Shiites," but decided against it.

We have now read the transcript of Bush's interview with the three Iraqi-Americans jut prior to the invasion wherein he didn't understand all of the "Sunni - Shiite" cross-talk ongoing and said, "I thought they were all Muslims!" Obviously, his country-experts should have briefed him on this important point long before a few weeks before the actual invasion. Our troops were already on the Kuwaiti border at the time.

Many believe that had Cheney or Rumsfeld (both of whom knew what we were getting into) had set aside their concerns relating to US control of Mosel and Basra (the oil and its distribution center) and advised Bush in this area, President Bush would not have committed the US military to a war in which they are fighting Sunnis (on the side of the Shiites) one week and fighting Shiites (on the side of the Sunnis) the next.

I believe that Mr. Bush wants to do the right thing; it's only that he's still taking his advice from unreliable sources. He isn't one to admit that he made a mistake, even if it was really the fault of his advisors and intelligence personnel.

But whatever ... read the cover story on Billy Graham in next week's Newsweek. You won't be sorry!