As someone who has the greatest respect and affection for the lives and works of (a strong influence in a Southern Baptist childhood), in the News Observer made me want to weep.
From the article: "It is a struggle worthy of the Old Testament, pitting brother against brother, son against mother, and leaving the famous father, the Rev. Billy Graham, trapped in the middle, pondering what to do.
Retired and almost blind at 88, the evangelist is sitting in his modest log house on a mountaintop in Western North Carolina and listening to a family friend describe where , heir to his father's worldwide ministry, wants to bury his parents.
Billy's wife, Ruth Bell Graham, is listening too, curled up in a hospital bed on this bleak November evening. At 86 years and 100 pounds, she suffers from degeneration of the spine, which keeps her in constant pain.
In a nightgown and pearl earrings, she stares up at the longtime friend on her right, her face and mind alert. On her left sits her younger son, Ned, 48, who has taken care of her and Billy for four years, and Ned's wife, Christina.
Events will unfold quickly in the days afterward: more meetings, prayers and a notarized document that Ruth signed before six witnesses.
But at this moment everyone's attention is on the visitor, crime novelist Patricia Cornwell, who is talking about a memorial library that the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, headed by Franklin, is building in Charlotte."
At issue is whether or not the Grahams will be buried in Charlotte, at Franklin's new library complex . .
. or at " " religious training center they founded and built in the mountains near Montreat (just off I-40, east of Asheville).
"Nestled in forests of poplar and Southern pine, invisible from the highway except for a single gray steeple, the 1,500-acre Cove was Ruth's project from its beginning in 1984.
She believed that people working hard for Christ needed a place where they could idle in a rocking chair, stare at the mountains, and find new energy to continue their work. Her husband and his board agreed, setting up the Billy Graham Training Center at the Cove.
When Ruth was supervising construction at the Cove, she paid particular attention to the chapel, a spare yet elegant stone edifice built by local laborers.
She arranged six arched, clear glass windows on each side of the sanctuary so that visitors would always see outside. She asked that the floors be made of native pine and the chandeliers of cast iron from Asheville. On the sanctuary's back walls she hung two damask banners summing up Billy's ministry and what she considered hers, the first quoting Jesus saying, "Go Ye Unto All the World" and the other, "Come Unto Me and I Will Give You Rest.
"
A few hundred yards from those banners is the quiet, leafy spot where Ruth intends to be buried."
After the lawsuits were "resolved" in 2001, and in the wake of 9/11 . .
. desperate for some spiritual respite from a world gone completely mad . .
. I visited the Cove. I sat in the empty chapel with glorious mountains visible all around (through the massive windows that Ruth was wise enough to leave spare).
I visited the site where a guide told me the Grahams would be buried.
There are no words.
According to the article, Ruth's other children, led by youngest son, Ned, encouraged her to make her wishes known in a notarized document and she did: "Since it is impossible for me to be buried at my 'first home' in China, my next choice is the beautiful mountains of Western North Carolina which I have loved and where I have lived for the past 60 years.
"
In the article, Ned speaks reverently of his parents. "His parents are finally home together most days now. They eat supper watching old movies like "The Sound of Music" and listening to Ned or Christina read the Bible.
Ned has chosen stories about decision-making and God's solace in troubled times.
Billy Graham sits next to Ruth's bed for long periods, stroking her arms and face."
While I also have great respect for Franklin Graham .
. . particularly his work through the medical relief organization, , this time I've gotta say, Leave your Daddy be.
Don't make him choose.
Your brother, Ned, is right, "There never would have been a Billy Graham without a Ruth Graham."
Listen to your Mother.
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