Thursday, September 26, 2002 3:50PM EDT

By TIM WHITMIRE, Associated Press Writer

CHARLOTTE, N.C(AP) - America is gradually being "Islamized" even while Islamic countries squelch religious freedom within their borders, evangelist Franklin Graham said in his latest comments on Islam.

Graham spoke in an interview published Thursday by the Asheville Citizen-Times.

"Our country is slowly being, very quietly, being Islamized by huge contributions from Saudi Arabia to our universities to pay for Islamic studies, to support Islamic causes in this country," Graham told the paper's editors. "I don't have a problem with that, but I can't go to Saudi Arabia and take even a Bible. I can't go to Saudi Arabia with a Bible. They will confiscate it."

A Temple University professor of Islamic studies and comparative religion expressed concern about the thrust of the comments.

"It's really the tone of Mr. Graham's remarks and his general kind of sweeping statements that are most disturbing," Professor Mahmoud Ayoub said Thursday.

Saudi money donated to American universities usually comes from individuals who have studied in the United States and is not directed at spreading Islam, said Ayoub, a native of Lebanon whose position at Temple is not endowed.

"In fact, I have argued to donors like the Saudis and others that they should have a little more say in how their money is spent," Ayoub said. "They don't have any say."

Graham, 50, is the son of America's most famous evangelist, Billy Graham, and is his father's named successor.

Since the Sept. 11 attacks, Franklin Graham has made repeated comments on Islam, calling it "a very evil and wicked religion."

Last month, in a radio interview, he questioned why Islamic clerics have not apologized to the American people for the Sept. 11 attacks.

In Tuesday's interview with the Citizen-Times, Graham spoke at length about Islam, apparently angered by a recent bombing near a hospital in southern Sudan run by his Boone-based Samaritan's Purse relief organization.

Sudan's Islamic government is engaged in a long-running war on the country's southern population, which is primarily Christian.

Graham said the bombing occurred just before a Sudanese diplomat invited him to participate in peace talks there. Graham said he asked the diplomat to deliver a message to the Sudanese president to stop attacking civilians.

"So after I finished the conversation, on my way home from Arkansas, two fighter planes bombed a little Dinka village and killed 14 people," Graham said.

"They will lie to you at the same time talking peace: 'We want you to be part of the peace process,' Well, thanks a lot for dropping a bomb on my hospital."

Graham traced the roots of the Sept. 11 attacks to the 1979 revolution that brought the Ayatollah Khomeni to power in Iran.

"We in the west have never experienced this kind of behavior, have never seen this before, where religion is driving people to mass murder, where religion is killing innocent people," Graham said. "(This) Islamic revolution that has taken place, starting in Iran, is rising and getting stronger."

Ayoub said that, in reality, there is a deep divide between Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida group and the Iranian revolutionaries.

"Iran is a Shiite country and both the Saudis and al-Qaida (are Sunnis), they see the Iranians as infidels," he said.

Ayoub added, "I do not think that Christianity is free from religious violence. ... I'm not saying Muslims are saints, but nor are Christians."

-- Anonymous, September 27, 2002

Answers

There was a fascinating article in The Atlantic this month about the future of Christianity. I read it several times, and it really got me to thinking, but I digress. One of the points of the article is that certain varieties of Christianity are growing exponentially in the Southern Hemisphere-- and that within a couple decades, there will be many more Christians than there are members of any other religion (although it may not be a Christianity that Americans and Europeans recognize). Unfortunately, the article is not online, but there is an interview with the author here:

http://www.theatlantic.com/unbound/interviews/int2002-09-12.htm

-- Anonymous, September 28, 2002

Good heavens! And we've been reading for at least a decade that I know of that Muslims will far outnumber any other religion. Of course, if they keep knocking off Christians then they WILL predominate. I don't have time for a good juicy read today but will check out the article maybe tonight or tomorrow. THanks for the head's up.

-- Anonymous, September 30, 2002