Jerry Falwell

Falwell and twin brother Gene were born in the Fairview Heights region of Lynchburg, Virginia, the sons of Helen Virginia (Beasley) and Carey Hezekiah Falwell. His father was an entrepreneur and one-time bootlegger who was agnostic. His grandfather was a staunch atheist. Jerry Falwell married the former Macel Pate on April 12, 1958. The couple had two sons and a daughter (Jerry Falwell, Jr., a lawyer and current chancellor of Liberty University; Jonathan Falwell, an ordained minister who serves as the senior pastor at Thomas Road Baptist Church; and Jeannie, a surgeon).  He graduated from Brookville High School in Lynchburg, Va., and from Baptist Bible College in Springfield, Missouri in 1956. This Bible college was unaccredited until 2001. Falwell was later awarded three honorary doctoral degrees. The honorary doctorates were Doctor of Divinity from Tennessee Temple Theological Seminary, Doctor of Letters from California Graduate School of Theology, and Doctor of Laws from Central University in Seoul, South Korea.

In 1956, at age 22, Falwell founded the Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, where he served as pastor. The Church went on to become a megachurch, and is now run by Jerry Falwell’s son Jonathan Falwell, who serves in the same capacity as his father. The original church was located at 701 Thomas Road.   During the 1950s and 1960s, Falwell spoke and campaigned against the U.S. civil rights activist Martin Luther King, Jr. and the racial desegregation of public school systems by the U.S. federal government. Liberty Christian Academy (LCA, founded as Lynchburg Christian Academy) is a Christian school in Lynchburg, Virginia, which was described in 1966 by the Lynchburg News as “a private school for white students.”  The Lynchburg Christian Academy later opened in 1967 by Falwell as a segregation academy and as a ministry of Thomas Road Baptist Church.  The Liberty Christian Academy is today recognized as an educational facility by the Commonwealth of Virginia through the Virginia State Board of Education, Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, and the Association of Christian Schools International.

In 1971, Jerry Falwell founded Liberty University, the largest private, nonprofit university in the nation, the largest university in Virginia, and the largest Christian university in the world. Liberty University offers over 350 accredited programs of study, with approximately 13,000 residential students and 90,000 online.  In 1971, before the Roe v. Wade decision riveted America, the Supreme Court ruled in Green v. Connally to revoke the tax-exempt status of racially discriminatory private schools. Green v. Connally, produced a ruling that any institution that practiced segregation was not, by definition, a charitable institution and, therefore, no longer qualified for tax-exempt standing, holding: “Using federal tax funds to finance private schools for purposes of segregation of students in segregation academies violates the IRS public tax fund rules, as well as the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, because discrimination coupled with segregation is inherently unequal. District of Columbia district court affirmed.”

By 1975, the Internal Revenue Service moved to revoke the tax-exempt status of Bob Jones University, which forbade interracial dating (blacks were denied entry until 1971). The decisions infuriated Falwell. “In some states it’s easier to open a massage parlor than to open a Christian school,” Falwell complained.  Heritage Foundation co-founder Paul Weyrich stated that Falwell launched the Moral Majority political action committee during 1979 to aid the Catholic public protest against legal abortion in the United States in response to U.S. President Jimmy Carter’s “intervention against Christian schools” [the IRS intervention began during the Ford Administration] by “…trying to deny them tax-exempt status on the basis of so-called de facto segregation”.  The Moral Majority became one of the largest political lobby groups for evangelical Christians in the United States during the 1980s. The Moral Majority was promoted as being “pro-life”, “pro-traditional family”, “pro-moral” and “pro-American” and was credited with delivering two thirds of the white, evangelical Christian vote to Ronald Reagan during the 1980 presidential election.  According to Jimmy Carter, “that autumn [1980] a group headed by Jerry Falwell purchased $10 million in commercials on southern radio and TV to brand me as a traitor to the South and no longer a Christian.” During his time as head of the Moral Majority, Falwell consistently pushed for Republican candidates and for conservative politics. This led Billy Graham to criticize him for “sermonizing” about political issues that lacked a moral element, before adding, “We did not always agree on everything, but I knew him to be a man of God. His accomplishments went beyond most clergy of his generation.”

Falwell strongly advocated beliefs and practices he believed were taught by the Bible. The church, Falwell asserted, was the cornerstone of a successful family. Not only was it a place for spiritual learning and guidance, but also a gathering place for fellowship and socializing with like minded individuals. Often he built conversations he had with parishioners after the worship service into focused speeches or organized goals he would then present to a larger audience via his various media outlets.  Falwell found the Vietnam war problematic because he felt it was being fought with “limited political objectives,” when it should have been an all out war against the North. In general, Falwell held that the president “as a minister of God” has the right to use arms to “bring wrath upon those who would do evil.”  On his evangelist program The Old-Time Gospel Hour in the mid 1960s, Falwell regularly featured segregationist politicians like Lester Maddox and George Wallace. About Martin Luther King he said: “I do question the sincerity and nonviolent intentions of some civil rights leaders such as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Mr. James Farmer, and others, who are known to have left wing associations.”

In 1977, Falwell supported Anita Bryant’s campaign, which was called by its proponents “Save Our Children”, to overturn an ordinance in Dade County, Florida prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, and he supported a similar movement in California.  Twenty-eight years later, in an appearance on MSNBC television, Falwell said he was not troubled by reports that the nominee for Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, John G. Roberts (whose appointment was confirmed by the U.S. Senate) had done volunteer legal work for homosexual rights activists on the case of Romer v. Evans. Falwell told MSNBC’s Tucker Carlson that if he were a lawyer, he too would argue for civil rights for LGBT people. “I may not agree with the lifestyle, but that has nothing to do with the civil rights of that part of our constituency,” Falwell said. When Carlson countered that conservatives “are always arguing against ‘special rights’ for gays,” Falwell said that equal access to housing, civil marriage, and employment are basic rights, not special rights. “Civil rights for all Americans, black, white, red, yellow, the rich, poor, young, old, gay, straight, et cetera, is not a liberal or conservative value. It’s an American value that I would think that we pretty much all agree on.”

In February 1999, an unsigned article that media outlets attributed to Falwell was published in the National Liberty Journal – a promotional publication of the university he founded – claimed that the purple Teletubby named Tinky Winky was intended as a gay role model. An article published in 1998 by Salon.com had noted Tinky Winky’s status as a gay icon. In response, Steve Rice, spokesperson for Itsy Bitsy Entertainment, which licenses the Teletubbies in the United States, said, “I really find it absurd and kind of offensive.” The immensely popular UK show was aimed at pre-school children, but the article stated “he is purple – the gay pride color; and his antenna is shaped like a triangle – the gay-pride symbol”. Apart from those characteristics Tinky Winky also carries a magic bag which the NLJ and Salon articles said was a purse. Falwell added that “role modelling the gay lifestyle is damaging to the moral lives of children”.

In early 2005, Falwell was hospitalized for two weeks with a viral infection, discharged, and then rehospitalized on May 30, 2005, in respiratory arrest. President George W. Bush contacted Falwell to “wish him well”. He was subsequently released from the hospital and returned to his duties. Later in 2005 a stent was implanted to treat a 70% blockage in his coronary arteries.  On May 15, 2007, Falwell was found without pulse and unconscious in his office at about 10:45 a.m. after missing a morning appointment, and was taken to Lynchburg General Hospital. “I had breakfast with him, and he was fine at breakfast…He went to his office, I went to mine and they found him unresponsive” said Ron Godwin, the executive vice president of Falwell’s Liberty University. His condition was initially reported as “gravely serious”; CPR was administered unsuccessfully. As of 2:10 p.m., during a live press conference, a doctor for the hospital confirmed that Falwell had died of “cardiac arrhythmia, or sudden cardiac death”. A statement issued by the hospital reported he was pronounced dead at Lynchburg General Hospital at 12:40 p.m., EST. Falwell’s family, including his wife Macel and sons Jerry Falwell, Jr. and Jonathan Falwell, were at the hospital at the time of the pronouncement.

Falwell’s funeral took place on May 22, 2007, at Thomas Road Baptist Church after he lay in repose at both the church and Liberty University. Falwell’s burial service was private. It took place at a spot on the Liberty University campus near the Carter Glass Mansion, near his office. Buried nearby is B. R. Lakin.  After his death, his two sons succeeded him at his two posts; Jerry Falwell, Jr., took over as Chancellor of Liberty University while Jonathan Falwell became the Senior Pastor of Thomas Road Baptist Church.  The last televised interview with Jerry Falwell was conducted by Christiane Amanpour for the CNN original series CNN Presents: God’s Warriors. He had been interviewed on May 8, one week before his death. Falwell’s last televised sermon was his May 13, 2007, message on Mother’s Day.