Reverend Franklin Graham is truly concerned about the current state of Christianity in America, what with some church leaders now more concerned about famous affiliations and looking "cool" instead of truly sharing the Gospel.
In launching his "Decision America Tour," where he will visit all the states to encourage more Christians to be active in government, he said his main purpose was to promote God and not politics.
"If candidates showed up – we're not going to recognise them," Graham told Fox News. "We're not going to give them a microphone."
Graham explained that the tour is his way of "trying to lead this nation in prayer, confessing the sins of our country, asking for God's forgiveness and encouraging Christians to get engaged in the political process."
Because of this, Graham refuses to do what many young ministers are doing nowadays—dodging issues that some might consider to be politically incorrect. The son of legendary American evangelist Billy Graham said many older pastors understand the need to address relevant issues such as same-sex marriage, terrorism, and abortion, even though young pastors refuse to acknowledge them publicly.
"The younger pastors – so many are caught up in the pop culture, and the pastor in a church is more about being cool," he said. "We're beginning to put theology in the back seat and I'm concerned about the church."
"To be honest with you, the problems we have in America today are the failure of the church," he added.
The problem now, Graham said, is that the government is taking away the church's responsibilities. Things such as health care used to be the church's responsibility, but now the government is taking control of it and taking morality out of the equation.
"The churches have allowed the government to take away their responsibility and so the government is feeding people, the government is clothing people, the government is now in charge of health care," he said. "We as a nation are in trouble and only God can fix it."
