'Calling was never based on compensation,' says evangelist, who draws salaries from 2 ministries.
By Tim Funk and
Ames Alexander tfunk@charlotteobserver.com
Posted: Saturday, Oct. 10, 2009
In 2008, Franklin
Graham's compensation from the two ministries totaled $1.2 million, including $669,000 from BGEA.
Evangelist
Franklin Graham told his staff on Friday he wants to give up his pay as head of the Charlotte-based Billy Graham Evangelistic
Association, saying his calling to the ministry "was never based on compensation."
Comment:
Why did he take so long to make this decision? Why did it take negative publicity to force this decision?
Graham's decision
to ask the BGEA board of directors to stop paying him came a day after an Observer report raised questions about the
size of his compensation from the BGEA and Samaritan's Purse, the Boone-based international relief agency that Graham has
led since 1979.
In 2008, his
two salaries, two retirement packages and other payments from the ministries totaled $1.2 million. That included
$669,000 from BGEA, where, in February, 55 employees were laid off - more than 10 percent of the staff. Revenue at BGEA
dropped 18 percent last year; at Samaritan's Purse, it climbed 11 percent.
Graham, 57, will
continue to draw his salary and benefits from Samaritan's Purse, which totaled $535,000 in 2008.
Comment:
This Samaritan could buy a luxury hotel to house the man in the Bible.
After the Observer began asking questions about his compensation, he asked
the boards of the two ministries on Tuesday to suspend contributions to his retirement plans until the economy bounced
back.
Comment: No remorse. The decision is only temporary.
In a memo to
BGEA employees Friday, sent just before the end of the workday, he announced that he had asked the BGEA board of directors
"to consider that I work for no compensation. I feel that God has called me to this ministry and that calling was never based
on compensation."
The memo, which
covered several other subjects, made no mention of the concerns raised in the Observer. The newspaper reported criticisms
from charity watchdogs, who said they doubted anyone could do two full-time jobs leading organizations that, together,
employ almost 1,000 people with budgets of more than $200 million.
Comment: Does he work 80 hours per week?
Graham spokesman
Mark DeMoss said the evangelist called him Friday, before he sent the memo and a letter to BGEA board members. "He said, 'It's
not worth it. I'll just do without.
Comment:
It's not worth answering to the public. He will keep the $535,000 and drop the $669,000.
The board can
do what it wants,'" DeMoss reported.
BGEA board member
Denton Lotz said it's up to Graham - and not the board - to make such decisions. "I think that's great if he feels he can
do it," said Lotz, the pastor of an inner-city church in Boston.
Lotz's brother is married to Graham's sister, Anne Graham Lotz. She's an evangelist based in Raleigh and one of five Graham
family members on the 20-member BGEA board.
Comment:
Many family members have their hands in the pie.
Graham, who leaves
today for a Samaritan's Purse trip to Asia, was not available for an interview Friday.
'Here's what
I'm going to do'
Non-profit watchdog
Pablo Eisenberg, a senior fellow at the Georgetown Public Policy Institute, said he was delighted by Graham's decision. "He's
still getting more than most non-profit executives get," Eisenberg said. "He should be satisfied."
As head of Samaritan's
Purse, Graham earned more last year than any other leader of an international relief agency based in the United States. That includes eight with larger budgets, according to data compiled by Guidestar, a group that monitors nonprofits.
Comment:
1 Cor 9:18What
is my reward then? Verily that, when I preach the gospel, I may make the gospel of Christ without charge, that I abuse not
my power in the gospel.
Acts 20:33-35
33 I have
coveted no one's silver or gold or apparel. 34 Yes, you yourselves know that these hands have provided for my necessities,
and for those who were with me. 35 I have shown you in every way, by laboring like this, that you must support the weak. And
remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He said, 'It is more blessed to give than to receive.'"
Samaritan's Purse,
which sends planeloads of aid to victims in disaster areas and shoeboxes filled with Christmas gifts to poor children around
the world, "is where (Graham) started his ministry life," said DeMoss. "It's where he spends most of his time. And it's the
bigger of the two (ministries)."
Comment:
But he gets $134,000 more a year from BGEA.
Graham lives
in Boone and travels to Charlotte, site of the BGEA headquarters, five or six times a month, DeMoss
said.
Comment:
How can this be considered a full-time job?
DeMoss didn't
know when the BGEA board will meet to take up Graham's request to work for free. The full board meets twice a year, DeMoss
said, and its executive committee meets separately three times annually. "The executive committee can meet at any time," DeMoss
said. "And the full board can meet by phone." DeMoss said some BGEA board members tried to talk Graham out of requesting a
suspension of his retirement and an end to his pay.
Comment:
Afraid of a trickle-down affect on their own salaries.
"They said to
him that the CEO ought to be compensated," DeMoss said. "But he's at the point where 'Here's what I'm going to do. I make
a comfortable salary at Samaritan's Purse.'"
Moving ahead
Comment:
CEOs possibly. But there should be some moral constraints on gospel workers.
Whether he's
paid or not, Graham plans to go ahead with a full schedule of BGEA crusades - Graham calls them festivals - in 2010, DeMoss
said.
Today, he flies
to North Korea, where he'll present $190,000 in equipment and supplies for a dental
center being built in Pyongyang. Samaritan's Purse has been working there since 1997, providing more
than $10 million in medical and dental aid.
Graham will also
visit China, where last year Samaritan's Purse sent a Boeing 747 filled with
supplies for those devastated by a 7.9-magnitude earthquake.
