Evangelicals - From Faith to Power

Want your problem solved?

Want that burden lifted?

Right now, you want those frustrations and inner conflicts quieted and you want inner serenity in your soul?

Do you want that?

You really do?

All right.

You can, right now, if you let Christ come into your heart.

-[ Dramatic music plays ] -NARRATOR: This is Billy Graham, the man who helped spread Evangelicalism, a form of Christianity, from the United States to the rest of the world after World War II.

No religious leader before him had ever preached in front of 200 million people around the world.

...not at this very important moment.

[ Group singing, man speaking French ] NARRATOR: Christianity in all its denominations -- Catholicism, Orthodoxy, Anglicanism, Protestantism -- was losing ground.

Yet thanks to Evangelicals, Christianity is one of the few religions in the world that's still growing.

As of 2020, 660 million people in the world identify as Evangelicals.

That's nearly one out of twelve human beings.

[ Man shouting indistinctly, crowd cheering ] Jesus is their friend, their savior, the king of kings.

They are fighting a battle whose ultimate objective is nothing less than saving humanity.

Some speak of spiritual warfare.

[ Crowd cheering ] [ Music continues ] The Evangelical mission is to defend the moral values they draw from the Bible and to bring Christ's message to every human being on the planet.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] LARSON: But the reality is, ever since the Babylonians took the Israelites out of their homeland, God's man has waited by the side.

Because John said, "I saw one.

When he spoke, it was like the sound of many waters.

His feet were like fine brass."

He's the glory of the city!

He's the eternal city!

And he's comin' back for you and me.

And his name is Jesus Christ, the son of the living God!

[ Music builds, continues ] [ Dramatic music plays, choir singing ] He's alive -[ Music builds, ends ] -[ Applause ] Our faith needs to help the culture conform to the reality of faith.

Culture changes, people change, civilization changes, but God's word never changes.

Lift up your hands and rejoice.

Hey!

There's a sound of victory!

There's a sound of victory!

Come on!

There's victory!

NARRATOR: The most radical among them call for imposing the supremacy of the literal truth of the Bible on the whole of society -- on a cultural, social, and political level.

...is broken off of you right now.

[ Crowd cheering ] NARRATOR: In the United States in 2016, Donald Trump won the presidency thanks to 81% of white Evangelicals' votes.

Evangelical leaders got a foothold in the White House, and for four years, they were at President Donald Trump's side.

...will humble themselves and pray and seek Your face.

You will forgive their sins and heal... MORRISON: We thank You for Jesus and his love, and we pray that his love will be shown through Your church forevermore.

-Amen.

-[ Crowd cheering ] NARRATOR: Two years later, in Australia, the fervent Evangelical Scott Morrison came to power.

That same year, in Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro was elected president, thanks yet again to those Christians' votes.

Named "The Myth" by his supporters, he has declared that only God will wrest power away from him.

[ Dramatic music plays ] I'd like for all of us just to -- I'm gonna -- We'll just turn and let's face the Capitol.

And let's raise our hands toward the Capitol.

And, Father, we pray right now in Jesus' name... NARRATOR: What are the strategies of the Evangelical wave that has surged across every continent since the end of World War II?

To understand this incredible success story, we will travel the world to meet converts and preachers, religious and political leaders.

They will tell us about their faith, their spiritual battles, and the great crusade that they have embarked upon, some to the summits of power and among the most influential countries on the planet.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] [ Group vocalizing ] [ Music continues ] [ Music continues ] NARRATOR: Evangelicals from around the world share four tenets that they must believe in and apply in their own lives -- being born again, Bible reading, Jesus's crucifixion having atoned for humanity's sins, and spreading the good word of the Gospel.

[ Applause ] First tenet -- being born again.

Becoming an Evangelical is a conscious choice that can be made from the age of reason.

That conversion is acknowledged by the ritual of baptism.

[ Man speaking French ] [ Applause ] [ Down-tempo music plays ] [ Birds chirping ] NARRATOR: Second tenet -- studying Scripture, both the Old Testament and the New.

The Bible is the foundation of a believer's entire life.

Shane Claiborne, an American Evangelical preacher and activist, and his wife, Katie Jo, have gone on a yearlong meditative retreat to devote themselves to daily Bible study.

"They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer."

Jesus is the lens through which we understand the Bible, the lens through which we understand the world.

Literally, the word becomes flesh.

That's how the Gospel of John begins.

The word becomes flesh in Jesus.

If we want to know what God is like, we look at Jesus.

Jesus gives us something we can, you know, really wrap our hands around.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: Third tenet -- expiation through Jesus's death.

Jesus died on the cross to atone for our sins.

Believing in his resurrection to free oneself from death -- an intimate experience that Evangelicals are invited to experience in their own lives.

An Evangelical Christian believes in the message of the cross -- that Jesus died for our sins, paid the price, and because of his death, burial, and resurrection, we are free from sin and death and have a promise of eternity with him.

[ Music continues ] NARRATOR: Fourth tenet -- evangelizing.

DOCHUK: Those who consider themselves Evangelical stress priority of the belief that Jesus's act on the cross provided this access to salvation for all and, perhaps most importantly, in exchange for this relationship with Christ, one's absolute commitment to spreading the gospel.

This is to evangelize.

This is what it means to be Evangelical, is to spread the good news of Scripture to the rest of the world.

NARRATOR: Evangelical missionaries travel the world bringing the good news to those who have not yet met Jesus.

LaDonna Osborn, a self-proclaimed bishop, runs the Osborn Ministries, an American missionary organization founded by her father in the 1950s.

[ Crowd cheering ] Africa is their favored continent.

The continent has enabled a number of preachers to build their careers and huge fortunes.

OSBORN: A wind began to blow.

The power of the Lord is in this place, and miracles are happening everywhere.

The people are wild with faith.

Seeing the crutches in the air and experiencing the power of God.

Look at this boy.

Come here.

He began walking.

His mother was holding the stick that he used to walk.

He is serious about receiving his miracle.

[ Crowd cheering ] It was my mother and father that pioneered this thing we know today as mass evangelism.

Go to an open field, say, "Everyone's welcome.

Come and bring the sick.

Jesus is a healer.

Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever."

And so what is the proof that our message is true, not just an alternative religion?

The miracles are the proof.

And that what it was in Bible days.

Jesus said, "If you don't believe me, believe the works that I do."

[ Down-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: Evangelicalism's roots are found not in the United States, but in Europe.

They go back to the 16th century.

Martin Luther, a German, and Jean Calvin, a Frenchman -- the two fathers of the Protestant Reformation -- challenged the all-powerful Catholic Church.

They taught and spread new theologies focused on strict study of the Bible.

The Reformation led to the creation of a host of religious groups.

The Anabaptists, Baptists, Puritans, and more spread across Europe.

But they were cruelly persecuted.

Wars of religion waged, thousands of people died, and many went into exile.

In the early 17th century, many of them began to migrate to New England, like the English theologian Roger Williams, who settled in Providence, Rhode Island, where he founded the first Baptist church in America.

The Baptists would go on to become one of the most influential denominations in the United States.

In his writings, he advocated religious freedom.

He was able to establish a relation of mutual respect with the Native Americans.

BALMER: One of the principal characteristics of the Baptist tradition as it emerges, particularly in North America, is the whole notion of liberty of conscience and the separation of church and state.

Roger Williams is the founder of the Baptist tradition in America, and he recognized the importance of separating these two entities.

He wanted to protect the integrity of the faith from too close an association with the state or with politics.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: The principle of the separation of church and state to ensure religious freedom that Williams extolled would be contested by the Puritans, a rigorous Anglican group.

On their way to America, they wrote the Mayflower Compact, the document that would govern life in the colony for many years.

For the Puritans, America was the promised land, where they gave themselves the mission of building a new world and preparing for Christ's second coming.

[ Music continues ] And they imposed their dogma.

[ Dramatic music plays ] NARRATOR: This conflict between conservative and progressives would play a decisive role for centuries to come.

Three waves of religious revival, from the 18th to the 19th century, developed a form of social Evangelicalism.

But the advent of modernism in the early 20th century changed everything.

[ Horn honks ] The most conservative Evangelicals saw modernity as a threat to Christian values.

Scientific progress and Darwin's theory of evolution shocked them into action.

Some of them entered into a kind of resistance by creating fundamentalism, a movement that advocated a return to the Bible and what would become fundamental dogma.

They cut themselves off from the rest of society and maintained a belief in the supremacy of Christianity in the cultural enclaves they controlled, particularly in the South.

[ Dramatic music plays ] On December 7, 1941, a dramatic turn of events.

Two years after the start of the Second World War, the United States faces the first large-scale attack perpetrated on its own soil.

[ Explosions echoing ] Immediately after Pearl Harbor, fundamentalists decide it is time to step into the limelight and proclaim their Christian values loud and clear in order to save the nation from liberalism and materialism.

In 1942, they found the NAE, the National Association of Evangelicals.

Modern Evangelicalism is born.

But it needs a spokesman.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: William Franklin Graham is the chosen man.

Born in North Carolina in 1918, raised in a very conservative environment on his parents' farm, he will become the face of modern Evangelicalism and go on to international fame as Billy Graham.

He was young, he was good-looking, he was charismatic, and says, "Wait a second.

As Evangelicals, we need to be more optimistic.

We need to embrace our role in American society.

We need to engage it and we need to change it."

[ Music continues ] Our Scripture tonight is taken from Amos, the fourth chapter and the 12th verse.

We read these words.

"Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel."

And God warns every man and every woman and every boy outside of Jesus Christ to prepare to meet almighty God.

NARRATOR: Billy Graham becomes the iconic missionary of the Evangelical movement that spreads around the world after World War II.

He will lead the Christian revival to its high point.

For over 50 years, he conducts the largest Evangelical gatherings ever -- not in churches or temples but in tents and later in stadiums.

GRAHAM: There's a little voice speaking to you now, and even while I'm talking, that little voice is saying, "That's what I need.

I need Christ.

I need God."

Your pride begins to speak up and argue.

For my father, I know that his concern as he was growing up was that the simple message of the Gospel was not being preached.

And the Gospel, again, it's going back to that Jesus Christ is God's son.

He came to this earth to rescue, to save us from our sins.

This is the message.

This is the Gospel.

And that is what my father focused on.

Shall we pray?

BALMER: The culmination of his great revival campaigns was to bring -- to invite people to come to Jesus, to walk forward toward Graham himself as a gesture of their commitment to be a Christian, to be a born-again Christian.

This is a theology that is very individualistic.

And this was part of his appeal, to talk to individuals and try to persuade them, to cajole them, to accept what he was preaching, to make a decision for Christ.

[ Dramatic music plays ] NARRATOR: Billy Graham calls his evangelization campaigns crusades.

He conducts them first in the United States and then around the world.

The first European crusade -- London.

In less than three months, two million British attendees are captivated by his preaching.

GRAHAM: Wouldn't it be great to see everybody in the city of London discussing Christ?

Wouldn't it be wonderful to see our churches crowded again?

Wouldn't be wonderful to see evil and materialism and secularism hurled back?

Wouldn't it be wonderful to see a lowering of our crime rate and divorce rate by the power of the spirit of God?

In the next five years, I am convinced that Britain is going to have a spiritual awakening such as you have not had since Wesley.

He had a way of communicating, particularly to large audiences, in a way that few people can do.

He understood the importance of that communication, and he was very good at it.

[ Choir singing ] NARRATOR: It is a triumph that catapults him to star status in just a few weeks.

The pope of the Evangelicals is born.

Resolutely in tune with modern life, he stands up for Christian conservative values, preaching them tirelessly all over the world.

[ Music continues ] CLAIBORNE: To name an Evangelical event "the crusades" is mind-boggling, right?

And then, you know, we still hear that language, though.

George Bush called his military campaign in Iraq and Afghanistan a crusade.

You know, like literally we are going to rid the world of evil.

This is a battle against good and evil.

So that crusade language is still with us.

One of the biggest organizations in the country, maybe in the world, has been Campus Crusade for Christ.

[ Group singing in French ] NARRATOR: Billy Graham becomes the icon of the perfect white nuclear family, the icon of postwar American economic, social, and cultural success, saving the world in the name of God.

-[ Down-tempo music plays ] -[ Group singing in French ] [ Music continues ] The Cold War has begun.

The postwar world divides up into two blocs -- on the one side, the so-called "free world" and on the other, the Soviet bloc.

The tone of Graham's crusades changes.

It gets more political.

GRAHAM: France has paid a greater price for freedom than any nation on earth.

[ Speaking French ] GRAHAM: It is one of the most strategic countries in the world.

[ Interpreter speaking French ] This great country could well lead the world back to God.

[ Speaking French ] GONZALEZ: [ Speaking French ] ANNOUNCER: The superliner United States arrives in New York, bringing Evangelist Billy Graham home from a four-months preaching tour in Europe.

The young Evangelist says he believes there is a religious awakening in Western Europe and that communism is losing its appeal to many minds.

There's some evidence that within Russia today there is great spiritual hunger.

And it is our prayer that not only will we see a great religious revival in the United States and Western Europe but also in the eastern world as well.

NARRATOR: Billy Graham becomes a figure of the Cold War, serving the free world.

To increase his chances of success, he founds a media empire.

His weekly radio ministry, "Hour of Decision," broadcast across the United States, has 20 million faithful listeners.

GRAHAM: We need a spiritual revolution in America... NARRATOR: He founds the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, which is in charge of collecting donations to finance his crusades.

He also creates Christianity Today magazine, which is still a reference in the world of Evangelicals.

And with World Wide Pictures, he gets into film production.

GONZALEZ: [ Speaking French ] [ Down-tempo music plays ] -GROUP: Oiltown, USA!

-[ Dramatic music plays ] Oiltown Everyone knows that it's great NARRATOR: In this film, one of the very first ones he produced, Billy Graham plays a televangelist preaching repentance to an oil tycoon -blinded by greed.

-Go ahead.

Bow your head.

Repent of your sins.

Confess that you're a sinner.

You can do it right where you are, right now.

DOCHUK: You have so many powerful, deeply devout Christian oilmen who quite simply saw it as their duty to go out into the world, to spread the Gospel, use their money to support Christian institutions, and, by extension, in their own mind, to help uplift third-world nations, third-world societies and bring them into kind of a higher social-economic order that was in line with their principles of Christian democracy.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: Funded by oil money, Billy Graham champions ethical capitalism and carries the Evangelical faith all the way to the White House and the heart of political power.

He will get to know every American president, even becoming close friends with some of them -- mostly the Republicans.

[ Music continues ] Billy Graham plays a key role in Eisenhower's decision to run for president.

Once he is elected, Graham offers to convert him.

It is at Graham's urging that Eisenhower has the motto "In God We Trust" printed on dollar bills and stamps.

[ Music continues ] DOCHUK: "In God we trust" was for the first time used in terms of kind of the expression of unity under a monotheistic being -- Protestant, Catholic, Jew.

This is something that Eisenhower embraced at the encouragement of Billy Graham.

Prayer breakfasts were also started in Washington, an annual occurrence where religious leaders would come together with political leaders to very much not just worship together, but to celebrate this kind of "one nation under God" concept.

[ Dramatic music plays ] NARRATOR: Billy Graham wants to bring a spiritual dimension to the euphoria of the postwar period, the triumph of the American dream.

[ Music continues ] GRAHAM: We cannot build the 21st century with these scientific instruments alone!

There is another dimension -- the dimension of the spirit, the moral dimension!

And we must come back to God as a people if we are to go into the 21st century and with the human race intact... NARRATOR: On the other hand, despite the image of a land of progress, the racial problem is still far from being resolved.

Despite the abolition of slavery in the late 19th century, segregation is still strictly imposed in many Southern states, and African-Americans continue to be cruelly discriminated against and repressed.

Madam, are you for or against integration?

We are against it.

And you, madam?

Et vous, madame?

I don't approve.

[ Speaking French ] Why?

Pourquoi?

Because God didn't make us that way.

What if we could develop a little pill that you could take along with your barbiturates and aspirins that could change your nature so that you'd never lose your temper again, you'd never be filled with racial prejudice again?

NARRATOR: Although he comes from a fundamentalist environment that believes in white supremacy, Billy Graham becomes one of the very first Evangelical leaders to speak out against segregation.

Seating at his revivals is unsegregated.

I've been told my whole life, sometimes by my grandfather and now it's just been passed on, about a time that he had a crusade in the South.

And it was segregated, and he asked one of his ushers to go down and remove the ropes that were segregating the crowd.

And the usher wouldn't do it because of the pushback.

So my grandfather himself went down there and removed the ropes 'cause he refused to speak to a segregated crowd.

And my father, being a white Evangelical preacher, decided early on that he was not going to have segregated meetings but he would integrate his meetings.

And this was a huge controversy, and a lot of white churches pulled away because of my father's position.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: Despite criticism from white supremacists, Billy Graham reaches out to Reverend Martin Luther King.

GRAHAM: Martin Luther King suggested to me that I stay in the stadiums in the South and hold integrated meetings, because he was probably going to take to the streets.

He said, "I'll probably stay in the streets, and I might get killed in the streets."

But he said, "I don't think you ought to because you will be able to do things I can't do and I can do some things you can't do, but we're after the same objective."

[ Dramatic music plays ] NARRATOR: Urban violence flares across the country -- riots in Birmingham, the march in Montgomery.

Martin Luther King is arrested.

Billy Graham says nothing.

He doesn't carry through on his commitment.

Billy Graham, I think, has to... to answer at some point for his failure to be part of the march from Selma to Montgomery, for example.

His presence there would have been a powerful statement against racism.

GROUP: Freedom Freedom Freedom, freedom -MAN: Louder!

Louder!

- Freedom NARRATOR: August 28, 1963 -- Between 200,000 and 300,000 people march on Washington.

Martin Luther King gives his famous "I have a dream" speech.

Billy Graham isn't there to hear it.

KING: I am happy to join with you today ...in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

ROYSTER: You know, Billy Graham as well as other religious leaders of that day could have said more.

You know what would have made a difference?

If Billy Graham had joined the march on Washington with Dr. King.

If Billy Graham had joined Dr. King when he was marching in Selma.

If he had joined him at the bus boycott when they were in Montgomery.

He could have said, "No.

We are all God's children, and we're gonna be in this together."

But he chose not to do that.

Could you imagine if Billy Graham had jumped up and marched with Dr. King, if he had walked with Dr. King, if he had spoken with Dr. King?

If he was willing to follow Dr. King's leadership in that moment, how might this country be a different place as a result of that?

[ Mid-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: November 22, 1963 -- Three months after the march on Washington, John F. Kennedy is assassinated.

On July 2, 1964, the Civil Rights Act, banning segregation, is signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson.

But on April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King is assassinated in turn.

The two key architects of the struggle against racism in the United States have been assassinated.

Mr. Graham, I believe you've just been informed of the tragic death of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Yes.

I was just informed about five minutes ago, and it comes as one of the greatest shocks of my entire life.

As a matter of fact, I feel at this moment very much as I did when I was informed of the death of President Kennedy.

This, I think, illustrates a bit of the deep sickness within American society.

When they come to tell Billy Graham that Martin Luther King dies, he acts surprised and everything.

But he's not that sad.

And many white Christians rejoiced that Martin Luther King Jr. had been assassinated.

They were fine with it.

They thought that was a great thing that happened, despite the fact that this began a whole summer of the nation burning.

NARRATOR: The very next day, the country is in flames.

Billy Graham's halfhearted support of Martin Luther King is a tremendous missed opportunity.

[ Dramatic music plays ] The Vietnam War is ramping up.

There are thousands of casualties.

Pacifism and feminism emerge from the hippie movement.

Once again, Billy Graham uses his influence to serve the Republican Party, actively participating in getting his friend Richard Nixon, the heaven-sent candidate that's supposed to get America back on track, elected.

All Americans may not agree with the decision a president makes, but he is our president.

BUTLER: For Graham, the pinnacle of what needs to happen is Richard Nixon getting that Republican nomination.

So he's very excited to see Nixon come to power.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: With Richard Nixon in the White House, Billy Graham becomes his minence grise, his shadow adviser.

But then comes the Watergate scandal.

I shall resign the presidency effective at noon tomorrow.

NARRATOR: With Richard Nixon's fall, Billy Graham goes through one of the most difficult periods in his entire career.

[ Music continues ] He feels betrayed, both as a friend and in terms of his public image.

He doesn't want to have anything to do with the White House.

He withdraws from domestic politics but not from his role as a worldwide missionary.

BUTLER: America was losing its aura during this time period.

You had the downfall of Nixon.

You had the end of the Vietnam War.

There were problems here.

There was unemployment, all kinds of things that made America look weaker to the rest of the world.

But for using Billy Graham, you could say that America was still a strong part of the worldwide powers.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: Billy Graham becomes a cultural ambassador, restoring the image of America overseas.

[ Music continues ] Twenty years after the Korean War between the communist-supported North and the South, which is aided by the West, his visit is highly symbolic.

GRAHAM: I come in that spirit and as His representative.

[ Applause ] NARRATOR: Billy Kim, Billy Graham's interpreter for the entire crusade, is a veteran of the Korean War... [ Speaking Korean ] NARRATOR: ...a war in which 3 million people died.

KIM: With such a devastating of the war, Korean people began to realize their only hope is in God almighty.

And so many people have turned to Christianity.

And that's, I believe, 1973, with the Billy Graham crusade.

[ Music continues ] At Yoido Plaza, the young people really went after the new faith in Christ.

I think that permeates the whole Christianity in Korea.

[ Music continues ] That time was Methodists, Presbyterians, a lot of them divided.

But when Billy Graham crusade came, they all joined together.

So logistically, it was impossible.

But God made it possible to have a successful crusade.

[ Music continues, group vocalizing ] NARRATOR: Out of the 185 countries where Billy Graham has conducted crusades, Korea breaks all the records.

In just five days, more than three million people pour in to hear him preach, over 1.1 million people on the last day alone.

I say to you as Christians today... [ Speaking Korean ] -...love one another.

-[ Speaking Korean ] GRAHAM: And that is the message I want to leave as I go back to America -- Love one another in Korea.

I am going to ask you today to receive Christ.

KIM: [ Speaking Korean ] GRAHAM: I'm going to ask you to do it publicly.

KIM: [ Speaking Korean ] KIM: I recall the people standing all around.

They were so serious listening to Billy Graham's message.

And I think that one single meeting, we had more than 38,000 decision cards came in.

That one meeting.

GRAHAM: There are 1,500 churches in Seoul.

KIM: Many of those people have committed their life to Christ and begin to go to church.

And Korean church becomes a megachurch.

And churches growing, leaps and bounds.

At one time, every day Korea has 15 new churches started.

[ Music continues ] NARRATOR: Historically a Buddhist nation, in the 18th century, Korea had already been through a wave of Christianization by the first missionaries.

But it isn't until Billy Graham's crusade that Christianity becomes the country's largest religion.

[ Indistinct talking on P.A. ]

[ Down-tempo music plays ] I'd like to welcome you all to the congress.

We're very happy you could be here.

NARRATOR: Fortified by his incredible success in Korea, Billy Graham organizes the First International Congress on World Evangelization in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Twenty-seven hundred Evangelical representatives from 150 nations on every continent are invited.

[ Music continues ] BUTLER: What Graham is holding up at the Lausanne conference in 1974 is an idea that's a very old idea.

That idea is that Christianity brings civilization to the world and that if you are Christian, then you will become more civilized than any other group of people.

NARRATOR: Reports, roundtables and meetings go on for 10 days.

While theologians from the southern hemisphere focus on social issues, others denounce secularization, the dangers of communism, and the decline in Christian values.

[ Music continues ] Francis Schaeffer, an American theologian, philosopher, pastor, and best-selling author and filmmaker, emerges as the star of the congress.

And the lordship of Christ covers the whole of life.

But this generation does not believe that truth exists in any form, all is relativistic.

There is no such thing as truth as truth.

JEFFRESS: This conference attacked one of the greatest threats to the Gospel, and that is liberalism.

I'm not talking about liberalism politically.

I'm talking about a failure to believe the word of God.

There is a spiritual war that is going on.

We just happen to be in the cross fire between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan.

Are we willing to deny self and take up the cross to follow our Lord?

[ Down-tempo music playing ] NARRATOR: Conservative fundamentalist ideas wind up getting the upper hand over more progressive notions.

Their goal -- evangelize the world and save Judeo-Christian civilization.

The Lausanne Covenant, which is drafted at the congress, bears witness to that.

[ Music continues ] DOCHUK: This notion of one nation under God, the Judeo-Christian America, is seized upon by the Christian right.

And they take that message, and to the present day, this is one of their rallying cries, right, is to defend Judeo-Christian America.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] JEFFRESS: So let me ask you this morning -- What truth are you holding on to?

What are you banking on that will help you survive your inevitable death and your judgment by God?

NARRATOR: Nearly 50 years after it was adopted, the Lausanne Covenant is still seen as the reference in defining modern Evangelicalism's mission and identity.

American conservatives also identify with its legacy.

Like at First Baptist Church Dallas, where Billy Graham was a member for 50 years.

Robert Jeffress, the church's senior pastor since 2007, writes sermons in line with the covenant's moral tenets.

First among them -- The Bible is infallible.

Everything in it is literal truth.

An Evangelical will take the Bible literally rather than figuratively.

And so then also we believe in a literal return of Christ, and so we look forward to that.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: Yet Protestantism, influenced by the European Renaissance, had forged an entirely different approach to the Bible, based on exegesis, or historical and critical study of Scripture.

American fundamentalism has grown in direct opposition to that critical approach.

A lot of what happens in the bad theology is that people are using verses of the Bible... ...to interpret Jesus rather than interpreting the rest of the Bible through the lens of Jesus.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] MAN: God also created the earth and formed man from the dust of the ground.

NARRATOR: If this film from 1979 can be believed, even science cannot challenge the facts in the Bible, because the Good Book tells the truth on all topics, including scientific ones.

MAN: The God of love created man and woman in His own image to have a relationship with him.

We are both what we call creationists, and that is that God did create us.

And somebody might say, "Well, how could all that be done in six literal days?"

But my answer is, "Well, God can do whatever He wants to."

[ Down-tempo music plays ] We're not saying the schools should only teach creationism and not teach evolution.

I don't mind at all teaching both ideas side by side.

Again, in the marketplace of ideas, I believe creationism will win out.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] NARRATOR: Creationism is not a common belief outside of the United States.

Elsewhere, "right to life" is the struggle that unifies global Evangelicalism.

Their reading of the Bible leads Evangelicals to insist that every life is sacred and that homosexuality is a sin.

JEFFRESS: God gives life, and no man has the right to take a life unless God gives that permission to do so.

Satan is a murderer.

He's a liar.

He's a deceiver.

And so I think the murder of children is certainly satanically inspired.

[ Indistinct conversations ] NARRATOR: In the name of the sanctity of life and the traditional family, anti-abortion marches have been organized since 1974.

Influenced by Catholics in the United States, Evangelicals soon joined them to fight against abortion rights, euthanasia, and marriage other than between a man and a woman.

Over the course of 50 years, the right-to-life movement has gone global.

[ Mid-tempo music plays ] On the very spot where Billy Graham preached to 1.1 million faithful in 1973 stands Yoido Full Gospel Church, one of the largest, richest, and most influential megachurches in the world.

[ Man speaking Korean ] NARRATOR: A 12,000-seat auditorium.

Over 800,000 members.

Seven services every Sunday.

Retransmitted worldwide in 16 languages, the pastor's sermons are in line with conservative American moral values.

Their battle -- protecting traditional families against any threats.

LEE: [ Speaking Korean ] NARRATOR: The Evangelical success story is not only global one, but a moral and financial one too.

The megachurch phenomenon has been growing exponentially since the 1980s.

There are now over 2,000 of them in the world.

Seventeen hundred and fifty of them are in the United States, including 19 in Dallas and 38 for Houston alone, a record.

[ Down-tempo music plays ] There are 432 more in the rest of the world.

Between 2010 and 2020, the number of Evangelicals increased by 30%, while the world's population during the same period increased by just 12%.

Some of the greatest growth of Evangelism is on the African continent.

[ Group singing ] Nigeria has no fewer than five megachurches, including the Redeemed Christian Church of God, a kilometer-long megacathedral.

It was founded by Pastor Enoch Adeboye, whose personal fortune has been estimated at $150 million.

He is among the top 10 richest Evangelicals in the world.

Their fortunes range from $20 million to over $1 billion.

[ Woman speaking indistinctly on P.A. ]

There's a powerful line from one of the early Christians who said, "The Gospel" -- the good news, the evangel, right?

-- "that was freely given should never be sold."

[ Exhales sharply ] And you think, "That's exactly what we've done, is sell the good news."

And even sometimes we've sold a counterfeit good news and made even more money off of that.

You know, as Cornel West says, we've taken the blood at the foot of the cross and we've turned it into Kool-Aid and packaged it up and tried to sell it and commercialize it.

So we've commercialized Christianity.

[ Group sining in Portuguese ] NARRATOR: In the late '70s, Billy Graham has reached a critical juncture.

His mega-meeting at Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro is another triumph, followed live by 50 million Brazilians.

But he is no longer in tune with the movement he revived.

And I say God bless Brazil!

[ Interpreter speaking Portuguese ] NARRATOR: Although he is the architect of worldwide evangelization, which was meant to reform society spiritually, he has no control over it.

Billy Graham will refuse to participate in the movement's relentless transformation into a political machine.

His stepping away creates a vacuum, which new, far more radically conservative figures, like Jerry Falwell, will fill.

They too will help bring their favorite candidates to power... Can we begin our crusade... joined together in a moment of silent prayer?

NARRATOR: ...Ronald Reagan in 1980 and Donald Trump in 2016.

It is my profound honor to be the first president in history to attend the March for Life.

[ Crowd cheering ] NARRATOR: In the grip of the conservative Christian right, the separation of church and state is cracking, threatening democracy in the United States and around the world.

[ Music slows, continues ]