Billy Graham on Atheism

Billy Graham was asked the following question:

Why does atheism seem to be growing so much in recent years? I guess there have always been people around who didn’t believe in God, but atheists seem to be in the public eye a lot more than they used to be.

Graham answers that atheists seem to "use the media very effectively." But then he trots out one of the standard canards,

They also appeal to people who want to be free from God or any moral restraints.

Atheists don't want to be "free from God." They don't believe in God at all. There's no need to be free of something you don't believe in.  And of course atheists operate under moral restraints just like everyone else. Moral and ethical behavior is not dependent on the fear of divine punishment.

Graham acknowledges that atheism has been around for "thousands of years," but also calls it a "fad."

many people today eagerly latch on to the latest fad (see Acts 17:21). Atheism attracts their attention, at least for a while.

How many atheists do you know that said, I think I'll stop believing in God for awhile just to try it out?  Let's see how it goes. You might think that Graham, at his age and with his long career as an evangelist, would have talked to many atheists over the years. Maybe he hasn't.

He closes with this whopper,

Don’t be misled by those who claim God doesn’t exist, because he does. And the ultimate reason we know it is because he came down from heaven and walked on this earth in the person of Jesus Christ. Christ was God in human flesh, and he proved it by rising from the dead.

But of course we don't know any of that -- other than that the evidence supports the existence of an individual named Jesus. Everything else is mere assertion lacking any hard evidence -- like most religious claims.