{"id":973,"date":"2018-02-21T17:44:02","date_gmt":"2018-02-21T17:44:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/?p=973"},"modified":"2022-01-18T10:20:32","modified_gmt":"2022-01-18T10:20:32","slug":"no-saviour-at-godless-west-ham","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/?p=973","title":{"rendered":"No saviour at Godless West Ham"},"content":{"rendered":"

A memory of Billy Graham on the occasion of his demise in his 100th year. A version of this piece originally appeared in Nearly Reach The Sky<\/em> by Brian Williams (Biteback Publishing 2015)<\/p>\n

My one visit to Upton Park left me with a single overwhelming conviction: there is no God.<\/p>\n

I travelled to West Ham’s then stadium to see the American preacher Billy Graham conduct a ‘revival meeting’ in 1989.\u00a0 My attendance, however, was as a newspaper reporter not a seeker after salvation.<\/p>\n

Graham had a global reputation in the 1950s and 1960s.\u00a0 A generation before tv-Christianity made household names of American preachers (many of whom gained a murky reputation for financial and sexual impropriety) Graham was the best-known charismatic evangelist.\u00a0 He toured the States and well beyond spreading his gospel of booming certainties.\u00a0 His was a faith that reduced the bible to homilies, promoted a belief in miracles and centred on an absolute conviction in being ‘born again’, stripped of sin and offering up one’s soul to Jesus.<\/p>\n

I arrived at Upton Park to find its stands packed to capacity – that was my first surprise.\u00a0 On the pitch was a stage, in front of which was a huge empty area.\u00a0 A parade of warm-up acts struggled to enliven the crowd.\u00a0 The only one I remember clearly was the blues singer Paul Jones, whose scripture-infused set provided definitive proof that the devil really does have all the best tunes.<\/p>\n

When Graham finally took to the stage, however, it was clear that we were in the presence of a man who understood how to work a crowd.\u00a0 Looking like a late-period Johnny Cash, he had the quality of an Old Testament prophet.\u00a0 And simple as his stories were, he invested them with a fervour that resonated even at the top of the West Stand.<\/p>\n

The climax of Graham’s sermons had always been the same.\u00a0 ‘Come on down’ he would demand – encouraging his audience to leave their seats and gather in front of the stage. Graham would then lead his congregation in a ‘sinners prayer’ – the cornerstone of born-again Christianity where all\u00a0 would either reaffirm, or embrace faith anew.<\/p>\n

So\u00a0 it was at West Ham – although Graham did not rely on oratorical skills alone.\u00a0 As his sermon reached its explosive conclusion and he called on us to come forward, a small army of stewards suddenly appeared among the audience.\u00a0 Soon they were pushing and cajoling us down the gangways and onto the turf.<\/p>\n

In the interests of journalistic enquiry, I followed.\u00a0 Now the stewards were tending to those of us on the pitch individually – ‘are you ready to make a sinner’s prayer’ one asked me.\u00a0 I declined, but noticing that those who did bend to their knees were being given a package of literature, I asked if, as a representative of the press, I might be given one.\u00a0 ‘They are only for the converted’, I was told.<\/p>\n

My professional instincts kicked in – that pack might be the key to a decent story, I figured.\u00a0 So I picked among the throng and found another steward.\u00a0 ‘I’m ready’, I said.\u00a0 The steward held my hands, pushed me to my knees and asked that I repeat these words: ‘forgive me of my sins Lord, I accept Jesus as my Master’.<\/p>\n

Graham’s performance had not really moved me, but now, bent down, hands clasped in the steward’s sweaty grip, I knew that, if a thunderbolt from the sky was ever going to smite a cynic, this was the moment.\u00a0 Seconds passed.\u00a0 I opened my eyes, my fingers were released and I looked up.\u00a0 The light momentarily dimmed as I was handed my information pack, but forked lightening \u2013 there was none.<\/p>\n

The moral, that I left with was this.\u00a0 Like West Ham themselves, Billy Graham, on song, could put on a show with the power to transport crowds to different realm.\u00a0If you are looking for miracles and evidence of the existence of God, however, you will have to go a lot further than the London Borough of Newham.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A memory of Billy Graham on the occasion of his demise in his 100th year. A version of this piece originally appeared in Nearly Reach The Sky by Brian Williams (Biteback Publishing 2015) My one visit to Upton Park left …<\/p>\n

No saviour at Godless West Ham<\/span> Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":974,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/973","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=973"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/973\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1388,"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/973\/revisions\/1388"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tim-dawson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}