I remember watching The Old Time Gospel Hour as a child while getting ready for church. I would sneak extended views of the sermon in between my mother's attempts to wrestle me into the latest monkey suit she had purchased for me to look all cute and proper in. Back in those days, anything less than a three-piece ensemble was a one-way ticket to perdition...that, and anything with a beat. After a history of heart problems, the Rev. Jerry Falwell died of cardiac arrhythmia on 5/15, shortly after being found unconscious in his office at Liberty University in Lynchburg, VA.
  In the one Falwell tv moment that does stand out in my memory, he had a cream pie hit him in the chest. Apparently he had hit on a salient point that struck a little too close to home for one listener. He just smiled, calmly took off his jacket and continued speaking, saying, "That's ok..." That was the demeanor I saw him use for as many of his 73 years as I bore witness to. He spoke his mind, many times to his detriment in going a little too far over the top or being unnecessarily harsh. We all are guilty of that sometimes...in fact, some of the content here thrives on doing so! But he called sin for what it was: sin. His detractors said he was lacking in Christ's love, but these are people who wouldn't know the real, biblical Jesus if he came up and smacked them square on the back of the head! God, in flesh or in spirit, is as perfectly just as he is perfectly loving. Of course, they showed us how to properly employ the Savior's love with the following quotes, pulled from the message boards of different news sites:

"Unfortunately, we will always remember him as a founder and leader of America's anti-gay industry, someone who exacerbated the nation's appalling response to the onslaught of the AIDS epidemic, someone who demonized and vilified us for political gain and someone who used religion to divide rather than unite our nation."
— Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.

"Jerry Falwell is going to burn in the fiery pits of hell!! Say hi to David Koresh, Jim Jones, Mohammed, John Paul II and Ma Theresa when you get there."

"Now that Jerry has assumed room temperature, he will be remembered as a hateful man, not a true man of god."

"For a supporter of Apartheid and someone who blamed 9/11 on gays, feminists and people who have tried to secularize America, I can only hope he is sitting down for his shit sandwich lunch at the longest gay pride parade ever in hell."

"He was hateful, bigoted, un American, waste of air and space."

And my personal favorite:

"A dead christian terrorist is a good thing. That is what Falwell was."

  There are so many tangents I could wander off on with all of this that I wouldn't even know where to begin. I certainly would not rule out exploring some of them over the next few posts. Some of these types of things were being said by people who would preface their words with something like: "I'm a born-again Christian, but..." I call these people CINOs(Christians In Name Only[see-noze], a term that, as of now, has been added to the official Perplexed glossary).
  Every time a leader in the Christian community dies, the CINOs are the ones I watch for in terms of how they respond to the loss. I expect the vitriol from non-Christians...they don't spare their abusiveness when the guy's alive, why expect that to change when he checks out? But the sad thing is the increasing number of believers that will sell someone out in their grave, because they want to be "a more credible witness". They feel if they go along as far as their conscience will allow them to with the distortions of those who hate Christians, that it will magically win those people over. Sadly, I see the number of these people increasing as time goes on. They have diluted the Gospel to a point where it has become nearly unrecognizeable among the pedantic psychobabble that passes for critical thought in society today.
  Falwell never subscribed to this notion, thereby pulling no punches when it came to calling out those mired deep in sin and imploring them to give their lives to Jesus. Much of the gloating rhetoric in the wake of his passing has come from the gay community, one of whom I quoted above. They call him things like "bigot", "obstacle of progress", "racist", "hillbilly", and other more predictable slurs to boot. People who cherish their sin will always react in extreme ways when their status quo is put under the microscope; yet they won't hesitate to do the very same to a Christian when given the opportunity.
  Even if his aim wasn't always perfect, Jerry Falwell's ministry did provide for scores of the underprivileged. Liberty University is one of the most respected institutions of higher learning in the country. But most importantly, nothing he believed or that bore his name ever compromised on truth or humility or grace. A spade was always called a spade, but with ever-abiding hope standing as a foundation of everything he taught. This will be greatly missed, considering the most visible leadership option today is provided by Joel Osteen and his hippy-dippy, plastic-banana, good time rock-and-roll lollipop gospel. Along with Billy Graham(whose death, when it happens, will truly be the end of an era), he was one of the last true balancing beams on the precipice of justice and mercy.