Rev. Jerry Falwell in 'gravely serious' condition after being found unconscious, aide says

LYNCHBURG, Va. -- The Rev. Jerry Falwell was hospitalized in "gravely serious" condition after being found unconscious today in his office at Liberty University, a school executive said.

Ron Godwin, the university's executive vice president, said Falwell, 73, was found unresponsive around 10:45 a.m. and taken to Lynchburg General Hospital. Godwin said he was not sure what caused the collapse, but he said Falwell "has a history of heart challenges."

"I had breakfast with him, and he was fine at breakfast," Godwin said. "He went to his office, I went to mine, and they found him unresponsive."

Godwin said Falwell was receiving emergency care. A hospital spokeswoman said she had "no information to release at this time."

Falwell, a television evangelist who founded the Moral Majority, became the face of the religious right in the 1980s. He later founded the conservative Liberty University and serves as its president.

Falwell survived two serious health scares in early 2005. He was hospitalized for two weeks with what was described as a viral infection, then was hospitalized again a few weeks later after going into respiratory arrest. Later that year, doctors found a 70 percent blockage in an artery, which they opened with stents.

Liberty University's commencement is scheduled for Saturday, with former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich as the featured speaker.

Falwell defends invitation to adulterer Gingrich by comparing "it" to Regan's divorce........

"This morning we are seeing reports of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich admitting to having a sexual dalliance at the same time that President Bill Clinton’s sexual dalliance with an intern was dominating the national headlines.

Mr. Gingrich admitted to the affair in a two-part interview with Dr. James Dobson, during a “Focus on the Family” broadcast.

I was pleased to hear Mr. Gingrich state: “I’ve gotten on my knees and sought God’s forgiveness.”[Gingrich made no mention of his other adulterous affairs, does only the latest one count?]

He has admitted his moral shortcomings to me, as well, in private conversations. And he has also told me that he has, in recent years, come to grips with his personal failures and sought God’s forgiveness.[Gingrich is a serial adulterer. Did he admit that?]

I have been very impressed with the spiritual maturity of this man and am convinced that he has been honest and forthright in clarifying his past failings and his quest, as a Christian, for God’s forgiveness. [Gingrich claims to be a Southern Baptist, yet he has no testimony of being born again and he attends Catholic Mass with his 3rd wife.]

Mr. Gingrich, now 63 and a grandfather[By the two daughters that he refused to pay child support on], openly discussed his two divorces with Dr. Dobson, including the affair that took place during the Clinton impeachment proceedings. It is a “very painful topic and I confess that to you directly,” he stated.

As a pastor with more than a half-century of experience of working with fallible people, I have ministered to a few men who have experienced moral collapse. I have usually been able to tell which of these men was genuinely seeking forgiveness for their actions. My sense tells me that Mr. Gingrich is such a man. He is today happily married to wife Callista, and committed to be the husband he should be.[He never sought "forgiveness" until he decided to run for President.And unless he had an affaid with Falwell or Dobson, he is asking the wrong people to forgive him.]

I well remember the challenge we evangelicals faced in 1980 when our candidate, Ronald Reagan, was the first presidential candidate who had gone through a divorce. We wisely made allowance for God’s forgiveness and America was the beneficiary of this historic champion. [This is the worst excuse for an adulterer I have read since the Jim Bakker scandal!]

Consequently, I decided earlier this week to invite Mr. Gingrich to come to Liberty University on May 19 as our graduation speaker. This will be his second commencement speech at Liberty, previously addressing graduates in 1991.

In recent years, Mr. Gingrich has dedicated much of his time to calling America back to our Christian heritage.[Preachers, not lost politicians who don't attend ANY church except a CATHOLIC church are NOT QUALIFIED to call America back to ANY THING, especially something having to do with Jesus Christ!]

His most recent book, “Rediscovering God in America,” is a brilliant essay that highlights the unique and obvious Christian influence that inspired our nation’s dawning. The book takes readers on a tour of Washington, D.C., inspecting many documents, memorials, friezes and writings of presidents and national leaders who clearly put allegiance to Almighty God at the forefront of the nation’s development.[The book is fraught with errors.]

There has been a war on God in our nation in recent years and the effort to rekindle our national commitment to God is urgently needed.[The war on God is coming from compromising preachers and "evangelical leaders" like James Dobson who make excuses for ADULTERERS like Newt Gingrich. Their actions profane that which is holy.]

Mr. Gingrich is certainly one of the brightest men I know in public life today, and he is becoming one of our great ambassadors for reawakening the spirit of our Founders.
In fact, his topic during the May 19 graduation will be, “Rediscovering God in America.” I am already anxious to hear it and am pleased that our young people will hear this modern American statesman." (You can read Falwell's complete loss of credibility here)

Newt Gingrich: As unfaithful to his various religions as he has been to his wives?

James DOBSON: Well, you answered that question with regard to Bill Clinton instead of referring to yourself. May I ask you to address it personally? You know, I believe you to be a professing Christian and you and I have prayed together, but when I heard you talk about this dark side of your life and when we were in Washington, you spoke of it with a great deal of pain and anguish, but you didn't mention repentance. Do you understand that word, repentance?

GINGRICH: Absolutely. And I answered … maybe it was the way the question was posed in terms of how the cross-parallels of the two things. In terms of my own life, let me say that I was raised initially as a Lutheran and I ended up converting and becoming a Southern Baptist when I was in graduate school at Saint Charles Avenue Baptist Church with Dr. Avery Lee, who was just a great, great preacher and moral leader. And so that's my background.

Gingrich, third wife renew vows in Catholic ceremony

Newt Gingrich and his third wife, the former Callista Bisek, have renewed their three-year-old marriage vows in a Catholic ceremony in the U.S. Capitol, the bride said Thursday. (8/2003)

Her mother, Bernita Bisek, of Whitehall, Wis., who was a witness, said Newt Gingrich's second marriage had been annulled.

Callista Gingrich said her marriage was "blessed in the Catholic Church" and that "we had a very small group of family and friends" in attendance.

The ex-speaker and Marianne Gingrich were divorced in April 2000. Two years later, he asked the Catholic Archdiocese of Atlanta to annul the 19-year marriage. Marianne Gingrich told reporters then that she and her husband had married in a Lutheran church in Ohio in 1981 and that neither was Catholic.

At Marquette University, Mark Johnson, an associate professor of theology, said that an annulment is a declaration by the Catholic Church that it believes that the evidence shows that a "full, sacramental marriage never took place."
"An annulment, therefore, is a declaration that whatever external appearances there may have been to the contrary, what we thought was a marriage was in fact null," he said.

He said that when a Catholic weds a divorced person, they are barred from being married by a priest and would "risk grave scandal" if he or she took Holy Communion.

Asked how the church could annul a marriage between two non- Catholics, Johnson said: "The Catholic Church believes, and this is going to sound impolitic, that it has the fullest understanding of what a sacramental marriage is and the right to make judgment about the sacramental status of any Christian marriage."

Background on Newt

When congressman Newt Gingrich was a graduate student at Tulane
University I baptized him by immersion into the membership of the St.
Charles Avenue Baptist Church. Perhaps I didn't hold him under long
enough.
-- Rev. G. Avery Lee
callista bisek photo, marianne gingrich photo, jackie gingrich photo

Falwell invites adulterer to deliver commencement address

LYNCHBURG, Va. — Newt Gingrich's admission of an extramarital affair as he pursued President Clinton's impeachment in the Monica Lewinsky scandal has won praise from another conservative Christian leader: the Rev. Jerry Falwell.
It's also helped to gain Gingrich an invitation to deliver the commencement address at Falwell's Liberty University. Gingrich is considered a possible Republican presidential contender, although he has not announced any intention to run.
In an interview with Focus on the Family founder James Dobson that aired Friday, Gingrich admitted to the affair in 1998. In 2000, he divorced his second wife, Marianne, after his attorneys acknowledged his adultery with Callista Bisek, a former congressional aide now his third wife. Complete article here.