McCain visits evangelist Billy Graham and his son

by Dave Keating | June 30, 2008 at 04:10 am

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John McCain, who has had trouble convincing the religious right of his Christian credentials, went to Billy Graham's Blue Ridge mountaintop retreat in western North Carolina to meet with the powerful preacher Billy Graham and his son yesterday. The divorced senator has had a schitzophrenic relationship with the religious right in the past, calling such high-profile Christian leaders "agents of intolerance" during his 2000 run for the presidency but changing his tune when it came time to run in the 2008 presidential election, seeking and embracing their endorsements.

Republican presidential candidate John McCain met privately Sunday with evangelists Billy and Franklin Graham at the family's mountaintop retreat in North Carolina.

It was McCain's first sit-down with Billy Graham and his son, although McCain and the elder Graham are acquainted.

With 89-year-old Billy Graham in poor health, McCain flew to North Carolina expecting to meet only with Franklin Graham -- president and chief executive of the group his father founded in 1950, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Assn.

McCain, who is courting religious voters and trying to reassure skeptical conservatives, said he had "a very excellent conversation" with the two "great leaders."

Franklin Graham issued a statement after the meeting praising the Arizona senator's "personal faith and his moral clarity."

He said he was not endorsing anyone for president, but was urging "men and women of faith everywhere" to vote and to be involved in the political process.

McCain said last week that he did not consider the meeting with Franklin Graham to be political.

Franklin Graham was among 30 evangelicals with whom Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama met this month in Chicago.