From Staff Reports 

North Carolina evangelist and Asheville native Franklin Graham and the LGBTQ community recently was involved in a controversial flare-up, according an April 1 report in The Charlotte Observer.

“This time,” the Observer reported, “it centers on Graham’s Samaritan Purse’s coronavirus relief efforts in New York City. That work was praised by President Donald Trump this week. But LGBTQ advocates blasted Graham and his Boone-based nonprofit for requiring volunteers to agree that ‘marriage is exclusively the union of one genetic male and one genetic female.’”

The Observer story added, “That wording appears in a Statement of Faith which Samaritan’s Purse wants volunteers to review before going online to agree ‘to support the ministry guidelines.’”

In a tweet regarding the efforts of Graham and Samaritan’s Purse, N.Y. state Sen. Brad Hoylman asserted, “It’s a shame that the federal government has left New York with no other choice but to accept charity from bigots.”

When asked by the Charlotte newspaper about the Statement of Faith, Samaritan’s Purse reportedly said in a statement: “We are a Christian organization and we hire Christians who share our statement of faith. We have a common denominator of our faith in Jesus Christ and sharing that hope.”

On March 28, “six tractor-trailers left the Samaritan’s Purse office (in Boone) for New York, the U.S. virus epicenter.” The organization has teamed with New York-based Mount Sinai Hospital for the effort, according to media reports, the Observer noted.

On March 30, Samaritan’s Purse trucks delivered and set up — a 68-bed emergency field hospital for COVID-19 patients in Central Park in Manhattan across from Mount Sinai Hospital, along with medical supplies and equipment, the Observer stated. 

The arrival of Samaritan’s Purse in New York City drew the wrath of some gay-rights advocates over Graham’s numerous past comments regarding the gay community, as well as its Statement of Faith, according to various media reports.

“Viciously anti-LGBTQ group runs Central Park tent hospital & forces volunteers to reject gay rights,” a headline on LGBTQNation.com March 31.

In a post on its website on March 28 about the New York field hospital, Samaritan’s Purse said, “Licensed Christian healthcare workers are needed to serve with Samaritan’s Purse as we respond to the COVID-19 pandemic.”

As of 5 p.m. March 31, 1,096 people had died in New York City due to the virus, Spectrum News NY1 reported.  

What’s more, Sen. Hoylman, a Manhattan Democrat and self-described “gay dad; public school parent; husband to David,” also tweeted, “Being gay is not a sin. Telling LGBTQ New Yorkers that they are wrong to love their partners might qualify.”

In a statement responding to Hoylman’s concern, Graham said, “We certainly do not discriminate, and we have a decades-long track record that confirms just that... Our doors at the Emergency Field Hospital in the East Meadow are going to be open to all New Yorkers who need our help... This is a time for all of us to unite and work together, regardless of our political views.”