Jerry Falwell
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Date: 2019-01-03

Jerry Falwell, by Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=16504 / CC BY SA 3.0

Jerry Falwell

Jerry Lamon Falwell Sr. (; August 11, 1933 – May 15, 2007) was an American Southern Baptist pastor, televangelist, and conservative activist. He was the founding pastor of the Thomas Road Baptist Church, a megachurch in Lynchburg, Virginia. He founded Lynchburg Christian Academy (now Liberty Christian Academy) in 1967 and Liberty University in 1971 and co-founded the Moral Majority in 1979.

On May 15, 2007, Jerry Falwell died suddenly of cardiac arrhythmia in his office at Liberty University at the age of 73. He was buried in the grounds of the university he founded.

Falwell and his twin brother Gene were born in the Fairview Heights area of Lynchburg, Virginia, the sons of Helen Virginia ("née" Beasley) and Carey Hezekiah Falwell. His father was an entrepreneur and one-time bootlegger who was agnostic. His grandfather was a staunch atheist. Jerry Falwell married the former Macel Pate on April 12, 1958. The couple had sons Jerry Jr. (a lawyer, now chancellor of Liberty University) and Jonathan (senior pastor at Thomas Road Baptist Church) and a daughter Jeannie (a surgeon).

Falwell and his wife had a close relationship, and she supported him throughout his career. The Falwells often appeared together in public, and they did not shy away from showing physical affection. Reflecting on his marriage, Falwell jokingly commented that "Macel and I have never considered divorce. Murder maybe, but never divorce." Macel appreciated her husband's non-combative, affable nature, writing in her book that he "hated confrontation and didn't want strife in our home ... he did everything in his power to make me happy." The Falwells were married nearly fifty years until his death.

He graduated from Brookville High School in Lynchburg, and from the then-unaccredited Baptist Bible College in Springfield, Missouri in 1956. Falwell was later awarded three honorary doctoral degrees: Doc...