Bob Jones III - Religious, Political, and Social Views

Religious, Political, and Social Views

• Bob Jones III once declared that BJU had banned interracial dating because "God has separated people for His own purpose"; nevertheless, on March 3, 2000, he announced on Larry King Live that the University would abandon the long-standing rule over which the university had lost its federal tax-exempt status in 1983.

• In 1980, Jones said the problem of homosexuality would be solved "posthaste if homosexuals were stoned."

• In 1982, when asked by TV talk show host Phil Donahue, "Does anybody get to heaven if he's not born again?" Jones replied, "Absolutely not. Jesus told Nicodemus, a religious man, 'You must be born again.'...The Lord Jesus said, 'I am the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh to the Father, but by me.'"

• Jones once denounced Ronald Reagan as 'a traitor to God's people' for choosing as his vice president George H.W. Bush, whom Jones called "a devil." But some years later, he personally thanked the elder Bush for being a good president.

• Jones referred to Catholicism as "the religion of the anti-Christ and a Satanic system" and called Mormonism and Catholicism "cults which call themselves Christian," but in October 2007, he endorsed former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, a devout Mormon, for the Republican nomination for President.

• Shortly after George W. Bush won re-election in 2004, Bob Jones III sent a congratulatory letter to the president declaring that he had "been given a mandate....Put your agenda on the front burner and let it boil. You owe the liberals nothing. They despise you because they despise your Christ."

• In 2011, referring to Barack Obama's religion, Jones said, "Some people will say whatever they think the politically helpful thing would be.... I say, 'Where is the evidence that he is a Christian?'"

• Jones's most often repeated quotation: "The most sobering reality in the world today is that people are dying and going to Hell today."