AP - LYNCHBURG, Va. - The Rev. Jerry Falwell, the television evangelist who founded the Moral Majority and used it to mold the religious right into a political force, died Tuesday shortly after being found unconscious in his office at Liberty University, a school executive said. He was 73.

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. “CPR efforts were unsuccessful,” he said.

Godwin said he was not sure what caused the collapse, but he said Falwell “has a history of heart challenges.”

jay: heart challenges? like sympathy or like blockages?

Falwell had 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.

[…]

Days after Sept. 11, 2001, Falwell essentially blamed feminists, gays, lesbians and liberal groups for bringing on the terrorist attacks. He later apologized.

In 1999, he told an evangelical conference that the Antichrist was a male Jew who was probably already alive. Falwell later apologized for the remark but not for holding the belief. A month later, his National Liberty Journal warned parents that Tinky Winky, a purple, purse-toting character on television’s “Teletubbies” show, was a gay role model and morally damaging to children.

jay: oh, so both sympathy and blockages. gotcha. i had forgotten about the teletubbies thing. and i had no idea that the antichrist was already alive and had taken the form of a male jew. what i find really sad is that it took jerry falwell’s death for me to learn that he sounded a lot like borat.

rob: it’s always sad when a teletubby dies. (i’m just relieved that it was the evil racist one that died instead of the gay one.)

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