I didn't see or hear the Pat Robertson program on which Falwell made the statements which you maintain most Americans disagree with. I have gathered from FR posts and from brief excerpts on other TV programs that he named abortion, pornography, homosexual practices, and sexual promiscuity as sins for which God may be lifting the hedge of protection which he has wrapped around America until now.
I can't help but wonder, why would a Christian or Jew who believes the Judeo/Christian scriptures were authored and given to us by God not believe those practices to be offensive and abhorrent to God? Since His word describes each and every practice named by Falwell as heinous, wicked, evil sins, and warns all who practice them that the end result of that practice is eternal destruction unless the one doing those things repents, why should it be controversial to suggest that God is seriously displeased with a nation which openly approves those things and protects those who practice them by both legislation and judicial ruling? If it is true that the vast majority of Americans disagree with Falwell, then I take that to indicate that those people do not believe what God has plainly said about those sins.
I believe, as apparently Mr. Falwell also does, that the American people have been beguiled by liberal secular humanists working through public schools, universities, apostate pulpits, the media, and the entertainment industry, among other institutions, into accepting as harmless and normal practices which until recent decades have been recognized to be sinful and/or immoral by virtually all people of all cultures and religions. Today, anyone who says or believes otherwise is condemned as a judgemental, mean-spirited, hate-filled bigot by those who defend those practices. If that were true, which it isn't, that would mean that the kind and gentle Jesus is also a judgemental, mean-spirited, hate-filled bigot. Anyone who claims, as some do, that Jesus excused or overlooked sinful practices because of his love for the sinner either hasn't read the Gospels, or has and is deliberately misrepresenting his person and character.
I realize that non-believers are not impressed by quotes from scripture, but nevertheless I will cite one verse which I believe is relevant to Falwell's statement.
Ga.6 v7, "Do not be misled; remember that you can't ignore God and get away with it: a man will reap just what he sows. If he sows to please his own sinful desires he will plant seeds of evil and he will reap a harvest of spiritual decay and death;" That doesn't necessarily mean that God Himself actively causes that death, it may also mean that God allows the predictable results of sin to be fully realized.
Since 1973 America has sown the deaths of 38 million innocents in it's abortion mills. If nations are held to the same standard as men in the quoted verse, as I believe they are, our nation must reap a harvest of death if she does not repent of her sins and return to the God of her fathers.
You don't have to agree with God's word, and you certainly don't have to agree with me. But the word of God has proven itself over several millenia to be true and reliable. I don't want to see our beautiful, wonderful America suffer, any more so than the weeping prophet Jeremiah wanted to see ancient Israel suffer the fate he was sent to foretell. But I am convinced that God is just and that he fervently desires that justice be done on Earth. I don't believe He will tolerate forever the ultimate injustice of aborting innocent human lives without withdrawing at least some portion of the protection he has provided to America until now.
While I understand that the Old Testament is full of such occurences, it does strike modern ears like mine as monstrous and barbaric that firemen, policemen, secretaries and salesmen should die for sins they did not themselves commit. If your child had been in the tower or in one of the planes would you still regard it as a just chastisement by God?
A God who takes innocent life to punish other people's sins can hardly complain about humans who also take innocent life. So I can understand if people feel angry and defiant at the reports of Falwell's remarks.
Also, people won't and shouldn't tolerate a politician using a national catastrophe to push their own agenda. The clergy may have the best interests of people or the will of God at heart, but they should not be exempted from having to wait until a decent interval has passed either. It can be hard sometimes to separate witness from egotism. Falwell may have had a legitimate point, but he should have waited until the bodies had been recovered and the shock had worn off. A wiser spiritual leader would have recognized that.
What was particularly shocking or off-putting to many people was that Falwell's God seemed to have more in common with that of militant Islamicists than with that of the Christians they know in their neighborhoods.