Falwell talks about the challenges Christian programmers face with secular TV outlets in exclusive 2004 interview with Sky Angel 

Contact: Nancy Christopher, Vice President, Corporate Communications, Sky Angel/Dominion Video Satellite Inc., 239-403-9130 Ex. 213, Nancy.christopher@skyangel.com

NAPLES, Fla., May 18 /Christian Newswire/ -- Liberty Channel, a 24-hour Christian and family entertainment television network founded by Rev. Jerry Falwell and carried nationally on the Sky Angel multi-channel, Christian and family television service, will be airing the following special programming on Sky Angel Channel 9716: 

• Liberty University Baccalaureate Service (Live) Friday, May 18, 7 p.m. ET
• Liberty University Graduation (Live) Saturday, May 19, 9:30 a.m. ET
• Thomas Road Church Service (Live) Sunday, May 20, 11 a.m. ET
• Dr. Jerry Falwell Funeral Service (Live) Tuesday, May 22, 1 p.m. ET

"Dr. Falwell was a great friend to Sky Angel and our prayers are with the Falwell family and the entire ministry," said Kathleen Johnson, Sky Angel's vice president of programming. "Sky Angel is honored to have been able to deliver Dr. Falwell's Liberty Channel to our viewers for the past several years and looks forward to furthering Dr. Falwell's mission to provide 'family-friendly television for the 21st century' through continued carriage of his programming on Sky Angel." 

In April 2004, Johnson taped an interview with Rev. Falwell for Sky Angel's news show, "Inside Sky Angel." Falwell shared how secular television outlets were becoming more and more hostile to Christian programming and highlighted the need for Christian-owned alternatives such as Sky Angel.

"When I started on television 48 years ago buying time, you almost had to go in on your knees with the general manager to get him to even allow you on," Falwell told Sky Angel. "And even today, the major network affiliates want the tape there two weeks in advance so they can preview it and decide if you are saying anything they don’t agree with. ...One network, they watch our program days before it goes on the air, and if there's something in the program that they don't like, that program doesn't air.

"The trend in commercial television, be it cable or local stations and certainly at the network level, is anti-Christian, anti-evangelical," added Falwell. "The politically correct elite who now just about run the communications systems here in this country will eventually, completely black out their stations from programs that mention Christ, that preach the Bible, evangelical programs."

Falwell further noted: "In Canada, we have to let them edit our programs just so we can be on at all. That can happen, and I think it will happen, in the U.S. if we don't take our stand, not because necessarily the law demands it but because the politically correct leadership, the executives, the elite at the tops of most of the major networks are anti-Christian, anti-Judeo-Christian in their views and values, and people like evangelical preachers are gonna find their message censored. That's why Sky Angel, I predict, in 10 years will be maybe the last safe haven or one of the few last safe havens for people who take the Bible seriously."

About Sky Angel
Sky Angel® is a Christian-owned multi-channel television service committed to faith-based and family programming—the only one of its kind in the world. Sky Angel, which can be added to an existing television service or received exclusively, delivers into U.S. homes, churches and businesses over 30 TV and radio channels of quality Christian programming, popular family entertainment and 24-hour news. More information is available at www.skyangel.com.