I've been out of the loop for the past few days because I've been spending some much-needed time with my daughter. With that in mind, I really do hate for my first mention of the devastating Oklahoma tornado to be something as seemingly petty as the response of a woman who doesn't believe in God to Wolf Blitzer's idiotic assumption that she does, but those are the breaks, I guess.
I think the reason I'm posting this and not feeling too bad about it is that this morning I listened to NPR do an interview with Republican Rep. Tom Cole -- who's from the town of Moore, Oklahoma, which was almost completely flattened by this F5 tornado -- and when asked what Americans can do to help, Cole answered, "Well, first and foremost, pray for us." Now don't get me wrong: Tom Cole sounds like a really decent guy and I have no doubt he had the best of intentions with his comment, but, really? First and foremost? That's what Americans should be doing to help people who've just had their lives utterly destroyed by what's occasionally known, ironically, as an act of God: Pray?
Maybe that's why I find the reaction of the woman in this interview so refreshing: because it proves that sometimes there actually are atheists in foxholes -- and there are almost always idiots behind cable news microphones.
If you're a conservative Christian, this is the day you've been dreading, the one you can mark on your calendar that begins you and your family's inexorable move into the doomsday shelter you built in your backyard. Yes, Armageddon has begun.
In other words, what most of us already knew has finally been made abundantly clear to everyone: A) There are people in professional sports who are gay, and B) Tebow is a shitty quarterback.
Today's Daily Banter column looks at the collective freak-out the Christian right is having over gay marriage and how evangelicals and the like now want us to believe that they're the persecuted ones.
Here's the opening shot:
"It’s always entertaining to watch the right, particularly the Christian right, whine about victimization. As Steve Benen over at the Maddowblog says today, no one’s raised self-pity to a melodramatic art form the way America’s conservative Christians have, regardless of their particular political or denominational bent. To hear Pat Robertson, or William Donohue of the Catholic League, or Bill O’Reilly, or many, many others tell it, you’d think Christians were still being thrown to lions, maybe along the Capitol Mall, and a date with the cross awaited anybody who dared to slap a Jesus fish on the back of his car. If the Sodom-and-Gomorrah-esque anti-God dystopia Christians complain exists in American society really did exist, Tim Tebow would’ve been burned alive years ago rather than be allowed to become a guy who gets paid an obscene amount of money to be a shitty quarterback."
You know how I feel about internet sensations. You know how I despise virally created superstars or even laughingstocks. And yet I just have to circulate this, even at the risk of being part of the crowd that will surely make this girl the most (only somewhat unfairly) loathed idiot in America by this time two days from now.
Sure, there'll be the inevitable backlash from hardcore Christians who'll call her a martyr and will hold her up as some kind of modern day Joan of Ark, come to save us from ourselves and ruthlessly struck down for it upon the altar of our culture's depravity. But fuck it, the whole thing will have been worth it just for the opportunity it afforded most of us to mercilessly mock someone who truly, deeply deserved it.
I give you, Rated T for Tolerance, a Christian, anti-gay "rap" from some teenage girl standing in the woods.
"(President Obama puts us on) a path that grows government, restricts freedom and liberty and compromises those values -- those Judeo-Christian, Western civilization values that made us a great and exceptional nation in the first place."
-- Paul Ryan, on a town hall-style call last night with social conservatives, organized by Ralph Reed
"(President Obama) has said he's a Christian, so I just have to assume that he is. All I know is I'm a sinner, and God has forgiven me of my sins... you have to ask every person."
A personal rule of thumb: If you've got the word "reverend" in front of your name chances are I'm gonna care less about your opinions on politics than I do about anything that comes out of the mouths of those people who won't shut up about Downton Abbey.
By the way, is Franklin Graham a self-righteous asshole? Well, he says he isn't, so I guess I'll have to take him at his word. You have to ask every person, though.
"I'm sure he thinks he's being very funny, but he's simply a disgrace. One day, Johnny Depp and his cronies will face the judgment of our Lord and they will burn in hell for this filth."
-- Lee Douglas of the Christian Coalition, who's not at all pleased with Johnny Depp's participation in a song called Jesus Stag Night Club that could, in Bill Nighy in Love, Actually fashion, wind up being the dark horse #1 single in the U.K. on Christmas Day
As you might expect, wrathful Christians are calling the song -- which casts Jesus as a drunken reveler -- "blasphemy." In a related item, there are people who still use the word "blasphemy" and concern themselves with the supposed eternal punishment for it in the year 2011. Gotta give credit to hardcore Christians: They have zero sense of humor and yet they're the funniest people on the planet.
Also, I realize this joke is old as, well, hell -- but if Johnny Depp's gonna be going south once the lights go out, wouldn't you rather be there hanging with him than be just about anywhere else?
I wasn't going to bother with this since, generally, "Fundamentalist Christian + Insanely Terrified of Your Own Shadow = Just Another Day at the Office." But then CNN posted an actual interview with the Georgia guy who recently got fired because he refused to wear a little sticker that happened to have the number 666 on it, because, of course, that would be accepting the Mark of the Beast on his person -- and I just had to run with it.
Why? Because it's everything you'd expect and more. And that makes it hilarious.
Seriously, how do these people even make it through an average day without pouring water directly into light sockets or accidentally running themselves over with their own cars?
A couple of weeks back, I wrote a piece that ran here and at the Huffington Post that decried the inevitable pandering each and every presidential candidate was going to willingly do to America's craven supplicants to Christ as election season really ramped up -- the ridiculous religious purity test they'd all eventually have to take and pass to get elected. Well, at the very least most of those people wouldn't already be in positions of real power -- simply gunning for them. They wouldn't already have the monumental responsibilities of being part of our nation's government the way, say, the current members of the House of Representatives do.
And yet, with 14 million people out of work, millions more underemployed, people taking to the streets in protest, and the United States still at war in a foreign country, what immediately pressing issue did the House debate and vote on yesterday?
Whether or not "In God We Trust" should be "reaffirmed" as our national motto.
The measure, it almost goes without saying, was floated by a southern Republican, the only kind of idiot who would really be deluded enough to firmly hold that political policy and the very good of the country flows top-down from heaven. Rep. Randy Forbes, in speaking on the floor of the House, said this:
"Unfortunately, there are a number of public officials who forget what the national motto is, whether intentionally or unintentionally. There are those who become confused as to whether or not it can still be placed on our buildings, whether it can be placed in our school classrooms."
Once the vote came, the resolution passed 396-9. Of course putting a measure like this before a U.S. lawmaker is like putting an obvious punji spike pit three steps in front of him or her -- you may as well ask Congress to vote on banning the extermination of all puppies and kittens.
Still, this thing got introduced in the first place -- so there you have it. That's what's important to our lawmakers. Not you, not me, not the real-world problems each of us is facing or the jobs millions of us don't have -- but whether or not we're paying enough tribute to God.
You know, speaking of numbers, I've got one for you: 9. That's the percentage of Americans who think Congress is doing a good job. Just 9%. A 9% approval rating. And this kind of horseshit is what they think they have the luxury to debate on company time.
If there's any justice in the universe, not even God will be able to save these assholes come election day.
I love the ultra-Christian. I love them because they make it so easy for me. One of the least mentally taxing things I do around here is wake up Sunday morning and find a post for the Sunday Sacrilege segment. It literally requires almost no effort to locate something completely absurd from, say, Christian Nightmares to pop up on the main page -- and generally whatever item I grab turns out to be so hilariously surreal that I don't even have to create a punchline for it. The whole thing is one big punchline; I couldn't improve on it comedically if I were the reincarnation of Bill Hicks.
Take, for example, "Jesusween."
There are so many possible jokes about something called "Jesusween" that, again, it's probably not even worth bothering. I mean, after the initial giggles, my mind immediately went to thoughts of a particularly cruel pet name concocted by Mary Magdalene -- and that was just for starters.
But here's the thing: The fact that a group of highly devoted Christian types came up with this name, without one single person apparently shooting it down, proves just about incontrovertibly that the hyper-religious don't have a damn thing even approaching a sophisticated sense of humor, to say nothing of a lick of common sense (which I guess sort of goes without saying). If you didn't instantly grasp that the word "Jesusween" was ripe for playground taunts between fourth-graders and outright ridicule from misanthropic jerks like me, I have no idea how your doe-eyed ass walks out of his front door every morning without being eaten alive by the world.
While we're on the subject of a more "Jesus-y" Halloween, though, I figured I'd bring back a classic quickie from the DXM Vault. This one goes way back.
"And By the Way, If You See Your Mom This Weekend, Would You Be Sure and Tell Her... SATAN! SATAN! SATAN!" (Originally Published, 10.31.06)
I always found Halloween to be kind of a silly holiday. I certainly understand its pagan roots, but at this stage of civilization -- things being what they presently are and all -- I can't help but feel that the inflated emphasis on ghosts, witches, black cats and the like as objects of fear is, well, Rockwellian in its quaintness.
I mean, could any of Edgar Allen Poe's delusions -- even at its most brutally drug-induced -- have ever metastasized into something as perfectly evil as Dick Cheney?
Terrorists want to kill me; my President doesn't have a brain, yet still inexplicably walks, talks and smirks; his second in command is regularly seen growling, and shoots his elderly friends in the face; human viscera lines the streets of Iraq -- and you're telling me the ranch-style house up the street with a couple of tombstones in the front yard, a vegetable with a face carved in it, and the all-night Monsterfest on A&E is supposed to scare me?
Sure thing.
That said, I'll relay a truly terrifying tale from my short time at one of the most frightening places on Earth: Dade Christian School.
The God-fearing men and women who ran the place were -- and no doubt still are -- committed to making sure that all of their students have a Halloween that's happy, safe, and free of the torment of eternal damnation. That's why every year the school has its own Halloween party in which each child is encouraged to dress as -- wait for it -- his or her favorite Bible character. Needless to say, this typically causes some confusion, seeing as how the whole beard and robes thing was pretty much the only look going back in the day.
Upon learning the theme of the traditional Dade Christian Halloween-Without-Hell Extravaganza, I of course began peppering the teacher with question after ridiculous question about what my costume could and couldn't entail:
Could I pour salt all over myself and be Lot's wife?
What about water, would dousing myself in water help me to stand out as obviously being Noah?
Could I just come naked and be Adam?
If I dressed as Pharaoh, could I cast the entire school into bondage?
Isn't Satan technically a Bible character?
These annoyances continued until the teacher finally ended them in the usual way: by sending me to the Dean's office.
Surprisingly, he wasn't expecting to see my face again so soon -- being that a few days earlier an angry and frustrated faculty chaperone had deemed that I be exiled to his office for reading the novelization of Halloween III: Season of the Witch during the entire bus ride to and from our class trip to Disney World.
You know something? Now that I think about it -- maybe dressing as a Christian really is the scariest costume imaginable.
Hope you have a good Halloween this year, kids -- and whatever you do, stay away from Old Man Cheney's house.
It seems like every time a self-described conservative Christian candidate rises to a position of prominence within the public consciousness these days, various articles start popping up illuminating the truly insane depths of his or her already questionable belief system. While I really do think that no one who chooses ridiculous superstition over logic and reason in any part of his or her life should be allowed near the White House, it's simply a foregone conclusion that a profession of faith is a requirement for all political leaders in our current culture; you either make it clear that you believe in Jesus or you just don't stand a chance of ever becoming a political leader in America, circa 2011, in the first place.
While we should all prepare, now that campaign season is ramping up, for another offensive series of diversions from the real issues facing this country aimed at testing the purity of our candidates' religious devotion -- another CNN "Faith & Politics" forum, a command performance before Pastor Rick Warren, or some other such horseshit -- it'll be incumbent upon those for whom faith or prayer doesn't constitute an effective plan of action to keep fighting back as best we can. The bottom line is that we're once again faced with more than a couple of people vying for the highest office in the land who not only buy heavily into notions like magic, and fairy tales, and holy books, and end times prophecies, and various silly shibboleths, but who also believe that it's their divinely commissioned obligation to make sure the rest of us submit to it too -- whether we like it or not.
That New York Times article dissecting the Tea Party -- the one I published a quote from earlier today -- is revealing on so many levels that it's worth referencing more than once. While the first excerpt I posted highlighted a fact that shouldn't surprise anyone -- namely that, while loud, the Tea Party isn't very big and it's certainly not very popular -- another finding within the story is even less surprising. It answers the question, "Just what is the Tea Party made of?"
Remember that the people who wrote the article have been studying the rise of the movement that would ultimately become the Tea Party since 2006.
"So what do Tea Partiers have in common? They are overwhelmingly white, but even compared to other white Republicans, they had a low regard for immigrants and blacks long before Barack Obama was president, and they still do.
More important, they were disproportionately social conservatives in 2006 — opposing abortion, for example — and still are today. Next to being a Republican, the strongest predictor of being a Tea Party supporter today was a desire, back in 2006, to see religion play a prominent role in politics. And Tea Partiers continue to hold these views: they seek 'deeply religious' elected officials, approve of religious leaders’ engaging in politics and want religion brought into political debates. The Tea Party’s generals may say their overriding concern is a smaller government, but not their rank and file, who are more concerned about putting God in government."
What does this mean? Simple: the Tea Party is basically nothing but the hard-right, conservative Christian wing of the GOP as it has existed for years. Again, no surprise there at all. This is why for all the shouting about how smaller government and controlled spending are at the top of the list of their demands, the tea baggers as a group have been engaging in horseshit misdirection pretty much since the beginning. When George W. Bush was throwing taxpayer dollars around like he was President Diddy, the then non-existent Tea Party didn't give a damn -- that's because Bush was a white, conservative Texan who may as well have been wearing a giant diamond-encrusted Jesus piece around his neck, his religious affiliation was so obvious. He was forgiven his transgressions -- hell, they weren't even considered transgressions -- simply because of who he was and how comfortable he made the usual suspects among conservative America. It's only after the guy in the White House morphed, against their divinely inspired will, into a black, multi-cultural, progressive "elitist" who represented the kicking down of the castle gate they'd always taken for granted would be in place to protect their dominion that they collectively decided to raise holy hell.
Incidentally, in a somewhat related item, I continue to get amusingly irate e-mails from people who remain less than pleased with the crack I made about Sakina Mengle's role in the Tea Party movement; for those who don't remember, Miss Mengle is the black woman featured on the "Diverse Tea" website and someone who contacted me and called me out for my admittedly juvenile joke at her expense.
Miss Mengle and I had a very nice conversation, if you recall. Her Tea Partying supporters aren't quite as magnanimous.
Behold, Pierre:
"You are a disgusting turd! The Tea party is made up of all sorts of people who are concerned for America's future. And I am quite confident each of them is more intelligent than you and more informed, and less filled with racial prejudice. It is an inclusive group which is positively focused and doesn't make disparaging remarks about someone of color who supports, and is entitled to support, another point of view. Learn about American democracy and get a life!"
Yes, Pierre. The Tea Party doesn't make disparaging comments about someone of color who supports other points of view besides its own. Unless, of course, that person happens to be the President of the United States.
Big fan of anything, though, that calls somebody a turd and still manages to be pretty articulate.
I get that I'm, ironically, preaching to the choir here. If you're a regular around these parts, chances are you already know that between Michele Bachmann and Rick Perry -- and despite the Tea Party's proclamations that it's about economic and not social issues -- religious zealotry among conservative presidential contenders is alive and well. Over the weekend, Perry hosted 30,000 people in Houston at a prayer event he dubbed "The Response"; it featured the usual exultant arm-raising, Jesus-inspired trance-dancing and of course thunderous appeals to on high for guidance through these dark times. Bachmann, meanwhile, is -- well, Bachmann; her special brand of Christian fanaticism wouldn't get her declared mentally fit to stand trial for jaywalking much less allow her to be elected leader of any halfway-sane country.
Still, if you need a refresher course on just what we're likely up against in 2012 -- and by "we" I mean the vast swath of rational Americans who remain largely unheard-from in our political discourse simply because crazy makes for better ratings and more page hits -- scan through the following couple of pieces. I don't need to tell you how scary they are -- but that's sort of the point.
Two little postscripts: First, you may as well hook the keg up in your living room and prepare for the inevitable drinking game to be played wherein you down a beer every time somebody on the right screeches about how the articles above are part of the liberal media's obsession with destroying conservative Christians (two whenever Bachmann is defiantly referred to as a "strong Christian woman with conservative values.")
Second, yesterday on ABC George Will suggested that Rick Perry would be running on a platform of "Texas exceptionalism."
Now go get a paper towel and clean the coffee off your computer before it shorts it out.
-- Bill O'Reilly on Norway shooting and Christian extremist Anders Behring Breivik
If you're curious, it's called the "No True Scotsman" argumentative fallacy. It's also, even as a straightforward claim, tremendous bullshit, as a good portion of history has demonstrated.
As for the so-shameless-it's-comical hypocrisy in how an avowed Christian mass murderer is treated by these people versus how any self-described Muslim killer is -- it's really not even worth going into.
Adding: By the way, the montage of Fox News talking heads Stewart runs through -- culminating in Hannity's final, hilarious bit of punctuation -- is why The Daily Show could easily make the claim that it's got some of the most ferocious journalists in the country on its staff.
From PPP's survey of 574 GOP primary voters nationwide.
Of course Obama wouldn't be taken in the Rapture. He has to stay here and fight Jesus in a 153-day worldwide cage match before he's finally cast down into the lake of fire once and for all.
As I would've expected, my weekend piece on the non-Rapture resulted in a pretty good amount of entertaining back-and-forth from the Huffington Post peanut gallery. Since this is HuffPo we're talking about, quite a few people agreed with my take on things -- namely that regardless of whether you tout an actual date for Jesus's return or simply believe in a divine entity called Jesus at all, the belief is equally ridiculous. But there were quite a few dissenters (or, "decenters" as one irate commenter might say), and they generally alternated between the over-thinkers, who truly believe that the more big words they use the more likely it is their opinions make a lick of sense, and the God-said-it-I-believe-it types. Here's the best of the bunch.
"Too many people have seen Left Behind and follow Kirk Cameron's belief that the Rapture is a one time thing. Well, lets take a look around us. I am from Birmingham, AL and three weeks ago many were killed within 100 miles of my current location. Massive Floods down the Mississippi River, Tsunami's in Asia, Earthquakes in India, Asia, and Haiti. Big Brother, Wars taking place everywhere for different reasons, we are living in the end times. There isn't one day set aside for 'All Believers to ascend into Heaven' Alot of those that will be Left Behind will be believers as well as non-believers. The prophecy is a long one and all this will not happen overnight."
-- Idries King
In other words, it's what Harold Camping said: the Rapture is already upon us so he and his followers weren't actually wrong. Yeah, that's it. Never mind that there have been earthquakes, floods and so on since the dawn of time.
What I just said about using a lot of Triple Word Score language in an effort to supposedly lend academic heft to what's essentially horseshit? Read on:
"This blogger offers an overly reductionistic and conflated view. A belief in something called the 'rapture' as an event within history has historically been a minority view. It is only since the late 19th century (Darby) and early 20th Century (Scoffield) that this view gained popularity, reaching its height in the cold war (Lindsay's Late Great Planet Earth) and reprising again in the 90s (The 'Left Behind' series). Many Christians never have ascribed to such a belief... you cannot claim that religious beliefs are unilaterally irrational, baseless, and frequently contradictory to the "normal rigors for determining truth." I'll give that most might meet the last criteria, but they are not baseless nor irrational (empericism, for all it's benefit, does not have a corner on the rationality market). The final criteria, while generally true, is not unequivacally so. There are many religious beleifs founded upon historical evidence and thus subject to the same rigors, the only difference is that they don't reject supernatural explanations prima facia, and might be more prone to them than others (but that doesn't mean they reject "normal rigors for determining truh and fact.") It also is just plain false that they are frequently contradictory. People, as a whole, are not that stupid and if religions had been around for 1000s of years they are probably at least ineternally consistent (so this is really a ridiculous claim). Let's at least be honest about the facts of the matter instead of making broadly sweeping and unnecessarily derogatory remarks. "
-- George Medley
Say this for Professor Medley: Of all the arguments in defense of religion that you've ever read, his was the most recent.
"It's all about truth. What is true? Each person has to decide."
-- syntax facit saltum
No, actually. There has to be an agreed-upon set of facts that we all understand to be true (or false). If each person decides his own reality what you get is chaos. You're entitled to your own opinions; you're not entitled to your own facts.
This next one, by the way, could be my personal favorite -- simply because I can't imagine what the hell a hardcore Christian is doing at the Huffington Post in the first place.
"Where are the Christians? When I look at the banner at the top of this page, it says Christianity. Yet, the first story I see in the corner is some ventriloquist talking about porn. We as Christians need to get these infidels off our page. Find your own page. Preach your blasphemies somewhere else. Maybe, the net. can give you a page called 'anti-christs.' I have no more need to hear from adulterers, fornicators, liars, thieves, the high-minded rich, blasphemers, covetous, self-serving idlolators. Are you so insecure in your on self-worth that the only way to value your own life is to tear down the beliefs of others. I believe, so. Go elsewhere and preach your doctrines of descent."
-- rankinkri
I like this next one as well because it presumes that I'm rich, which is honestly the most laugh-out-loud conceit you'll find on the HuffPo religion page right now. It's probably because my mini-bio has me listed as the CEO of DXM Media, which I technically am -- but trust me, there's a CEO and there's a CEO. Guess which one I am.
"This post seemed remarkably glib. Granted, one does not generally expect a serious treatment of such a subject in this sort of forum, but it's horrifying to see how the author roped in 2 billion Christians with Harold Camping's group. I suppose that this much at least was expected. What is particularly nutty is action, not generally beliefs. After all, one man's lunacy is another man's logic. Camping's group was defined as nutty because their belief system created dangerous behavior. The author of this also fundamentally misunderstands why people are drawn to doomsday predictions, and this is common from people who have wealth and status in the world. For him, people are drawn to this because the world is so mysterious that we are desparate answers. I'm sure for a CEO, the biggest problem on his plate is the world's mystery. The less fortunate, who live pay check to pay check and cannot logically expect much else from this world have a real reason to yearn for an escape... It's not the religious alone who need to pull their heads out of their collective asses; it's folks like this guy who don't seem to understand that it's suffering, not mystery, that has created this yearning for heaven."
-- mmccathron
By the way, mmccathron makes an argumentative mistake that a lot of supporters of religion tend to make: he draws a distinction between belief and action. Yes, people are entitled to believe whatever they want and if faith gets you through the day then the argument can be made that it does some good. (Approaching it from that angle, however, doesn't in any way make the subject of your belief-system real.) But the thing about belief is that it doesn't happen in a vacuum; it informs your actions. Everything you do in life you do because you have a specific set of beliefs and values backing up each decision. To assume that someone will simply "believe" in something without it ever having a real-world effect is ludicrous.
These next two, just -- good luck.
"My intuition of the "Kingdom of Heaven is at hand" idea is just that--it is at hand, present with you, within you, and you have access to it, here and now, if you will only see it. You must use the "eyes of the spirit" however. Looking out into the world, paying someone else to proxy for you--this misses the point completely. Rapture happens to each person when they let the ego-based, me me me world drop away and allow spirit to be fully present to you (within you, as you). It has nothing to do with what anyone else is doing. It doesn't mean you're better than anyone else. It gives you no right to condemn anyone else. It just simply means you realize and directly experience your intimacy with God, that has, in fact, always been here. You just allow the scales to fall from your eyes, and directly experience what Jesus was saying. God so loved the world...You are saved. Accept it, be with it. And everyone else is saved, too. Your job is simply to fully get it for yourself. Directly experience divine love in the here and now--that is rapture."
-- fatafalena
"The reason anyone can miss when the rapture takes place is the scriptures haven't provided them with a vision. There's a cycle vision of civilizations, morning's [this] and evening's [Revelation 21], with short transition periods between them. There are two mass raptures, the first two days of Genesis 1 one is an all-at-once and the one-person-at-a-time (Matthew 20:1-16) while replenishing of the earth (Revelation 20:5) for Revelation's. The 6 days of creation and rest day was the transition from Revelation's, Revelation 20:4&5 are the 7 days [millenniums] reverse going into the next civilization. The first day's 'waters' the spirit moved upon symbolizes people, the light and dark was separating them and the firmament between the second day's 'waters' was the all-at-once rapture of the people who couldn't die (Revelation 21:4) which Adam brought upon us. Igniting the sun on the fourth day (Genesis 1:14) [therefore extinguished on the fourth millennium before the earth is rejuvenated anew like a plowed field becoming flat again after a time] was for a "signs" to put the Bible's message into as KJVs replenish (Genesis 1:28) and Ecclesiastes 1:9 tells us. In doing that we see what the 'narrow way with the straight gate' is, the transitions between civilizations, where the 'saved' ascends into the true promised land Jesus is scouting (John 14:3) to return and take us into one-at-a-time after this civilization is over... And if I'm the last prophet, Elijah (Malachi 4:5-5), whose purpose is to figure it all out and what's required to be part of the rapture, am I not fulfilling my purpose? We don't know who that Elijah is but we do know (Isaiah 49:1) it's his birth name, as mine is. We do know (Isaiah 58:12 & Matthew 17:11) he's to restore all things which he must know what has happened to do. I do know my vision does present an idea of what has and will happen time and time again, so if I'm he I am fulfilling my purpose. Who knows I'm not he except me, whose not saying it here, and what is termed god? "
-- Elijah A. Alexander, Jr.
This next person apparently didn't like my somewhat mocking tone (go figure) and then went on to miss the point entirely.
"Although the logic of this article is sound at a certain level, the author nonetheless assumes a certain level of 'of course this is ridiculous' to certain beliefs but presumably not to others. Strictly logically speaking, one could amend the author's take home message to say the following: 'Believing in Jesus Christ as the resurrected son of the creator of the universe who will eventually return to Earth equals crazy; NOT believing in Jesus Christ as the resurrected son of the creator of the universe who will eventually return to Earth equals not-crazy.' I'm sure many would protest that there is of course a difference between these views (which ultimately probably reveals little more than what one personally believes) -- and yes, that's exactly my point. There are also VERY important differences in the two beliefs the author discusses, and his differentiation only has cash value among those who already want to see anything that they don't believe in as lunacy. Summing them up in the reductionist way the author does, does not get us very far, nor does it clearly differentiate from ANY set of beliefs, at least not without assuming a certain level of what OF COURSE is crazy and is not (laugh, laugh, snort, snort)."
-- dw30
And then there's this:
"'So the Rapture turned out to be a bit of a bust.' ??? HELLO! It hasn't happened yet."
-- Marlyn
Oh, and one person who apparently got the check I mailed.
"Chez is one of the few reasons I even come to HuffPo anymore."
"We were convinced that on May 21, God would return in a very physical way by bringing in an earthquake and ushering the final five months of judgement. When we look at it spiritually, we find that he did come... We have not made a mistake insofar as the timeline (and so) we're not going to pass out any more tracts. We're not going to put up any more billboards —- in fact they're coming down right now... The world has been warned. The world is under judgment... We're just learning we have to look at all of this more spiritual. But it won't be spiritual on October 21."
There are no monster earthquakes, no oceans turning to steam, no fire shooting up out of the ground and, most sadly, no heathen dead rising from the grave to walk to earth in search of brains while Christians ascend skyward on beams of light. It would be easy at this point to do a traditional post-mortem point-and-laugh because that's always what this thing was deserving of -- but there's still something overwhelmingly sad about the fact that there are those out there who sold everything they owned, jettisoned their childrens' futures and wound their lives down to this singular point in time not only because they truly believed that earthly concerns wouldn't matter anymore after today but because not having absolute faith in that notion would damn them for all eternity. These people are now, for lack of a more diplomatic descriptor, thoroughly screwed.
But there's no sense in letting something like that eat you alive from the inside out; there have always been suckers out there and there always will be, gullible souls so desperate for a cure to a life that simply offers too much incomprehensible mystery that they're willing to swallow any form of snake oil peddled in their direction. You can't save everyone, nor should you try -- an ironic statement, certainly, given the topic.
Still, there's something really worth pointing out in the wake of the non-Rapture. While it was easy for most of us to handily dismiss the lunatic predictions of Pastor Harold Camping and his merry band of messianic misfits, what shouldn't be forgotten is just how unremarkable their basic belief-system is. Sure, even a lot of hardcore Evangelicals ridiculed Camping's assertion that Jesus was going to appear out of the sky today, but make no mistake: Whether they choose to say it loudly and publicly right now, as far as they're concerned the only thing Camping got wrong was the exact date. There are millions of people still going about their business today convinced that at any moment they can be beamed up to heaven while the rest of the Earth falls into a period of tribulation that ends in its ultimate destruction. And by the way, these people aren't considered crazy -- they're just called faithful, and deserving of having that faith respected and lent credence by the rest of us. It's fascinating that, really, the only thing that puts Pastor Harold Camping and his followers one step over the line into the world of the insane outlier is that they thought they had figured out the time of Jesus's return, not that they believed absolutely in the notion of a divine entity called Jesus -- or that he would magically appear to us -- in the first place.
If you need it put in more reductionist terms it can be summed up like this: Believing in Jesus Christ as the resurrected son of the creator of the universe who will eventually return to Earth equals not-crazy; believing that you know when Jesus Christ will make that triumphant return equals crazy. See how, well, crazy that is?
When you look at it in those terms it's kind of astonishing how one belief is considered legitimate in our society and worthy of respect -- and one is considered outlandish and worthy of ridicule.
No, the Rapture didn't happen today. But that doesn't mean a whole lot of people won't go on believing that it will happen eventually, that the Bible really does "guarantee it." And that belief is deserving of no less dismissal -- and no less derision -- than the one for which we've all had such a good time mocking Pastor Harold Camping over the past couple of weeks.
