Blog Master G

I don’t often comment on religion in this blog, but it’s in order today. It seems that about 70 million Americans — 25% of the population — believe that the Rapture is imminent, according, at least, to an extensive article in the December 2005 issue of Vanity Fair:

204 | AMERICAN RAPTURE Best-selling author and evangelical leader Tim LaHaye has contacts that extend to the White House. That could spell trouble, Craig Unger discovers, since his theology espouses a bloody apocalypse in Israel.

Referenced in the story is a site that’s not a joke (at least not to those who believe): RaptureReady.com. On this site is the Rapture Index, where you can find, on any given day, the likelihood of whether the Rapture will occur today. As of November 14, the Rapture Index is 157, which is really high. Good? Bad? Who knows… but apparently anything higher than 145, according to the VF article, means “get ready.” The Rapture is coming. It seems this is good for those who believe… ’cause who needs to save this planet when eternal bliss awaits?

The Rapture, of course, refers to this passage of the Bible: 1 Thessalonians 4:15-17 (ASV):

For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we that are alive, that are left unto the coming of the Lord, shall in no wise precede them that are fallen asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven, with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we that are alive, that are left, shall together with them be caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.

According to Evangelicals led by the likes of Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and Tim LaHaye (author of the best-selling Left Behind Rapture series), those of us who believe in silly humanist ideals like equal opportunity, gay rights, pornography (find a same-sex prayer partner if you need to be freed from this sin), and a woman’s right to an abortion are minions of the Antichrist, doomed to be defeated by Lord Jesus with a sword protruding from his mouth creating a river of blood (they’ve done the math, according to the VF article, to calculate that something like 2 billion of us will be slaughtered when the Almighty comes to whisk them away to Heaven to live the everlasting life) when he descends to do battle after having saved those who believe in him.

Because I’m sure that separatist Jesus doesn’t want those evil gays and supporters of human rights and pornography on his side when he comes to kick our collective ass to the curb.