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Your Fucking Stupid And Superstitious Press

Okay, you guys know I went full-blown atheist over the past couple of years. But I've got a number of close friends who are very religious, not to mention my mom -- and, hey: Religion got her singing again, after a twenty-year hiatus, and she sounds great, and it fills her life. So I try, I really try, to coexist with religion, as long as it doesn't stomp on my friends' wombs or stuff like that. You know what I mean. I really do try not to step on anyone's toes, unless it seems to me they're just brain-damaged about it.

Like this:

ZAHN (voice-over): As rockets rain down, bringing random death and destruction, families seek refuge deep underground. How do they survive the weeks of stress and the nightmare of a war with no end in sight?

Plus, with shockwaves of violence spreading through the Middle East, is the erupting warfare a prophecy of Armageddon? What ominous signs convince these people that the end of the world is upon us?

[...]

ZAHN: And we're back. One of the most disturbing and mysterious books of the Bible is Revelation. For centuries, Christians have read its visions of wars, plagues, and the end of the world and asked themselves if they were living in the so-called end times. Well tonight a lot of Christians are convinced that the apocalypse may be coming soon. Take a look at the Rapture Index on the World Wide Web. It assigns numerical values to wars, earthquakes and disasters. And tonight, it's at 156, which is in the "fasten your seat belt" category. So are we really at the end of the world? We asked faith and values correspondent Delia Gallagher to do some checking.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DELIA GALLAGHER, CNN FAITH AND VALUES CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They say the end of the world is coming.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As far as I can tell, we are at the very end and we need to prepare ourselves for that according to the world of God.

GALLAGHER: The Israeli Hezbollah conflict they say is a sign that the Bible's final chapter, the Book of Revelation is unfolding before our eyes.

One of the Bible's most widely debated books, Revelation is filled with vivid and frightening imagery: Satan, the four horsemen of the apocalypse, the mark of the beast. It all depicts a great world apocalyptic battle for Israel, Armageddon, that ushers in the return of Jesus Christ and the beginning of a thousand-year period of peace.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The sixth angel sounded and I heard a voice from the four...

GALLAGHER: At this pentecoastal church in Dallas, Pastor Craig Treadwell (ph) tells his congregation that their salvation is tied to events happening 6,000 miles away.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are we in World War III right now? It certainly looks like we are.

GALLAGHER: Events he says that were predicted 2,000 years ago.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Bible prophetized that two billion people will die. There is a massive nuclear holocaust just ahead.

GALLAGHER: Scary stuff coming from a popular local posture, but he's not alone. Well known reverend Jerry Falwell updated his Fallwell Confidential column last week to say "it is apparent, in light of the rebirth of the state of Israel, that the present day events in the holy land may very well serve as a prelude of forerunner to the future battle of Armageddon and the glorious return of Jesus Christ."

In recent times some Christians have looked for signs that the apocalypse is near. Some have even tried to carry out its prophecies, and over 62 million have bought these fictional books, the "Left Behind" series, describing the inevitability of the end.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Today we will read straight from the bible. GALLAGHER: And pastor Treadwill's radio show that he co-hosts with Pastor Ervin Baxter, the talk is of end time.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You've got one-third of mankind killed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You've got two billion dead, Israel will survive but will suffer a lot, and then finally relations between Israel and the international community will go south, the world community invades, Armageddon.

GALLAGHER: Treadwell and Baxter say we're in or near the final seven years leading up to Armageddon. They say just look to Revelation chapter 9 if you have doubts.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This war will emanate from the River Euphrates. Did you know most of the Euphrates river is in the nation of Iraq?

GALLAGHER: The pastor says there's a correlation between almost every image in the bible and current events.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The bible talks about tsunamis, it talks about the waves in the sea roaring. It talks about a dramatic increase in earthquakes.

THE REV. KEVIN BEAN, ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S CHURCH: There's a fiction being created here, like a Steven King horror movie.

GALLAGHER: Reverend Kevin Bean of St. Bartholomew's Church of New York City says Revelation is not meant to be read so literally and he says, it's irresponsible and dangerous to misinterpret the text.

BEAN: It's a part of our church, it's a part of our tradition, but we don't read it the way a lot of people do, which is to make that false correlation with present day events. That is a crock.

GALLAGHER: According to a Harris Interactive Poll of 1,000 people 59 percent say they believe the events described in Revelation will occur at some point in the future and 17 percent say that it will happen during their lifetime. So the question remains, how was Revelation meant to be read?

BEAN: Apocalyptic is about encouraging and consoling a people that are facing calamitous and catastrophic times. To say that, in spite of all of this, there is a God at work in this terrible world and a God that will vindicate.

GALLAGHER: And back at North City's Church in Dallas plans are being made.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Look to the book of Revelations as indicators for what's going to happen.

GALLAGHER: For what they believe may be the end of the world as we know it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GALLAGHER: And the question of what just is going to happen is hotly debated amongst Christians who have very different interpretations of this cryptic book of their scripture.

ZAHN: Delia, stand by. Because when we come back, we're going to bring in a panel of religious experts to debate just that, whether we covering the start of an even bigger story than we thought, is Armageddon really coming or is the literal interpretation a crock, as we just heard a priest in Delia's piece say? We're going to take a short break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ZAHN: You've just seen how some Christians are convinced that the latest explosive events in the Middle East fulfill a clear biblical prophecy, that Armageddon, the end of the world is on the way. Let's go to our top story panel tonight. Faith and values correspondent Delia Gallagher, who's report you just saw, Jason Christy, editor of "The Church Report," a monthly magazine for Christian clergy, and Bruce Filer, a writer and photographer, whose books include "Walking The Bible." All right, I'm going to steal the words of the priest we just heard from in your piece. Is this little translation of Revelation a crock?

JASON CHRISTY, EDITOR, "THE CHURCH REPORT": It scares me. We did a poll last week because there was a lot of chatter both through the phones, on TV, and online and what we came up with in one day, 160,000 viewers, 88 percent of my viewers on my website said no, we're not buying into this. It looks --

ZAHN: They may not be, but an awful lot of people are.

GALLAGHER: Well, and the question is what are they not buying into? Because there are those who say these particular events in the Middle East are not the forerunner of Armageddon, we are not seeing Armageddon now, but that Christians hold that Armageddon will at some point in the future happen is the question. Because this is part of their scripture, and it's something which needs to be interpreted in some way and many of them go for the literal interpretation as they go for the literal interpretation of the gospels on other things.

BRUCE FEILER, AUTHOR, "WALKING THE BIBLE": I think the larger question here, Paula, is who gets to speak for God, and you have this battle going on in the world today between the extremists and those who view the world as a different creation, as being a more moderate open issue, and I think that what's problematic about this view is not that people believe it, it's that it is an interpretation that we are headed for some conflict, some sort of ultimate end of time.

ZAHN: All right so how do Jews view this?

FEILER: I think with Jews, I think as a contrast to that do believe there's going to be a Messianic Age, but I think that Judaism is far less focused on an end that ultimate kind of end game, where God swoops down and has this fight with the devil, as they're focused on what we can do on this earth, and I think that that is, for those of us who love the bible, are troubled by this. Is that what the bible is is God and humans trying to work together to create a more righteous world. And I think that anything that gets the focus off this world and toward the idea, a hastening, we want this somehow, World War III, there's this idea, you mix it with politics, it's very dangerous.

ZAHN: I don't understand, the evangelical support for Israel and what that is rooted in and why we need to pay attention to it.

GALLAGHER: Well, that's part of this. It's wrapped up in it. Obviously if you feel that the second coming is going to happen in Israel, then you want to see that Israel is going to be a secure and safe place for that to come, and there are a number of sort of different things which they believe have to be fulfilled in order for that to happen.

CHRISTY: It's very scary though. I think back to the late 80s, '89 in fact, there was a movement in the Christian evangelical movement that said this is it, 1989 is going to be the end, and a lot of new Christians were brought in to the church and there was this tremendous feeling of rapture and then nothing happened, and there was a feeling of oh, I just sold out to the chicken little theology. And people had a real bad taste about that in their mouth.

FEILER: There is no literal interpretation of something that is not literal.

ZAHN: Give us context here, Bruce, because you're the guy that studies this. This is written in the first century A.D. at a time when Christians were ...

FEILER: Were small and vulnerable and felt that they were being persecuted by Rome. And think that there has been this big question of who is the persecutor. At times it was the Catholic Church, at times it was the Soviet Union. Recently it has been Islam. That's why it's catching hold today because there is this fear, particularly in this country, that Christianity is being persecuted today and this kind of plays into that, but, again, I think the problem is you take the lesson of the prophets.

My new experience has been retracing the prophets, and the lesson of the prophets is God's not going to take care of it, you are responsible, you redeem yourself, you make the world a better place and it's keeping the focus on you and this is taking the focus of what we can do to make the world better and saying it's all part of God's plan.

ZAHN: So I assume you have plans above and beyond the next seven years, Bruce?

(CROSSTALK)

FEILER: I'm not going to predict who's going to win the U.S. Open, or, you know, when the next hurricane is going to come.

ZAHN: Thank you, expert panel, always good to see you. Bruce Feiler, Jason Christy and Delia Gallagher. And you can see more of Delia's reporting on "AMERICAN MORNING" every weekday at 6:00 a.m.

They actually filled prime time with this. Not on CBN, but CNN. At least they did a little debunking of it. But the fact that the crazies get coverage at all shows where we are as a society.

As was pointed out in comments on the Israeli-Hizbollah cease-fire thread yesterday, there are a lot of people out there who are looking forward to Armageddon, the Rapture, whatever you want to call it, because they will be going home to Jesus. And, are those folks, then, really the ones you want in power?

So much of this irrational shared psychosis is being instituted in the halls of power in this country and around the world that I genuinely fear for the future of civilization -- not at some vague, abstract point down the line, but right now. The Middle East is a powderkeg right now. (Just love all the coverage of how the Middle East has been in turmoil for over two weeks, as if the ongoing war in Iraq hasn't been happening for almost three and a half years.)

Religion is supposed to be a good thing. But it gets increasingly hard for me to see that. And I don't want my life, the lives of my friends and family, the lives of my fellow citizens, the survival of my species, determined by a bunch of superstitious assholes who believe the delusional rantings of three-thousand-year-old goatherders are lining up like dominoes waiting to fall.

Unfortunately, that's exactly who's running the show.

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The sad part is that I don't think they really believe anything of it. They're catering to a demographic, as they always do. Notice how many of the so-called learning channels have been focusing on biblical themes?

Course, what the heavy duty religous types who believe in this don't realize is that it makes them look all the more silly to those who don't agree with their beliefs.

Oh, I don't mind learning about religion (which is NOT the same as a "religious education") -- in fact, I've always thought it would be a really really good thing to start teaching comparative religion in high school. The beliefs that shape the lives of billions of people are of paramount importance in understanding them.

But treating the Bible, and especially Revelations, as if it's a program book for an upcoming monster truck rally is just nuckin' futz.

And the worst part about the heavy duty religious types can be summed up by, of all people, Weird Al Yankovic (http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/weirdalyankovic/amishparadise.html):

A local boy kicked me in the butt last week
I just smiled at him and turned the other cheek
I really don't care, in fact I wish him well
'Cause I'll be laughing my head off when he's burning in hell

Is why a war between a Jewish state and a Shi'ite muslim group is being portraied with christian scripture/dogma.

As for WWIII, let us remember that WWI and WWII killed people numbering in the millions and was fought in areas all over the world. This conflict (or at least this round of it) has a death toll that is probably still under 500 people and is taking place in an area you could drive across in less than 8 hours (If you could drive from Gaza to the northern tip of Lebanon).

You know, I don't think that the Fundie Right will ever acknowledge the debt they owe to the PC movement. Before PC, when treating all viewpoints as vaild was not quite the dogma that it is now, you could just say, "You don't believe in evolution? You're an idiot." or "You think the Rapture is going to happen JUST LIKE in the Book of Revelations? Well, say "Hi" to the tooth fairy for me, next time you see her."

Don't get me wrong. Respecting other people's points of view is entirely right and proper, nine times out of ten. It's that tenth time that sticks in my craw. And I get just as annoyed with the Loony Left as I do the Raving Right.

I MUST purchase a Flying Spaghetti Monster t-shirt.

I'm not sure if it counts as comparative religion (on the learning channels) if the only religious side of things comes from just two of the so-called big-three. Don't see much in the way of Islamic documentaries, do we?

And what about Hinduism, one of the Eastern side of the globe's Big Three? Daoism? Buddhism? Heh.

My point, such as it might be, is that the media doesn't really care. Those in charge want ratings and you get ratings by charging people up and getting them anxious. Not by making them feel that they have any responsibilities for how they think and act. /That/ takes work.

I doubt they even care if the watcher agrees or disagrees. As long as they're getting strong emotional charges out of their viewership they're getting a reaction. Which is why I don't allow myself to get angry at nitwitticism of this sort. Speculation is just that, speculation. If there's a God, he's either incompetent, helpless or a big jerk who likes to watch people squirm. Of the three, I'd prefer the second, because it puts it squarely on our heads to do something about it.

THE REV. KEVIN BEAN, ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S CHURCH: It's a part of our church, it's a part of our tradition, but we don't read it the way a lot of people do, which is to make that false correlation with present day events. That is a crock.

At least there's someone with a brain in there..

I went to a (very) secular private school. Seventh grade social studies was mostly dedicated to comparative religion -- we had a course book called "The World's Six Great Religions" or some such. I think it had the Big Three monotheistic faiths, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. There could be a lot of debate as to what the "top 6 religions" should include, but it was a pretty good overview of what a lot of the world believes, where they are alike, and where they differ. It was NOT, as most fundies would have "religious education" be, a course on "Why Christianity is right and all those other heathen faiths will send you to hell".

In 10th grade, we got to "Hero With A Thousand Faces" and more comparative mythology. It's a lot harder to get sucked up into fundementalism when you see that Christianity is just one more retelling of the same old story...

(Granted, my school wasn't perfect. We had a history teacher who informed us the Chinese Cultural Revolution had "a few excesses"(!). Helloooo, Captain Understatement!)

I understand what you're saying, and I believe we're on precisely the same page. But what sticks in my craw is that the "Loony Left" is called that by the superstitious yahoos on the Right for insisting on, y'know, proof of stuff. With evidence and all that.

It all comes back to: The world is a difficult and complex enough place as it is, without having to obey the contradictory whims of an invisible sky cop who we can't prove even exists.

I think it's time to start going through the southern states and carpetbagging them. "Do you know the rapture is coming? Cast off your material possessions, for the rich man may not enter the kingdom of heaven. I'll buy your real estate at..."

I remember a neighbor who was a Fundie. She was convinced way back during one of the Israeli conflicts it was the End of Days. That we would find her house empty when the Revelation came as she would be going bodily into Heaven.

My thoughts were "Cool. Free stuff".

Yeah, but it's still a part of their church, a part of their tradition. If it's tied to past events, then it's a crock because, well, the world's still here, and their church and tradition are wrong. If it's happening in the future, then they're buying into it the same as the other folks, just tweaking the timeline.

Oops.. meant "RAPTURE" not "REVELATION".

[snort][chuckle][guffaw] Yeah, why do Falwell and Schuler and Robertson have so damn much stuff if they can't take it with 'em? Hmmm?

Lucky. I did a lot the same, but the hard way -- I had a bible, and I had that lovely D'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths (http://tinyurl.com/jf9cu) (which I still have somewhere -- think I'll go track that down), and I had a telescope and a microscope and a library just a few blocks away, and my Sunday School teacher had no idea how to deal with me. Eventually, she didn't have to worry about it, as I just stopped going.

Keep in mind that this is hardly the biggest conflict there's ever been in the middle east. Also, if you're referencing the historical location of Armaggedon the fields of Meggido. Hello, fighting isn't anywhere near that part of a very small country.

Ah.. terminology confusion. I am completely with you. When I think of the Loony Left, I'm thinking of "Dude, before Columbus, Turtle Island was a totally egalitarian paradise.." or "Dude, they can totally cure cancer with grass clippings, but Big Pharma is covering it up to make more money.."

Same problem, different symptoms, really.

ooooh, that was one of my favorite books as a kid!

If only. Nope, all of us on the Left are "loony". Howard Dean is insane because he yelled in a pep-rally atmosphere. Al Gore is nuts because some there's no evidence for global warming being caused by humans, and, besides, he said he invented the Internet. Paul Krugman is shrill because he insists, in defiance of record bottom-line profits and CEO salaries and benefits, that our economy sucks because of the inconsequential circumstances of massive consumer debt, jobs being outsourced constantly, the manufacturing sector giving way to the service sector, a freakin' insanely huge national debt, ineffectual and prohibitively expensive programs such as Medicare D, and the entire Iraq war not even being on the books. Blogger Mary Ann Scott was an icon of "the Angry Left" because she swears.

The Media are willful, constant, conspicuous allies of the enemies of truth.

They've rereleased it. And the Norse myth version, too!

Did I buy copies for my own kids, why yes, yes I did. :)

From Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, wherein a fundie televangelist gets temporarily hijacked by an angel:

He became more serious.
"Brothers and sisters, I've got a message for you all, an urgent message from our Lord, for you all, man and woman and little babes, friends, let me tell you about the Apocalypse. It's all there in your Bible, in the Revelation our Lord gave Saint John on Patmos, and in the Book of Daniel. The Lord always gives it to you straight, friends-your future. So what's goin' to happen?
"War. Plague. Famine. Death. Rivers urv blurd. Great earthquakes. Nukyeler missiles. Horrible times are cumin', brothers and sisters. And there's only one way to avoid 'em.
"Before the Destruction comes-before the four horsemen of the apocalypse ride out-before the nukerler missiles rain down on the unbelievers-there will come The Rapture.
"What's the Rapture? I hear you cry.
"When the Rapture comes, brothers and sisters, all the True Believers will be swept up in the air-it don't mind what you're doin', you could be in the bath, you could be at work, you could be drivin' your car, or just sittin' at home readin' your Bible. Suddenly you'll be up there in the air, in perfect and incorruptible bodies. And you'll be up in the air, lookin' down at the world as the years of destruction arrive. Only the faithful will be saved, only those of you who have been born again will avoid the pain
and the death and the horror and the burnin'. Then will come the great war between Heaven and Hell, and Heaven will destroy the forces of Hell, and God shall wipe away the tears of the sufferin', and there shall be no more death, or sorrow, or cryin', or pain, and he shall rayon in glory for ever and ever-"

He stopped, suddenly.

"Well, nice try," he said, in a completely different voice, "only it won't be like that at all. Not really. "I mean, you're right about the fire and war, all that. But that Rapture stuff well, if you could see them all in Heaven-serried ranks of them as far as the mind can follow and beyond, league after league of us, flaming swords, all that, well, what I'm trying to say is who has time to go round picking people out and popping them up in the air to sneer at the people dying of radiation sickness on the parched and burning earth below them? If that's your idea of a morally acceptable good time, I might add.."

Emphasis mine.

It's not just the southern states, dear. Utah, Idaho, and other rural states are full of fundies, too.

At least 40% of Mississippi voted for Kerry.

I think it's on a par with that "most popular news show" bit they do -- to which my response is, "Who the hell CARES if it's POPULAR -- is it SOMETHING WE NEED TO KNOW?" Essentially pandering to the audience so as to deliver them to the advertisers. Infotainment has always been a slut, and simplistic religion has always been...well...popular.

What they never figure out is that the world is ending all the time. And beginning all the time. Because they're living in a storybook and have intensely mixed feelings about getting to what's supposed to be the last chapter -- unaware that it's actually a series, one of many, in a proprietary universe (also one of many). One thing about explosions, though -- they sure do drown out ambivalence and nuance so ya don't have ta *think* about all that crap, Pilgrim.

One of the things I find most horrific about this is that these people want my mother's people--and Jesus's people--to go to the devil, literally, so they can go to heaven.

Seriously, if they do really believe it's coming but don't think that current events can possibly be connected, I want to see how they figure that.

Like my dad always used to say: you buy the premise, you buy the joke.

In a lot of ways, it's the flip side to what I said earlier in the thread about the invisible sky cop. I understand that life is difficult, but I have never figured out why "the next life" is supposed to be so much better, and what is so very wrong with this life that we can't enjoy the millions of wonders around us all the time.

Heck, without moving from the desk yet this morning, I've had a lovely talk with my mom, fragged some 'bots in Quake 3 Arena, worked on a song, and got comedy music, excellent DVDs, entertaining e-mail, all the world's news, and a spirited debate with my friends on the nature of Armageddon. Later, I go out in the bright sunshine and relatively fresh air, go see a friend, run some errands, send music out to nice folks who will then be happy when it arrives in their mail a few days from now, and get some much-anticipated Garlic Filet Medallions at Lone Star.

That's a day. :)

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