When I was a child in the 1950s, I was somewhat of a millennialist -- largely out of fear of death. I had learned about Judgement Day in my fundamentalist Christian church and learned that if I were a believer and alive on the Day of Reckoning, I could go straight to heaven. The year 2000 seemed like a nice round number and , therefore, a likely year for the end. I figured there was a good chance I would be alive in 2000, so I practiced righteousness for as long as I could.


Of course 2000, like 1000, came and went without the world ending, but right about then we learned of the Mayan prediction that the world would end in 2012. That date has also come and gone without incident. Nevertheless, lots of people referenced in this website are still preparing for and even trying to bring about Armagideon. And if the hallmark of Armagideon is lack of food and justice, then it has already happened many times over throughout history.

Wednesday, March 23, 2016

Greed to the Glory of God

I came across a discussion of the various types of Evangelicals recently.  See:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/religion/ted-cruzs-campaign-is-fueled-by-a-dominionist-vision-for-america-commentary/2016/02/04/86373158-cb6a-11e5-b9ab-26591104bb19_story.html
It seems that Ted Cruz is a "dominionist," one who believes that Christians should take charge of the society and impose right-wing Christian values on everyone.  This includes an "end times transfer of wealth" where money is taken from the evildoers and given to righteous Christians.  According to the dominionists, this must happen before Jesus can return.  Rafael Cruz, Ted's father and a traveling evangelist, tells us that God will appoint Christian "kings" to oversee this transfer of wealth,  Ted Cruz has been identified as one of these kings.

It is amazing how a focus on end times prophesy can totally warp the values of the underlying religion.  Every Christian knows or should know that greed is one of the seven deadly sins.  Greed is bad.  Only heathens on Wall Street argue, ala Gordon Gekko, that greed is good, but they are only contending that greed is good for the economy, not to bring back Jesus.  It takes an incredible amount of chutzpah to believe that by amassing wealth one is actually helping God's plan.  Of course, if you know what "chutzpah" is, you will probably be on the losing end of King Cruz's wealth transfer.

To learn more about this self-serving doctrine, I turned to raptureready.com the compendium of end times information.  Their FAQ section is hilarious.  They have 39 categories of questions averaging about 25 questions each.  So, in total they have close to 1,000 frequently asked questions.  I don't know how the visitors to the site have time to get rapture ready when they are spending their time asking all these questions.

In any event, I searched the FAQs and found a category called "Money."  There is no mention of the need for Christians to take all the money before Jesus will return.  In fact, Rapture Ready takes the standard view that while there is nothing inherently wrong with money or having it, it is wrong to be greedy and it's harder to be righteous if you are rich.  So not only are Cruz's religious beliefs outside the mainstream of Christianity, they are even outside the mainstream of goofy Evangelical Christianity.  Very few people actually believe that God requires Christians to take over the country and run it according to a Christian version of sharia law.  How can anyone think this guy is "electable?"
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