55% Of Americans Believe 'The Rapture' Is Real And Many Believe Jesus Will Return Before 2050!

If you found our post about American Pastor Robert Jeffress and his dismissal of the 8 people that have been killed in abortion clinic bombings in The United States since the 1980's disturbing, well hell, we haven't even got started on the religious stupidity abounding in USA yet!

Author Declares Vibrators To Be A Tool Of Satan!

For today's sermon of the absurd, we focus on American christian fundamentalist belief in 'The Rapture.'

Whilst most of you in The States will be well aware of this loony story, most people around the rest of the world have yet to have a good old belly laugh at what complete nonsense a majority of U.S. Christians actually believe, so lets delve a little into a report at the misleadingly titled newsmax.com website and see just what it is that is being fed into a lot of gullible Americans heads.

So just what is 'The Rapture' you may be asking, if you are not sitting at home in Texas watching Pastor Robert Jeffress on cable TV and eating your 6th slice of pizza pie cake?  There are a few interpretations of what 'The Rapture' actually is but overwhelmingly modern Christian fundamentalist dogma has taken it to mean a belief that just before or simultaneously with the second coming of Jesus, believers, both dead and undead, will be raised up into the air onto clouds where they will meet the 'Lord.'

According to some pictures I once saw in a Jehovahs Witness publication, many years ago, the exact location where true believers will congregate has a perfect Costa Rican like eternal spring climate and the wind will be just right for wind surfing all year round.  From the pictures I saw, it was not discernible if the Witnesses would be importing some of their less attractive behaviors such as ostracizing members of their community and ignoring members en masse if they engage in morally unacceptable behaviour.

Apparently, some holy books say that only 144,000 people will make it up into the clouds during the rapture.  Some learned lunatics say the number of 144,000 relates to the 12 tribes of Israel, whilst others say that 144,000 is 'just a spiritual number' and doesn't mean the actual amount of people with a one way ticket to cumilonumbnuts.

By this point, I think we have enough information to ascertain that 'The Rapture' is a whole load of bollocks, as they may say in the United Kingdom (and Ireland.)

So let us study the report at newsmax.com and see what it may tell us about the United States right now!

The newsmax article tells us that a recent poll by Newsweek found that 55% of Americans believe that 'The Rapture is real and a further study by Pew Research Center finds that 27% of U.S. Christians believe that Jesus' return' to earth will definitely happen before 2050.  On the upside, the Pew Center Research study also found that there has been a large drop in the number of United States citizens who would class themselves as Christians, which in 2007 stood at 78% of the population, down to 70% last year, although by my reckoning, that means there are well over 100 million people in the States who are still believing in 'The Rapture' as a real and coming event.

More than anything, I guess that says a lot about education standards in the U.S.A.

After the newsmax article proudly flaunts the profound ignorance and stupidity of a huge mass of the American public, it then goes on to showcase its own numbskullery by giving us :-

'7 Reasons Why The Rapture May Be Real - AND CLOSE AT HAND!'

You will need to set aside for one moment your disbelief that major 'news' websites in America reports such bilge while we investigate what these '7 reasons' are.

1. The "tribulation" may be already happening - newsmax finds 'proof' for this by pointing to 'Islamic terrorism, ISIS, nuclear-armed North Korea, Iran's possible acquisition of nuclear weapons, the increasing bellicosity of Vladimir Putin' amongst other possibilities

2. Jesus Christ himself promised that he would return to the earth immediately after the tribulation. - No evidence is offered by newsmax of any tribulation actually occurring but I guess if Jesus said it, it must be so.  Mustn't it?

3. Jesus tells the Apostles that before the Second Coming, "They will kill you, and you will be hated by all nations on account of my name. - The evidence for this is that apparently Christians are currently undergoing unprecedented persecution at the hands of Islamic Extremists.  However, what they also fail to say is that this is in the main due to U.S. foreign policy which has caused huge blood shed, misery and loss of life to much of the arab world.

4. In the last days many believers will turn away from God, Jesus also foretold - The evidence for this, no less, is the same Pew Research Center study we quote above.  Whilst most sane people would say an almost 10% drop in U.S. citizens who believe in unproven hogwash is a good thing, newsmax invert this news and spin it as a reason to think the 'end times' are upon us!

5. In Revelation, John wrote: "I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony about Jesus and because of the word of God. - Yes, you've guessed it, ISIS beheadings.

6. The Bible states that the Rapture will follow the rebirth of Israel - newsmax have this one definitely ticked off on their checklist as this bible prophecy they state happened in 1948.

7. Several biblical analysts point to a prophesy in the book of Ezekiel - (we lift the evidence directly from newsmax here) 'indicating that in the end times, a military alliance will develop between what is believed to be Russia, Iran, Syria, and Turkey, with those nations attempting to destroy Israel.  Iran is already supporting the Assad regime in Syria, an enemy of Israel, while Turkey's relations with Israel have become strained and Russia has sealed a deal to send weapons to Iran, which has vowed to destroy Israel.'

Well, wouldn't you just know it?  The only thing to do that situation is to send U.S. and allied weapons and troops to the area at the expense of U.S. and western tax payers, bomb the shit out of the place, murder a whole load more innocent people and then wait for Jesus to absolve all your sins.

Oh but wait, wasn't Jesus meant to have said something about love and peace?

Don't worry newsmax, at least Pastor Robert Jeffress would be proud of you.

Assholes!

Texas Pastor Dismisses Eight Dead In Abortion Clinic Bombings As 'A Good Half-Hour's Work For A Muslim Terrorist'

Many of our readers may be forgiven for thinking that medieval superstition and religious buffoonery and the horrors it leads to are limited only to poor and impoverished areas of the planet.  However, it doesn't take much scratching of the surface of Christian America to find religious stupidity on a grand scale.

It is one such mild surface scratch that has led us to be confronted by one Pastor Robert Jeffress. The good pastor is the lead mouth piece of the 11,000 member First Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas and also hosts a TV show that is aired by 1,200 television stations and other countries, or so we hear on good authority from wikipedia.

Jeffress' latest foray into the world of sanity has seen him be magnanimous enough to conclude that :-

'It would be unfair to characterize all Muslims as violent,' he said he 'wanted to demonstrate the scope of the problem facing the world as the end of time draws near.'

Some of you may be a little perturbed that a far out crank who appears on 1,200 televisions station across the United States and 'the world' who believes that 'the end times' are coming can be an influential force in deciding who gets the block vote of Americas millions of right wing christian GOP voter base but in reality, this is just business as usual and has been for the last 50 years or so in the U.S.

The pastors rant , is reported on at christianexaminer.com where he is quoted as saying that  "It was Satan himself who delivered those delusions to those people to lead people by the millions away from God" in reference to the Muslim belief that the religion of Islam was delivered to Muhammad by an angel.

Christianexaminer.com report that 'The sects and terror groups that make up that army, which includes Shiite Iran, have a shared goal of destroying the Jews, Christians and the political framework of modern democracy.'

 "That is why it is absolute lunacy for our president and Congress to negotiate a deal on nuclear weapons with Iran when they are intent on destroying Israel, us, and exterminating our nations from the face of the earth," Jeffress said.

And it would appear that Jeffress is so steeped in lunacy himself, that he feels himself qualified to speak about it.

Our hero, Jefress goes on to validate U.S. foreign policy thus :-

'There were more people killed in one day on Sept. 11, 2001, than in the entire 400 year history of the Spanish Inquisition.'

Obviously Jeffress has not looked at the figures, as 9/11 took the lives of nearly 3000 people whilst the inquisition took the lives of 3-5000 people.  And really, does conflating either of these two issues make either of the tragedies more acceptable.  Perhaps Jeffress should do the math on the actual percentage of world population that those murders accounted for in their relative historical periods for a clearer understanding of what he said.

Eventually we come to Jeffress' most shining moment :-

'Since the 1980s there have been eight people killed by abortion clinic bombings carried out by people claiming to be Christians.'

 "Eight people. That's a good half-hour's work for a Muslim terrorist."

So are we to understand that he believes because SOME people who claim Islam as a religion are murdering people en masse, the eight abortion clinic murders are absolved.

Pastor Jeffress, you are not, as you claim, preaching the gospel of love as practiced by Jesus.  You are using fear and your followers lack of education in order to further your own aims.

You are no better than those for whom you reserve your ire.

Another reason for everyone to turn their back on all religious ideologies.  Now!