The Steel Magnolia

Two interesting pieces were posted on Signs of the Times yesterday. The first one partly expresses my own feelings: if God is as the Christian Fundamentalists describe him, I want nothing to do with such a god.

I’ll gladly stay behind
By BRENDA PETERSON
seattlepi.com
Thursday, April 21, 2005

A neighbor recently insisted I read the Left Behind series. “Especially now after 9/11,” he said, “and the blessed countdown for the Rapture has begun.”

“Why are you so … well, cheerful, about the end of the Earth?” I asked him.

He gazed at me with the true alarm of deep pity. “I’m afraid you’ll have a rough time of it here during the Tribulations — plagues of locusts, frogs, viruses … the Earth attacked by tsunamis, volcanoes, dark legions of the unsaved.”

“Don’t you love any of us you believe will suffer so?” I said.

This gave my neighbor a moment’s pause. But then he admitted with some chagrin. “You can’t blame us born-agains for at last getting our heavenly rewards. We’ve waited thousands of years for End Times.”

My neighbor’s fervor sent me to search the Internet for the Rapture Index — a “prophetic speedometer,” which concludes that we’ve hit 153, and the warning, “Fasten Your Seatbelts.” Giddily, the Rapturers anticipate ecological collapse, Mideast holy wars and Christian Zionists as evidence of the Second Coming. In a twinkling, they say, the righteous will ascend, dropping golden dental work, our nightgowns and perhaps even some spouses.

All this might seem darkly comic, if not for a Time magazine poll that 56 percent of Americans “believe the prophecies in the Book of Revelation will come true.” And that the Left Behind books are the biggest selling fictional series in the United States.

In complex and challenging times, apocalypse is such a simple answer. This fight-or-flight fear is hardwired into our reptilian, forest-slashing, migrating, pioneering species — leave the Old World behind, find a New World. No need to really change, adapt or evolve, just find another planet or heaven to plunder for our own rewards. After all, the dark side of fundamentalism is consumerism.

The next time I saw my neighbor he sported a new bumper sticker: “This Vehicle Will Be Unmanned in Case of Rapture.” It was a surprisingly sunlit Seattle day and we strolled down to our backyard beach on the Salish Sea to continue our End Times talk. We sat down on driftwood and watched the comic black-and-white tuxedo harlequins diving and popping up in the waves. A Great Blue Heron swooped in with the caw of a dinosaur bird. How could this ancient bird fly with such huge wings? How did she escape extinction? Somehow the Great Blue had adapted and survived beautifully.

“So,” my neighbor asked excitedly, “what did you think of the Rapture Index?”

“Doesn’t the Scripture say, ‘For God so loved the world?’ ” I asked. “Well, I’m going to start a Real Rapture Index with signs and wonders of how beautiful and sacred this Earth is. Another mantra is: For we so love the world … .”

My neighbor looked at me, startled, then fell very quiet as we watched a harlequin float past, his bright beak dripping a tiny fish. Happy, so happy in this moment. The Great Blue cawed hoarsely and stood on one leg in a fishing meditation. Wave after bright wave lapped our beach and the spring sunshine warmed our open faces.

I put my arm around my neighbor, the driftwood creaking slightly under our weight.

“Listen,” I said softly, “I want to be left behind.”

Left Behind to figure out a way to fit more humbly into this abiding Earth, this living and breathing planet we happily call home, we call holy.

Slowly my neighbor took my hand and we sat in silence, listening to waves more ancient than our young, hasty species, more forgiving than our religions, more enduring. Rapture.

Brenda Peterson is a novelist and nature writer, most recently of “Animal Heart” from Sierra Club Books.

The second piece should really give some of the above mentioned Christian Fundamentalists pause to think about what they are believing:

Oh Rapture!
whatreallyhappened.com

One of the major problems America faces is a large population of religious fundamentalists who have become as fanatical in their own way as any Middle Eastern Ayatollah. At present, they are caught up in their own version of the myth of the end of the world, and hope that by working to bring it about, they’ll get to sit at the right hand of their deity and to hell with everyone else. No doubt fistfights will break out over who gets to sit closest, but that is a subject for another article.

So fervent is the belief of the mythoholics that they are ready and willing to sacrifice money, children, civil rights, freedom, even life itself (so long as it is someone else’s) to bring about the final rapture and end of the world. Never mind that the guy selling this belief is a child molester and makes money off of these fables, the seekers (and there is one born every minute) do so want to believe!

So, I thought it might be appropriate to list some of the many other times in history that religious fanatics of all kinds have decided the world was about to end, what they did about it, and what really happened to those who followed them when the world did not end as scheduled. […] Click HERE to read the list.