Terry Gross of NPR's Fresh Air interviewed John Hagee, founder of the Christian Zionist group, Christians United for Israel. Hagee is the pastor who claimed New Orleans was destroyed by God's will. He asserts God destroyed New Orleans because of a scheduled gay pride parade. He does not mention the innocent victims outside of New Orleans, it must be ok for God to incur collateral damage when he takes vengeance on those horrible gay sinners. Can you imagine? A whole city destroyed because of a scheduled parade? Hagee reiterates his position in this interview. Listen to it! Hagee is frightening, even more so when you consider that he has the ear of President Bush.
Hagee's interview focuses on Israel, "the rapture" and the coming war. For the uninitiated, Hagee sounds like he escaped from a mental institution or a Monty Python film. Hagee is focused on the the end times. He wants war in Israel. He wants the rapture to come. He believes the end is near- And, he is in the mainstream when it comes to Evangelical Christians.
A Christian pastor recently commented on my blog post on heaven and hell
...too bad it is a total misunderstanding of Christianity but whatever. The Christian message is that the Kingdom of Heaven is in reach today. The model for Christian prayer is "your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven". When Christians say Jesus is the Christ, this means that our king is reigning in us and through us today.I know Pastor Brad means well, but naiveté only goes so far. Hagee believes in a antithetical flavor of Christianity, like chocolate to your vanilla. Hagee is pulling for an expanded war in Israel, which hurries along the rapture, so he and his followers can go live in heaven with their god. It is a freaky scary over the top super religious nutball theology followed by thousands and thousands of people populating evangelical megachurches all throughout the country. Even direct exposure to sunlight cannot kill this weed. I kept waiting for Terry Gross to ask "you believe what?' However, Hagee just kept doing the job for her.
Hagee and his ilk grow more powerful by the day. Hagee is not focused on "Heaven on earth" or "our king reigning in us" - He is focused on ending life on earth through trying to force an all out war in the middle east. I wonder if he is a Christian at all.
Technorati Tags: Religion, The Rapture, Evangelicals, John Hagee
2 comments:
I heard that too. Scary stuff. Not the rapture, I mean, but that the nutjobs peddling this stuff have gotten so much power.
I listened to this when it aired. Frightening really. I've been following and researching everything on the net related to this guy and found out some interesting stuff. One thing that's not entirely unknown is that he founded Christians United for Israel (a DC lobby group) the other is that he is busom buddies with a former president of AIPAC. I can't remember his name but he's a real estate lawyer (former?) from TX. Anyway, can we wonder about the increasing tension with Russia and Iran? Does he and people like him really have the ear and influence of foreign executive policy?
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