L.B.: The Pope of Mount Prospect

Left Behind, pp. 421

After the Steeles meet with the Rev. Bruce Barnes, it's Buck Williams' turn:

Two hours after the Steeles had left, Buck Williams parked his rental car in front of New Hope Village Church in Mount Prospect, Illinois.

The real Mount Prospect is home to more than a dozen churches. I can't help but wonder if they also exist in the fictional world of Left Behind and, if so, what's going on at their buildings while Bruce stays up late at New Hope trying to design a cool logo for the Tribulation Force.

Were the parishioners or members or attendees of those other churches -- the Baptists, Lutherans, Methodists, Episcopalians and Catholics -- among the disappeared? If so, have they also, like New Hope, begun to gather small cadres of those who realize what happened and what they missed?

The gist of LB thus far suggests that all of those mainline Protestants and Catholics would not make the cut come Rapture time. They might call themselves Christians, but they're not Real True Christians according to Tim LaHaye's idea of God's standards (which is to say, Tim LaHaye's standards -- he seems to think that on the day of judgment God will hire him as a consultant to separate the wheat from the tares). But even so, non-RTCs still have children. Or had children. The disintegration of every single child of every single family at all of those churches would lead to crowded sanctuaries filled with grieving, traumatized parents seeking answers.

Pastors like the now-departed Vernon Billings tend to stick to themselves. They don't associate or cooperate much with other clergy in their communities. They don't get involved with ministerial councils or interdenominational efforts. The stated reason for this is usually that light should have no fellowship with darkness, by which they mean that they would consider it a sin to associate with people like that liberal Methodist pastor who got arrested at that protest last year, or that woman from the Episcopal church who calls herself a priest, or that "welcoming and affirming" [epithet] from the local UCC church who wears a rainbow prayer stole.

Plus when the rabbi shows up at those interfaith meetings, they ask you not to mention Jesus when you pray, and you know the spell doesn't work if you don't say "in Jesus name."

Working with other churches is perilously ecumenical. Ecumenism -- cooperation among disparate Christian churches in recognition of our underlying unity -- is not considered a Good Thing by people like Billings, or Lahaye and Jenkins. Even the most harmless-seeming forms of cooperation, such as taking turns providing shelter through a local interfaith hospitality network or some such, are too dangerous. It's a slippery slope from there to syncretism, the collapse of absolute standards, moral relativism, one world religion, One World Government, human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together ... mass hysteria.

The Ghostbusters quote at the end there is hyperbole. The rest of that isn't. This is exactly what they believe. What they will tell you they believe. What they teach. Left Behind teaches this explicitly. Readers are intended to see the slippery slope between a metropolitan ministerial council and Carpathia's "Enigma Babylon One World Faith." This is meant as a warning.

This objection to interdenominational and interfaith cooperation was much-discussed in evangelical circles following 9/11. The scale and impact of that tragedy was such that a few RTC pastors for once set aside that objection, participating in some of the various memorial vigils and prayer services. That participation was a source of "controversy" and recrimination for months afterward. (That same kind of controversy never seems to follow, however, when the interfaith activity in question is a vigil for Terri Schiavo or an anti-abortion rally. That's interesting.)

The willingness to interact or associate with clergy from other denominations or faiths used to be one of the markers for differentiating between fundamentalists and evangelicals. Evangelicals rallied behind Billy Graham as he effectively worked with local churches from every denomination (even papists!) to help coordinate his mass-evangelism "crusades." Graham's mega-church heirs -- people like Bill Hybels and Rick Warren -- have taken a similar approach. I may not like everything Warren says, but I appreciate that he's willing to work with clergy of other denominations and even other faiths. This new generation of leaders, like Graham, insist that such cooperation is possible without compromising one's own identity. Their critics disagree, vehemently. And those critics are no longer found only in the fundamentalist/separatist wings of the subculture.

The fundies' white-knuckled anxiety -- their barely repressed doubts and their fear that their faith may be a house of cards that would crumble if exposed to the wider world -- seems to be spreading to other branches of the evangelical movement. That's the predictable result of adding weird mythologies to one's faith. The fundies convinced themselves that if the world is any older than 10,000 years then Jesus doesn't love them. Thus they have to avoid all exposure to science. Evangelicals are trying to convince themselves that homosexuality is a choice and that the invasion of Iraq was God's Will. Like the fundies, they have welded these ideas to the bearing walls of their faith, so that if they are not true, then nothing is true. They thus find themselves, like the fundies, having to avoid exposure to an awful lot of the real world around them.

There's one other reason that I think people like the Rev. Billings oppose interdenominational cooperation. It has to do with power and influence. Evangelical polity -- the structure of this unstructured, nondenominational movement -- is roughly feudal, like a collection of competing fiefdoms. It's very important to a guy like the Rev. Vernon Billings that he be the biggest fish in the pond. Acknowledging that his is not the only pond, and that it is far from the largest, threatens his sense of authority. Once you recognize the legitimacy, or even the existence, of all those other churches in town then it's much harder to maintain the illusion that you're the Pope of Mount Prospect.

Getting back to those other churches in town, if we accept the world of Left Behind as the authors have sketched it out for us, then we have to assume that most of the adults from those other congregations were not RTCs and so were not among the disappeared. Bruce Barnes was until very recently a faux-Christian himself, but he seems to view the clergy and laity of these other churches as an even more reprobate species of fraud. It thus never occurs to him to speak to them about what he knows or to attempt to recruit them to his cause.

But while it's not surprising that he doesn't reach out to them, it's strange that none of them are reaching out too him. Those other clergy may not believe the premillennial dispensationalist heresies that Billings taught, but they would all be familiar enough with the substance of them to recognize what they were seeing. They would realize by now what was happening -- realize that they, like all the church fathers and theologians they had ever studied, were wrong and that Billings and Hal Lindsay and (especially) Cassandra LaHaye were right. And despite their being overwhelmed with their duties chaplaining the traumatized community, those other clergy would all be getting in touch with Bruce Barnes.

That doesn't happen here. It doesn't happen for the same reason that Bruce has no problem renting a car or driving 20 miles out I-90 to Mount Prospect despite all the chaos and debris that should be but isn't affecting anyone, anywhere in this book a mere 10 days after The Event.

And but so anyway, Buck pulls up to the church:

He had a sense of destiny tinged with fear. Who would this Bruce Barnes be? What would he look like? And would be be able to detect a non-Christian at a glance?

The authors apparently imagine that his is a common question unbelievers have about RTC clergy: Does their non-Christian detection power work at a single glance, or does it require physical contact?

I can't figure out why anyone would ever think this. Nor can I figure out why the authors would think that anyone would ever think this. It's not just wrong, it's bewilderingly wrong.

And anyway why should Buck care? He's not trying to pass himself off as a Christian, so he shouldn't be worrying that Bruce's spiritual gaydar will penetrate his cunning disguise.

Buck sat in the car, his head in his hands. He was too analytical, he knew, to make a rash decision. Even his leaving home years before to pursue an education and become a journalist had been plotted for years. To his family it came like a thunderbolt, but to young Cameron Williams it was a logical next step, a part of his long-range plan.

What family wouldn't be thunderstruck? Buck finishes high school and then astonishes them all by announcing that he's going away to college to pursue a career. It's so utterly unprecedented.

We're constantly being told that Buck is methodical and analytical (always a bad trait in LB), but we never see this. It seems that by "analytical" in this case the authors mean his stubborn refusal to accept the undeniable implications of explicit divine intervention. That actually seems like the opposite of analytical.

We've also seen that not only is Buck capable of making a "rash decision," he has a propensity for it. He flew to England to expose an international conspiracy, but less than 24 hours later he was cutting a deal with them and helping them to cover their tracks. He met Chloe yesterday, fell in love at first sight and impulsively booked the seat next to her on a flight to Chicago.

Again, this could have worked in a different novel where this was an intentional device -- the self-deceived voice of an unreliable narrator rather than the voice of one writer's Mary Sue substitute. But here the chasm between Buck's concept of himself and his actual character and behavior escape not just his notice, but the authors' as well. They don't perceive any such gap, and even if they did they seem to think that their assertions trump the actions they describe. We've never seen Buck think "analytically" and we have seen him, time and again, make rash decisions, but when the authors contradict this -- "He was too analytical ... to make a rash decision" -- that's supposed to settle the matter.

This is Bad Writing, but it's not wholly unrelated to the authors' Bad Theology. The same gap between what they tell and what they show, between asserted character and actual character, can be seen wherever the novel touches on the nature of God. They tell us that the God they believe in is good, just and loving. But the God they show us is a bloodthirsty, capricious, evil monstrosity.

That's partly the result of Bad Writing, too, but more than that it seems to be Bad Writing by Bad People. The character of God in LB is, like Buck and Rayford, another Mary-Sue wish-fulfillment surrogate for the authors. They have recreated God in their own image. And that image isn't pretty.

Comments

[Keith]

Cyllan-- Glad to know it survived. I rarely get up to Atlanta and usually only on business so it leaves little time for concerts, alas.

[Robb]

"they'll know we are Christians by our sincere-looking haircuts."

Derek Webb wrote one of my favorite songs ever on a variation of that:

they'll know us by the t-shirts that we wear they'll know us by the way we point and stare at anyone whose sin looks worse than ours who cannot hide the scars of this curse that we all bare

they’ll know us by our picket lines and signs
they’ll know us by the pride we hide behind
like anyone on earth is living right
and isn’t that why Jesus died
not to make us think we’re right

when love, love, love
is what we should be known for
love, love, love
it’s the how and it’s the why
we live and breathe and we die

they’ll know us by reasons we divide
and how we can’t seem to unify
because we’ve gotta sing songs a certain style
or we’ll walk right down that aisle
and just leave ‘em all behind

they’ll know us by the billboards that we make
just turning God’s words to cheap clichés
says “what part of murder don’t you understand?”
but we hate our fellow man
and point a finger at his grave

[Reverend Ref]

Pastors like the now-departed Vernon Billings tend to stick to themselves. They don't associate or cooperate much with other clergy in their communities. They don't get involved with ministerial councils or interdenominational efforts.

I can certainly vouch for that. In my little town there's a ministerial association which I effectively started. For a long time, it consisted of me and the UMC pastor. However, we've recently welcomed the local former-LCMS-now-non-denominational pastor to our group. Apparently we are the only three who can play nice together. The Baptist and the A.G. pastors don't care to show up because someone might get contaminated with liturgical cooties, and the Mormons ... well ... I think the Roman Catholic guy might come, but he's in another town on Wednesdays.

Today is Good Friday. We hold a community-wide Stations of the Cross procession through town. I had 18 people show up for that and the noon liturgy. Of those 18, four . . . four!! . . . were my parishioners. Maybe the pastors don't play well with others, but apparently some of their parishioners do.

He had a sense of destiny tinged with fear. Who would this Bruce Barnes be? What would he look like? And would be be able to detect a non-Christian at a glance?

You know, when somebody shows up at my door for business or because they're distressed or because they're in need of some short-term financial help, I have yet to say to myself, "This person isn't a Christian . . . I'd better be careful."

Time to quit procrastinating. People are expecting an Easter sermon.

[Jon R]

Froborr: What if this life's purpose is life after death? I've always favored the interpretation that God put us here and has had a relatively hands-off policy (as opposed to the angels, who are in his presence all the time) because this life is meant to teach us how to be people. I think God wanted people to talk with and so on, but just making immortal beings like the angels doesn't work too well, because too much awareness of Him at an early age stunts the development of an intelligent being. So in the context of our existence as immortal beings, this life is much-needed preparation for our true purpose. It's sort of like those "Everything I need to know I learned in kindergarten" posters.

That's my standard theodicy for the problem of evil, by the way -- God could intervene and keep us from being assholes to each other, but that constant intervention would rob us of our whole reason for existence here on Earth. [Insert some sort of platitude about giving a man a fish.]

[Salamanda]

Froborr: I've never understood that argument about "perfect justice". A human is a finite being, and therefore any evil committed by that human is necessarily also finite (as is any good). Infinite punishment for finite crime is unjust, and therefore a perfectly just deity would not subject any human to eternal torment.

It's been several years, but if I recall rightly, it's that the evil committed by that finite human is an affront to an infinite/eternal God, and therefore, any punishment must be infinite/eternal for justice to be served.

Yeah, I know. It took me longer than I'd like to admit to realize how fucked up that sounds.

[practicallyevil]

Does their non-Christian detection power work at a single glance, or does it require physical contact?

Oh come on Buck, just go to one of the other eleven Temples in town and have them cast undetectable alignment on you, rookie move. It's 20 gold a pop, plus material components, they might even do it for free if you tell 'em you're trying to pull one over on Bruce Barnes over at the Temple of Saint Cuthbert, always going on as he does about divine revenge and whatnot.

[aunursa]

Salamanda: It's been several years, but if I recall rightly, it's that the evil committed by that finite human is an affront to an infinite/eternal God, and therefore, any punishment must be infinite/eternal for justice to be served.

And the pushback is that the punishment that Jesus (allegedly) served on behalf of humanity lasted only three days.

[patter]

Actual sign on St Louis area church:

Independent
Fundamental
Pre-millennial

(Translation: No others welcome here, goddammit!)

[Fraser]

J, what's the significance of eel? Is it trayf?

Jon R., I largely agree with your view of life here/life beyond (though I won't be at all surprised to find out if it's something completely different).

The bit from Great Divorce reminded me of one of Lewis's nonfiction pieces where he argued we need Hell simply to put people who refuse to repent and be good--and I must admit, there are people who might not, or not for a long time. I do believe that if Hell exists, repentance and redemption are still options--since that was declared heresy more than a millenia ago, I was surprised when a friend from a really small town in Georgia said that's what her pastor had always taught.

Inferno, which tackles this idea, is one of my favorite Niven books. And there's a scene in James Branch Cabell's Jurgen where the hero learns Hell wasn't part of the creator's plan but he was so impressed by the people who saw themselves as Great Monstrous Miltonian Satanic Sinners Deserving Damnation that he created Hell just to keep them happy ("He's fascinated by pride because he can't feel it--remember, he created the world and every day he has to look at it.").

[mike timonin]

Carl Rennie: "I'd like to imagine that any human being, when actually put into that position, would be unable to condemn anyone to an eternity of suffering."

And that would make you a Universalist. Or at least, puts you on the road to Universalism. Google "Death and Glory" theology, and "Give them not Hell, but hope and courage". I'd say look up John Murray, but there are two. One is the "father of American Universalism" and one was a member of the Scottish Reform Church, and they aren't the same. Anyway, when you get to Universalism, the rest of us UUs will be waiting for you.

[Dash]

rm--Baptist lady Rapture story: loved it!

He had a sense of destiny tinged with fear. Who would this Bruce Barnes be? What would he look like?

Buck needs to figure out who he is, methinks. Every time he has a conversation with a middle-aged white guy, he acts like a 16 year old on a blind date. First it was the knee-knocking sweats over dinner with Rayford. Now it's sitting out in the car wondering . . . Who would this Bruce Barnes be? What would he look like? Would he be able to tell that Buck was nervous? What if Buck said something stupid? Should Buck have worn the other jacket?

Imagine Barnes' surprise when Buck finally knocks on the door and hands him a corsage.

[Dan]

Wow. My computes is somehow synched into these comments. Last week it was damsels in castles. Now this week: 1 minute ago, as I read "Derek Webb wrote one of my favorite songs ever on a variation of that:" Derek Webb was coming out of my windows media player. What's up with that?
________

"it's that the evil committed by that finite human is an affront to an infinite/eternal God, and therefore, any punishment must be infinite/eternal for justice to be served." And since St. Anselm put it that way, that's been the accepted position ever since. Oh, except for many Christians who think St. Anselm got it wrong. . .there are a lot who would be closer to Lewis' position above. If God truly gives humans the freedom to choose God or not, then there must be space for those who choose to reject God. But if God is the giver of Life (the way, the truth, and the life, said Jesus), then those who reject God reject life. So all that imagery of hellfire and worms and such is really just metaphor to drive home the point that choosing wrong carries bad consequences.

_________

Recently I was discussing the "A Common Word Between Muslims and Christians" document, and heard exactly what Fred is referring to above. Christians can't work toward peace with Muslims, because "what fellowship does light have with darkness?" I was labelled a heretic for even mentioning that perhaps Christians and Mormons could serve on community watch councils together. "Nope - that'e being yoked together with unbelievers, so it's WRONG!"

[Cowboy Diva]

patter,
I need an address! I will be back in StL next week and want pictures. How impressive, however, that they can get their entire creed into 3 words/12 syllables!

Dash, you're my hero.

[Karen]

One of my best friends from college was in fact actually named Bruce Barnes. The Bruce I know, however, is pretty much the photographic negative of the L & J one, however: my Bruce is educated, funny, sensitive, and generally a wonderful human. I wonder if he knows of his fictional counterpart? *sends email, waits for response*

On the interfaith thing, my church is very active in Austin Area Interreligious Ministries. AAIM sponsors an ecumenical Thanksgiving service on the Sunday after the national food-and-football orgy. This year the service was scheduled in an annex owned by Hyde Park Baptist Church, until Hyde Park found out we invited Muslims! and Sikhs! and Hindus! Oh My!! Hyde Park then rescinded their invitation on the Monday before the event itself, required AAIM to find a new location ASAP.

[Becky]

I'd like to imagine that any human being, when actually put into that position, would be unable to condemn anyone to an eternity of suffering. I know that if I had to judge, and the choice was heaven or hell, I'd probably just say "fuck it, room for all!" I can't imagine that a thinking, feeling person would have that little empathy.

I'd like to think so, too. But considering the number of people in the U.S. who seem to support torture, it appears that there are a fair number of human beings who would gleefully condemn others to hell.

[Bugmaster]

Nah, forget Paladins or Clerics. It's all about Psionics for me. I have a swiss-army-beam, multi-use Mage Hand, and, at later levels, I can animate furniture to do my bidding through the power of will alone. Sure, I can't turn undead, but I can burninate them with white-hot fire. And I don't have to bow before a self-righteous control-freak of a god to do it, either...

[Miri]

Entirely tangentially, I really, really, really dislike the use of the word "fundies." And no, I'm not one. I just think it's glib and disrespectful, and I wish people wouldn't use it. Oh, well.

[Greg]

Isn't that the point?

[JessicaR]

"This person isn't a Christian . . . I'd better be careful."

And that is why L&J wrote Buck being worried about that. Any normal human being, christian or not wouldn't write about a person being worried a pastor would "sense" and therefore refuse to help. But L&J think the Christian thing to do IS to refuse help or even deal with a non christian, unless you're trying to convert them. It's such an ugly depressing world they've created, made even more toxic when their followers try to make their words flesh in this one.

[Praline]

The authors apparently imagine that his is a common question unbelievers have about RTC clergy: Does their non-Christian detection power work at a single glance, or does it require physical contact?

I can't figure out why anyone would ever think this. Nor can I figure out why the authors would think that anyone would ever think this. It's not just wrong, it's bewilderingly wrong.

I think part of it comes back to a point in a very early post - http://slacktivist.typepad.com/slacktivist/2004/05/lb_go_to_hell.html. Steele blesses out somebody for accepting help in a crisis, then accepts help in a crisis; the difference is that Steele does it privately - doing things publicly is the real problem. With that attitude, how you come across to others is extremely important. It's natural for a hero to worry all the time about how other people see him. Buck is going to see a Christian, so that's the issue he has to worry about.

As being an RTC is also a sign of competence in this novel, looking insufficiently Christian to a Christian of longer standing would be like Rayford running into a pilot who might realise that he's a little shaky on how to operate the new cockpit radio. It would make Buck look bad. And that can't happen.

Perhaps, as well, it's an attempt to portray self-doubt. Buck can't be allowed to doubt his journalistic skills, his attractiveness to women, his political nous or his analytical smarts, because he's supposed to be good at everything. On the other hand, anxiety about whether you're a good enough Christian is something a manipulative pastor will be keen to induce. Worrying about whether you're a good enough Christian is thus the only worry that gets any sympathy.

Oddly, this winds up with Buck being insanely over-confident about everything he's bad at, and doubtful about something he definitely is.

[practicallyevil]

Four men dressed in black entered Bruce Barnes office looking defeated.

"Reverends, Father, Rabbi," Bruce Barnes acknowledged but did not welcome men.

One of the Reverends stepped forward and made his plea, "Bruce, we may have had our disagreements in the past, but it's pretty clear what has happened. Billings knew everything their was to know about the Rapture, and you know everything their is to know about Billings. We want salvation and to do whatever we can to help those left behind."

Bruce Barnes looked up from his ancient, worn Bible, filled with a myriad of bookmarks and place holders. "First gentlemen," hissed Bruce, "you must help yourselves. You two, rededicate yourselves to Jesus right this second. You Father, accept Jesus into your heart, clearly if he was with you he would have told you to switch faiths months ago. Finally you 'Teacher' accept Jesus as your Messiah, and pray in repentance. After you are all made pure we must gather together supplies. Food, Water, and most importantly weapons. We must organize a resistance against the minions of the antichrist, and make this church defensible."

"But what about the others left behind?" asked the Rabbi.

"That's precisely whom we must defend against, they're already lost." Bruce Barnes replied with unnatural coolness.

A look of sadness came over the four men in the doorway.

"Let's go," sighed the second Reverend, "there is no salvation here..." He looked up at the grinning Bruce Barnes and finished, "For anyone."

With that, four men dressed in black left Bruce Barnes office looking defeated.

[practicallyevil]

Needless to say this will all also be over at Right Behind in a matter of seconds.

I'd also like to say I love the character of Bruce Barnes, because you could play him so many ways. He could be a hopeless philanderer, a mindless devotee of the Rapture gospel, Rayford and Bucks spiritual "Q," religious prick, whatever you want. It's a great way to look at Left Behind from an optimists point of view, the glass isn't half empty, it's entirely empty. That way you can fill it with whatever you want.

[Carl Rennie]

I'd like to think so, too. But considering the number of people in the U.S. who seem to support torture, it appears that there are a fair number of human beings who would gleefully condemn others to hell.

Yes, but there's a difference between torturing people in the abstract (they should burn!), torturing people under authority (I'm just doing my job), and being given the authority to decide whether or not to personally torture someone. Most people, if handed the tools and a bound person, would (i hope) just walk away. It's like the story (referenced by CS Lewis, since he seems pretty popular around here) of British being mad for the blood of the German invaders in the abstract but serving them tea when a wounded soldier shows up at their door.

[lucidity]

I have been rereading a translation of the bible based exclusively on the J text, and I noticed that during His first conversation with Adam and Eve, God blatantly lies to them, and the serpent tells them the truth.

And that's different from the version in Genesis how?

[Steven S.]

Weirder than pregnant virgins, you mean?

Aw, come on, we've been around for how long as a species? Surely *one* of us is allowed to turn into a parthenogenetic mutant!

[ohiolibrarian]

While Cassandra is in the overmind -- she specifically got cursed with foresight no-one would believe because she wouldn't give in to Apollo's seduction. I can't remember Apollo ever successfully seducing anyone, which is odd in a beautiful divinity of music. But now it makes sense: he talked to them like Buck.

I think this should win the Internets for the day.

[Praline, linking here to a very long post of her own about the misuse of the word 'freedom' in movie]

We've never seen Buck think "analytically"

I think this is a case of authoritarian dogmatists using words they don't trouble to understand.

It's in the air. Bush and his lot are doing things like tapping phones without due cause, holding people without trial and torturing suspects in the name of 'freedom'. All of these things are directly counter to the concept of freedom, but they know that it's a word All Good People believe in; being Good People themselves (obviously), everything they do must be in the service of freedom. It's using a buzzwords without considering its implications.

Similarly, 'analytical' is a word you'd expect to be appropriate an intelligent journalist. However, analytical thinking leads to questioning God's Plan, and what's really called for is blind faith. But, if they don't think about the word too hard, that doesn't matter. It's like a five-year-old using a word he's heard in another context: he doesn't know exactly what it means, but it seems to mean something good.

Besides, if someone as dopey as Buck is analytical, then that lowers the bar for any of their readers who think they should be exercising their critical faculties more. Do analysis the way Buck does it, and you won't end up questioning your pastor. It sets a good example.

[Dylan]

And would be be able to detect a non-Christian at a glance?

All joking about supernatural powers aside, I think a lot of RTCs believe they can figure this out pretty easily. It's why a lot of the fundie evangelists start out their spiel by asking probing personal questions. I can remember one I ran into in college that asked me something like "who would you say is your biggest spiritual influence?" that threw me for a loop--that's not the kind of chat I want to have with a stranger. Also, I went to a church for a while that did a "talking to people about Jesus" class that apparently suggested you start out your evangelistic conversations with a checklist of questions.

What's sad about this is it promotes the idea that you can measure up a person's spiritual life by how well they respond to tough, intimate questions. (Because obviously "do you believe in Jesus?" is too easy to lie about.) But the problem is, you don't figure out if the person's really a Christian with questions like that, you only figure out if they're outgoing.

People like that pride themselves on what's essentially intimidation, so I'm sure they imagine other people (like Buck) really think of them like this.

[aunursa]

Most people, if handed the tools and a bound person, would (i hope) just walk away.

The Stanford Prison Experiment comes to mind.

[pyramus]

Entirely tangentially, I really, really, really dislike the use of the word "fundies." And no, I'm not one. I just think it's glib and disrespectful, and I wish people wouldn't use it. Oh, well.

Because of course fundamentalist Christians would never say anything disrespectful to anyone not of their religious persuasion.

Yeah, I know two wrongs don't make a right, but given all the genuinely horrifying things fundamentalists say about others, I'd think that being called "fundies" is small payback indeed.

J, what's the significance of eel? Is it trayf?

Eel is treyf. Also catfish, porpoise, snakemeat, all shellfish, camel meat (but not camel milk), eagles and other predacious birds, insects that don't leap (crickets good, centipedes bad), and oh, so many other things, too.

[aunursa]

As does the Milgram Experiment.

[Salamanda]

aunursa: And the pushback is that the punishment that Jesus (allegedly) served on behalf of humanity lasted only three days.

Nice. Although I imagine if I said that, the response would be that because Jesus-is-fully-God, the sacrifice of said infinite God would be, well, infinite, and thus would cover all of the sins of humanity. Or rather, COULD cover all of the sins of humanity, if only everyone would just accept the staggeringly obvious truth of the Gospel and Get Saved. Something like that. *handwave*

[Sue]

Re. the spiritual gaydar, I see someone else has already mentioned those leaving the church. When I was 14-15 and stopped believing, I was utterly terrified that my parents and pastors would be able to sense it. As C. S. Lewis put it (I probably misquote) "you can always tell someone who's been in Narnia; there's something about the eyes". I also believed that the communion wine might turn into water the minute it touched my lips - but it never did.

[Hysterical Woman]

I liked to think that the four men in practicalevil's story were angels. (Is that the point, actually?)

[Lauren]

@ aunursa: The Milgram experiment does not apply. There's a difference between being asked by an authority to harm another person, and being asked by an authority to choose whether to harm another person. Unlike the Simpsons parody, the administrators of Milgram didn't hand the subjects a button and say, "you can push this button or not, your call." They said, "Push the button, damn-it!" When they moved the experiment off campus and into a strip-mall, removing the semblance of authority, compliance dropped from a majority to a minority.

In other words, it's not just the threat of punishment that keeps me from raping and torturing everybody at will.

[Monkay]

With that, four men dressed in black left Bruce Barnes office looking defeated.
Looking defeated, the four men dressed in black left Bruce Barnes' office.
Now his office doesn't look defeated . . . great Right Behind bit, but I just had to do that . . .

And: Spiritual Radar = Spraydar

[Peter Boysen]

I think you aren't giving the authors enough credit. Maybe Buck going to school to become a journalist really did take his family by storm, because he was illiterate up until then. It did say he was going to pursue an education, after all.

[Ken]

The real Mount Prospect is home to more than a dozen churches. I can't help but wonder if they also exist in the fictional world of Left Behind...

Or it might be "hiding a leaf in a pile of dead leaves". If you want to insert a fictional church, the best place to locate it would be in a town with a LOT of churches. Sort of like fictional addresses in Atlanta always being "on Peachtree"; with well over twenty "Peachtrees" in the Greater Atlanta area, one more fictional one won't make much difference.

The gist of LB thus far suggests that all of those mainline Protestants and Catholics would not make the cut come Rapture time. They might call themselves Christians, but they're not Real True Christians according to Tim LaHaye's idea of God's standards (which is to say, Tim LaHaye's standards -- he seems to think that on the day of judgment God will hire him as a consultant to separate the wheat from the tares).

The image that sort of Day of Judgement imagery always brought to my mind was Dr Mengele doing Selections on the unloading platforms at Auschwitz KZ. "LINKS! LINKS! LINKS!" (i.e. "TO THE LEFT! TO THE LEFT! TO THE LEFT!")

Readers are intended to see the slippery slope between a metropolitan ministerial council and Carpathia's "Enigma Babylon One World Faith."

Again, a fictional religion name so AWFUL only a PMD could have coined it for a CBA-approved bestseller.

...and you know the spell doesn't work if you don't say "in Jesus name."

The fundies' white-knuckled anxiety -- their barely repressed doubts and their fear that their faith may be a house of cards that would crumble if exposed to the wider world -- seems to be spreading to other branches of the evangelical movement. ... The fundies convinced themselves that if the world is any older than 10,000 years then Jesus doesn't love them. Thus they have to avoid all exposure to science. ...they have welded these ideas to the bearing walls of their faith, so that if they are not true, then nothing is true. They thus find themselves ... having to avoid exposure to an awful lot of the real world around them.

First, these two are related; all-or-nothing, magickal thinking. The Magic Words have to be spoken Just So; every jot and tittle of the Holy Book has to be of equal -- Cosmic -- value, no interpretation allowed, no heirarchy or priority of doctrines. All or Nothing. The Magick Spell has to be cast Just So or the very Cosmos will Be Overthrown and Perish in Fire and Water. The Cosmos has to be Just So and work Just So, or God Almighty Will Be Overthrown And Perish In Fire And Water. What part of "I AM THAT I AM" and "Aslan is not a tame lion" don't they understand?

To paraphrase a classic RTC putdown, "My God's big enough to handle a 13.7 Gigayear-old, nine-Gigaparsec cosmos. Sorry about yours."

The authors apparently imagine that his is a common question unbelievers have about RTC clergy: Does their non-Christian detection power work at a single glance, or does it require physical contact?

And can it be jammed or spoofed? Considering Mike Warnke and so many Spiritual Warfare types, I would say Yes.

And anyway why should Buck care? He's not trying to pass himself off as a Christian, so he shouldn't be worrying that Bruce's spiritual gaydar will penetrate his cunning disguise.

"Spiritual Gaydar" -- hee hee hee. You'd be amazed at all the RTC Spiritual Warrior types who think "Discernment" means "Ripples in the Force -- woo woo woo" instead of "seeing the reality beneath the appearance". Internet Monk said a lot of them make him think he just stepped into a Star Wars prequel; my analogy is Witchfinder General instead of Star Wars.

Though after the Volume 2 plug in last week's posting, I thought Volume 1 was going to end on the "Founding of the Tribulation Force" scene. In a pulp context, that would be a natural breakpoint. (Not quite a cliffhanger, but definitely foreshadowing into the next episode.)

But no, it looks like we have to have The Altar Call Ending, this time with Buck Jenkins' self-insert. (Please Make It Stop!) Talk about formula writing...

[fronobulax]

I think the church he's describing in the story is supposed to be Willow Creek Community Church - a famous Chicago-area mega-church. It's in the northwest suburbs off I-90, but about another 15-20 miles past Mt. Prospect.

[Ken]

In one small Maine town near here, there's a 'Bible-Believing Baptist Church', which name I love, because of the imputation that the other local Baptist Churches aren't. -- Davis X. Machina

The "We're the One True Remnant" conceit. Like that KJV1611 church my writing partner showed me a couple years ago. The Only RTCs in the entire world -- a DOZEN strong!

And I've found that "Bible-Believing" in a name implies one of those independent Fundie splinter churches with the abovementioned One True Remnant conceit.

In my experience many Christians *do* act like they have some kind of Christ-dar. If they initially think you're one of them and find out they're wrong, you'll get the "you're not a Christian? But you're so nice!" reaction. Or, they just assume you're *not* one of them because of your mohawk or your black leather jacket. -- McJulie

Larry Norman and Pastor Ron (a filker from Tulsa) even wrote songs about it. And anybody who looks or acts DIFFERENT from the RTC Standard (fursuiters, gamers, Goths) can tell you a war story about it. "BEWARE THOU OF THE MUTANT!"

I think they *think* they can tell because "they'll know we are Christians by our love." But it's really, "they'll know we are Christians by our sincere-looking haircuts." -- McJulie

I've always wanted to filk that hymn into "And they'll know we are Christians 'cause We're Smug".

Imagine Barnes' surprise when Buck finally knocks on the door and hands him a corsage. -- Dash

Why do LH&J insist on making it SO easy to do Canonical Slashfics?

[Ken]

With that, four men dressed in black left Bruce Barnes office looking defeated.

"Don't ask if They are real;
The Men In Black, their lips are sealed..."
-- Blue Oyster Cult, "Take Me Away" (an Eighties BOC song about alien abduction)

[Mnemosyne]

In my quick scan of the thread I didn't see that anyone else had posted a link to this, but speaking of what would be an ecumenical matter ...

(I don't know if you Protestants will get it, but we Catholics will be rolling in the aisles.)

[Nick Kiddle]

I also find it interesting that Abraham is able to negotiate with God in Sodom's defense, implying a notion of god most fundamentalists would be dead-set against. Unfortunately, he only haggles the deal down to ten good men. If he'd gone to one, the town would have been safe, and I suspect history would be quite different.

There's a lovely Robert Westall story called "Rachel and the Angel" about a teenage girl who gets the same challenge as Abraham wrt her own village. She does (I forget how) get it down to one, but fails to find anyone else righteous (the angel shows her all the hidden sins of the villagers she knows and trusts). Eventually the angel announces that the unrighteous village will be destroyed after a certain interval of time, and when she questions the interval it explains that it's so her dad can send her away to Bible camp. She sees through the trap and says that she'll honourably inform her dad that she prefers not to go, so the village is saved.

[Mark Z.]

Surely *one* of us is allowed to turn into a parthenogenetic mutant!

Conclusion: Jesus was a woman. And Mary was not only her mother, but her sister.

Hey, I'm cool with that.

[Ken]

So true - and genuinely (if subconsciously) reflected in so much anti-Catholic sentiment among evangelical Protestants. They reject structure & authority on an institutional level as "bureuacracy in the church" that "hinders the work of the Spirit", while at the same time, church leaders (from the "senior" pastors all the way down to the greeters & ushers) hoard whatever authority is available. -- Robb

You'd think that all these small Independent Splinter Churches (or "Fellowships" as they often call themselves) whose theology is Only Personal Salvation would be wildly anarchistic. After all, they're a loose collection of individuals all with independent direct lines to God ("PERSONAL LORD and Savior") who have rejected any sort of formal heirarchy or affiliation.

Well, guess again. Those Independent Splinter Churches are often the most into control-freak total conformity and "DIE, HERETIC!" reflex reactions to anything NOT conforming utterly -- at least this side of North Korea, Airstrip One/Oceania, or an al-Qaida/Taliban blood feud.

One of them (PMD, natch) messed up my head but good back during the Seventies heyday of Hal Lindsay; when I finally drifted back into Catholicism (Yes, Mystery Babylon, the Beast of Rome!), I actually found the original Western Rite Liturgical Church to be wonderfully liberating. Maybe it's because they've "Been there, done that, got the T-shirt" for twenty centuries and know where a lot of the dead-ends (heresies) are, while all these One True Way Splinter Churches keep reinventing the wheel. And reinventing the wheel. And reinventing the wheel...

[Bugmaster]

"Kill the Mutant, Purge the Witch, Burn the Heretic!"

[Marsten]

I noticed that during His first conversation with Adam and Eve, God blatantly lies to them, and the serpent tells them the truth.

Very observant of you.

Events retold through Genesis do certainly seem to hint towards a more complicated story than that which is commonly supported by modern accepted dogma. In many ways, it's one of those types of tales that need to be looked at closer.

You're right, Yahweh does indeed lie to Man. At that point in the story, it's worth noting that Man accepts the lie and believes it to be truth. Why the need to lie? We could assume that it was some form of test, maybe a plan to examine humanity's loyalty.

However, if we accept that idea, it only raises further questions. Why the presence of the serpent? Would the serpent have been commanded to tempt humanity? If so, then Yahweh is surely unjust to punish humanity as he does. If not, then the serpent exists outside of Yahweh's powers - and is a god not omnipotent? My point is, considering this lie as a test only serves to raise further questions on the validity of Yahweh's claim to godhood.

It seems almost logical that the serpent acts with its own agenda, outside of the greater machinations of any god. Modern interpretations typically state that the serpent was Lucifer, the Shiatan, but this is never stated explicitly in the text. If we accept this as true, however, we have to ask ourselves why Yahweh's adversary is willing to give humanity the truth that their own creator hides from them.

It's easy to understand the idea that the Shiatan acted with the intention of sabotaging Yahweh's creation out of spite, or rage, or arrogance. Yet it is undeniable that he acts with truth, where Yahweh's first act was deception. This in itself, if we consider the reliability of the record, throws into doubt quite a substantial amount of biblical rhetoric. Consider, if you will, the nature of the lie. Yahweh acted to prevent humanity from eating from the Tree of Wisdom. Why? In some translations, the 'wisdom' that the fruit grants them is the understanding of the nature of good and evil. When mankind ate from the fruit, they GAINED something. Wisdom. Understanding of the nature of good and evil. The first thing they gain is awareness of their own nakedness, and then the awareness of the world around them. We could compare this to awakening from a slumber. Quite literally, man gained Free Will. We could say, the serpent gave mankind their awakening.

Follow this path to its conclusion. It seems now that the serpent (who we assume to be Lucifer) has aided humanity. Why would Yahweh NOT want humanity to eat from the Tree of Wisdom? Let's remember that there is another tree, the Tree of Life, mentioned often in Quabbalah. By eating thus, humanity earn life eternal. Yahweh, upon learning of mans disobedience, ushers them from Eden before they can consume the fruit of life. If Yahweh created humanity in his own image, why would he NOT want to grant such wisdom and life to them? Why would he go to such lengths as lie to them, to ensure that they would not attain such?

Perhaps the lie, then, is all Yahweh has. Perhaps he lies to humanity because he has invented something that cannot be 'un-made' (and consider, when in biblical text is any person simply un-made by their creator? Even those who are damned continue to exist in some plane of existence or other). The only real purpose for a lie of such level, if not a test, is out of fear. Could Yahweh have created a people so much alike himself that, if by gaining free will and life eternal, they could become alike Yahweh himself? As a creator, wouldn't it be terrifying if your own creation actually surpassed you? This is, of course, entirely hypothetical. But if it were true, then it would paint the image of a god no more powerful than an Elohim, one of the higher-ranking archangels. Is the 'God' of Genesis bound by pre-existing laws, so much so that the presence in Eden of both Trees of Wisdom and Life cannot simply be un-made or uprooted for the protection of humanity? If so, then it hints that Yahweh may be no more in power or rank than Lucifer, and perhaps himself child of something far greater.

But as I said, this is entirely hypothetical. What matters is, it's the act of Yahweh to lie and deceive humanity for his own ends. It's the act of the serpent to tell the truth to humanity - perhaps for his own ends as well, but the end result is a step towards ascending for humanity. For that step towards apotheosis, should humanity not consider gratitude to the serpent who aided and guided us?

It's a rather interesting little train of thought, I think.

[Bugmaster]

Could Yahweh have created a people so much alike himself that, if by gaining free will and life eternal, they could become alike Yahweh himself? ... This is, of course, entirely hypothetical.

Not really. It's explicitly stated in Genesis (IIRC), as well as later on in the story about the Tower of Babel, where God delivers a crippling blow to humanity out of fear that they can engineer their way back into Heaven and depose him. Later on, Yahveh, having adequately dealt with humans, gets paranoid about other gods, and starts making all kinds of commandments (as well as object lessons) against worshipping them.

Self esteem is not one of Yahveh's strong points.

[chmood]

J: "I have been rereading a translation of the bible based exclusively on the J text..."

Sorry, I've been meaning to edit that thing for several millennia now. ;-)
----

'K!

I find Fred's analysis of the PMD opposition to interfaith dialog simply astounding; although I think, as many people have already posted, that it's more due to bad writing than to bad theology that Jenkins forgot to mention the other churches round Mount Prospect. (But I've never been; I wouldn't know.)

BTW, today at work I came up with a new appellation for our favorite Antichrist: Nicolae The Romanian Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain. What do you think?

And finally (for this post, at least) I think "spiritual gaydar" needs a name-change; for originality's sake.

If only I could come up with one off the top of my head.