If Barack Obama is really the Revelation Antichrist (and a Muslim), what will it be like to be governed by him?

Nothing has generated page hits to this blog to the same extent as my semi-considered attempt at being historically analytic and slightly michael taking posts considering whether Barack Obama might be the Muslim Antichrist prophesied in Revelation Chapter 13. A week after his election several dozen people each day are still reaching my blog through googling "obama revelation muslim antichrist".

I know that some people do genuinely, fervently believe that Barack Obama is foretold here in the Bible. People believe things, and some people believe more unusual things than others. For those who believe the Bible is to be read in such a way as to foretell an Antichrist, the Antichrist will destroy and bring an end to the world. And what, then, will be like for those in the US who believe Obama to be the Antichrist to stand up for the flag and the pledge of allegiance and submit to being governed by him? Terrifying, I would have thought.

Would anyone out there like to explain, contribute, comment...?

If Barack Obama's really the Revelation 13 Antichrist, surely we should feel compelled to vote for him....

I mean, given that the Bible (allegedly) says that the Antichrist will come, surely we should not presume ourselves able to stop him. And surely, if we were to try and stop him, we'd be guilty of attempting to re-write the book of Revelation, and liable to all the dire consequences of that. So surely, then, the only available option is to vote for Obama.

He he he *Grace cackles merrily and wishes all those enfranchised to vote a happy polling day*

Yet another post about Obama's alleged Revelation 13 Antichrist status

The whole saga of it all made it into the UK Guardian today. Given that the Guardian is a vaguely leftie paper still adhering to a tradition of considering itself too grown-up for God stuff, this is quite an acheivement.

Really, though, who is the Antichrist? Nobody you’ll find in the Bible, certainly. Revelation chapter 13 simply puts it as follows;

And I saw a beast coming out of the sea. He had ten horns and seven heads, with ten crowns on his horns, and on each head a blasphemous name. The beast I saw resembled a leopard, but had feet like those of a bear and a mouth like that of a lion. The dragon gave the beast his power and his throne and great authority ... The beast was given a mouth to utter proud words and blasphemies and to exercise his authority for forty-two months. He opened his mouth to blaspheme God, and to slander his name and his dwelling place and those who live in heaven. He was given power to make war against the saints and to conquer them. And he was given authority over every tribe, people, language and nation. All inhabitants of the earth will worship the beast—all whose names have not been written in the book of life belonging to the Lamb that was slain from the creation of the world...

So, leaving Obama aside for now, how do we get from that to the fundamentalist concept of the Antichrist as a person? The reasoning goes that, since God is all big and powerful, and since (according both to Newton in physical science terms and to Huntington in geopolitical terms) no force can exist without being opposed by an equal and opposite force. And since no force can exist without being opposed by an equal and opposite force, and since God is all big and powerful, the one who opposes God must be all macho and testosterone-laden too. And since the beastie of Revelation chapter 13 is the machoest, scariest non-God figure in the entire Bible, then he must be drafted into the Antichrist post.

There's a problem with this already, though: fundamentalists aren't supposed to do reasoning. With fundamentalism, the myth and metaphor of texts such as Revelation, as Karen Armstrong explains far better than me, are mean to be read like science textbooks. So, as a fundamentalist wanting to assert a doctrine of the Antichrist, one can only fall back on revelation: the Antichrist is how he is because God told me. And in our cosy postmodern world which has become very comfortable with the idea of people hearing all sorts of mutually contradictory things from various higher powers, it's a hard thing to refute.

So far be it for me to deny the existence for you of the Antichrist.

But how does Obama come into it? Well, in very much the same sort of way that Charles I of England came into it when people didn't want him in charge either. In both cases, God appears to have very specifically to have likened the Antichrist to the unwanted leader. And many, many times in between.

Maybe, though, God or those to whom he prophesied made some mistakes. After all, I have no grounds upon which to pronounce Obama not to be this mythically-constructed figure which some might attach the name of "Antichrist". After all, it's all convincing stuff;

According to The Book of Revelations: The Anti-Christ will be a man, in his 40s, of MUSLIM descent, who will deceive the nations with persuasive language, and have a MASSIVE Christ-like appeal....the prophecy says that people will flock to him and he will promise false hope and world peace, and when he is in power, he will destroy everything. And Now: For the award winning Act of Stupidity Of all times the People of America want to elect, to the most Powerful position on the face of the Planet -- The Presidency of the United states of America .. A Male of Muslim descent who is the most extremely liberal Senator in Congress (in other words an extremist) and in his 40s.

Whatever. But what I still don't get and can't get my head around is how one can reconcile all the obsessing about evil and all the hate-mongering, scapegoating and bile that seems to accompany all such Antichrist searching. Where does the love which Jesus kept going on and on and on about, where does that come into it? Where's it all gone...?

Even with the Lord on your side, a bit of sex appeal still helps

The scene is set in the lobby of GRACE's department. Four MALE MAINTENANCE/SECURITY STAFF are crowded round the widescreen television, which they have switched from BBC News 24 to FOX News. Sarah Palin is speaking and they are watching, breathless.

GRACE, having just locked herself out of her office, enters quietly from stage left.

GRACE: Um, excuse me...

MAINTENANCE/SECURITY STAFF do not respond

GRACE: (raising her voice slightly) Er, sorry to disturb you, but...

All four MALE MAINTENANCE/SECURITY STAFF slowly turn around, cringeing and all red-faced, looking as though they'd been caught reading Page 3 of The Sun .

What has Prince Charles suddenly done to deserve becoming the Antichrist?

Seriously, can anyone explain? All of a sudden, this weekend I've had 11 hits to this page from people googling "prince charles antichrist" or similar. And I'd thought it had all been resolved that Barack Obama was definitely the man...

"Praise the Lord and pass the business plan as God embraces Mammon": a prophecy of the pissing off of Pentecostals by today's Guardian article.

The article in question, subtitled "Pentecostalist gathering draws worshippers with get-rich philosophy", and written by Robert Booth, is online here.

Basically, it's an expose of the dire materialism and cringe-inducing prosperity-gospelness of the International Gathering of Champions "Empowered to Prosper conference" and of the Kingsway International Christian Centre, who are running the event. The reporting about the KICC is probably fair journalism. But the implication that all such churches and all such over-involvement with money is typical of Pentecostalists (I assume he means Pentecostals) is, I think, slightly misjudged, inaccurate and destined to outrage.

Pentecostalism began in early 20th Century America as a way of reigniting the power which came down on the early Church from the Holy Spirit at the first Pentecost, and of harnessing that power to liberate and transform every sphere of each person's life. So whereas there's an emphasis on God doing miraculous and very practical things - bringing healing, restoring families and relationships, arranging jobs, marriages and pregnancies - it's also about developing very individual, personal, ecstatic, emotional, intimate relationships with God. Given that God is so involved and immersed in the minutae of everyday life, then God must be concerned with an individual's financial situation. But, within mainstream Pentecostalism, money is only one apsect of a holistic bigger picture.

The clue to how, within the article, the fallacy may have arisen, is the author's implication (though, to be fair, not an assertion) that Pentecostalism began in Oklahoma. What began in Oklahoma was the whole word-faith, seed-faith, prosperity-gospel millieu. With Kenneth Hagin in Tulsa and then in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, to be precise, though its roots go back much further and broader than that. What word-faith teaches is that, seeing as we are healed by the wounds of Jesus (Isaiah 53:5, far removed from its original meaning) and given that God has promised us anything we ask for in his name (John 14:3, used entirely out of context) then all believers have the right to demand of God perfect health and limitless financial prosperity. Which is all entirely materialistic, but again, not entirely about the money. Mostly, but not entirely.

So I'll be interested to read what the KICC, and what some of the many un-financially-obsessed Pentecostals have to say about the Guardian article...

Todd Bentley, Michael Guglielmucci... and Brandt Russo

The sordid, tragic sagas of both Todd Bentley and Michael Guglielmucci are continuing to unfold and reverberate around the internet. Yet in the midst of it all, I found this article from the Charleston Gazette in West Virginia.

Charleston-based street evangelist in Florida jail
Charleston-based street evangelist Brandt Russo was in jail today after trying to hold services at a church in Lakeland, Fla.

Russo was arrested Tuesday at Lakeland's Ignite Church and charged with trespassing after he tried to hold communion services on church property, said friend and supporter Charessa Wilkinson. Russo was in the Polk County Jail on $500 bond this morning, according to jail records.

An ordained minister, Russo decided to give up his worldly goods, live on the streets and minister to the homeless. Russo decided to settle in West Virginia after visiting the state on a religious tour.

Earlier this month, Russo took his vegetable oil-powered school bus on a trip to different cities he has visited to shoot a documentary film about life on the streets. Wilkinson said Russo decided to go to Lakeland after learning of the plight of about 40 homeless men who are trying to live in a swamp about 100 yards from Ignite Church.

Russo believes leaders of the church -- until recently, home of controversial evangelist Todd Bentley -- should be doing more to help the homeless men camped right outside their door, Wilkinson said.

Russo, who has been thrown out of or asked to leave several nationally known charismatic churches, is not above using civil disobedience to draw attention to the plight of the homeless.

I believe that Brandt Russo has done entirely what Jesus would have: stepped aside from the plight of the religious bigwigs and got himself a troublemaking reputation for standing up to defend the oppressed and marginalised right in the temple compound.

Meanwhile, all the charismatic big shots have come out to distance themselves from and apologise for Todd Bentley and the family of Michael Guglielmucci have come out to affirm his need for love and healing. Todd Bentley's wife Shonnah allegedly wants nothing more to do with him, whilst Michael Guglielmucci's wife Amanda is allegedly determined that their marriage will survive. Todd Bentley is said to be praying and thinking before saying anything public, whereas Michael Guglielmucci has been on prime-time Australian TV attempting to explain himself. And I've got to the point of wondering, maybe this is enough. Maybe, as a person interested in what's happening and willing to pray yet entirely untouched by the former ministry or current unravelling of either Todd Bentley or Michael Guglielmucci, I don't need to know any more. Maybe the discussion and speculation of both is now best left to those directly affected.

Instead, maybe the media spotlight and blog space could divert to individuals like Brandt Russo. He sounds an amazing prophet, role model and human...

*Grace wonders about spending the $50 she refused to be parted with earlier on sending a large bunch of flowers to Polk County Jail*

ChurchSearch Week 10: Grace considers Patricia King's Extreme Prophetic XPWebChurch, but is put off by the $50 demanded at the door

Extreme Prophetic with Patricia King. A brief glance at their website suggests that they're likely to be what most Christians would consider somewhat heterodox or a bit dodgy. Their Doctrinal Statement which concludes

We believe God loves us with an everlasting love and has come to give us a future and a hope! Yippy! Yeah God!

does little to dispel this impression. However, I'm intrigued by the shamanic, gnostic, generally New Agey and mystical tone to it all. It seems very unusual, and I'd wanted to learn more. I'd wanted to try out their XPWebchurch both because of this and because, as an online community, it seems very well thought out and structured and generally very interesting.

And then they asked me for $50. In fact, if you read the introductory page, the link to the Tithes and Offerings page appears above the link to the Doctrinal Statement. That's seriously a bit worrying. And then, if you click to read the Tithes and Offerings Policy, you're told

Some have said, "I can't afford to tithe.” I would simply answer this by saying that you can’t afford not to!

Do they seriously not realise that the phrase you can't afford not to is the utterly stereotypical response of every money-scamming Scientology-style cult?

Can they not afford to freely share the good news of Jesus which came for free and brings limitless freedom at no cost, even for a 7-day introductory trial?

wondering what Michael Guglielmucci and Todd Bentley are saying to the Church

Oh dear. First Todd Bentley, now Michael Guglielmucci. It hasn't been a good month for the Church, and especially not its charismatic bits.

Briefly put, Michael Guglielmucci is an Australian youth pastor from Adelaide, so tragically stricken by the effects of terminal cancer that he needed an oxygen tube to manage on stage. The disturbing bit of that being that his cancer was something he'd entirely made up, fabricated and faked, and had sung and preached about to thousands of people. Like he's doing below.


The full story is throughout the Australian press.

And Guglielmucci has now been speaking to the media about why he did it. His claim is that he's 'addicted to porn' and needed, essentially, a credible-sounding illness to distract himself from it and cover it up from others. He claims that his obsession with porn is so strong that he has been losing his hair and throwing up every evening, and that he therefore needed a socially-acceptable explanation for these symptoms.

But losing one's hair and constantly vomiting are not symptoms of over-involvement with porn. Instead, they are fairly common and widespread reactions to stress. So why, given that Guglielmucci's "symptoms" arose through the horrendous pressure of being both a minister of Christ to young people and a man struggling with a life-consuming obsession, why could he have not admitted all this to those he chose in his church and/or family and asked for help and support and prayer?

I would like to hope that such help, support and prayer would have been readily and discreetly forthcoming. Yet the Church, as a whole, does not have a good track record of dealing maturely or compassionately with people's sexual difficulties. The Church is still saturated by a such a simplistic dualism in which people are morally responsible for what goes wrong with their minds but powerless over what happens with their bodies, and assumes that body and mind can clearly be delineated from one another. So by presenting himself with a form of cancer known as having no environmental causes rather than an ambiguous and somewhat amorphous sexual and/or obsession-type problem, Guglielmucci became a victim of a disease, a hero and a role model rather than the pervert he may have been regarded as. I'm not excusing Guglielmucci's behaviour, and I'm not suggesting that deceiving people by fabricating cancer is ever remotely acceptable. But I think that the Church, by expecting so much and so intensely of its leaders, whilst often offering disproportionately little to support them, must bear the blame for pushing some of its leaders past what they can cope with...

why I can't join the condemnation of Todd Bentley

Todd Bentley. I've been watching him and the Lakeland Revival on the GOD Channel and YouTube for a few months now. Headbutting the groins of cancer sufferers for whom you're praying whilst shouing "wham-bam!" isn't my understanding of how God generally works (see clip below) but it held my fascination in wondering what it was about him that drew people to his ministry, godly or otherwise. I think it was all his talk of the transsexual angel named Emma which endeared me to him. As one also prone to conversing with supernatural apparitions with a questionable connection to reality, I felt some kinship with a 32 year old man still so firmly and childishly attached to his imaginary friend.

During the past week, it has emerged that Todd Bentley has been having an unhealthy relationship on an emotional level with a female member of his staff, and hadn't been honest about it. The Christian press, and the charismatics in particular, are extremely angry and are using the revelation as evidence that Bentley was, all along, an unsavoury character, a snake-oiled charlatan and a possible agent of Satan.

All I can feel, though, is really, really sorry for Todd Bentley*. I'm not condoning his sexual misdeeds, nor suggesting that his offbeat antics have been innocuous or harmless to those his ministy has confused and hurt. I think it's entirely necessary that Bentley steps down from his position, I would hope to see a public repentance appear on YouTube soon and I would be very annoyed to see him back on stage any time soon. But haven't we all of us, under the pressure of overwork, stress or heightened emotion, committed acts that were shockingly immoral, destructive, thoughtless, dishonest, abusive or stupid?

Despite all that has happened, I cannot believe that there was nothing of God in Todd Bentley's ministry. And so, I find it oddly reassuring that God is willing and able to use someone as odd and misguided and sinful as the rest of us...



But what do others out there think?

*Of course, I really feel sorry for his wife Shonnah and their kids, too.

Barack Obama competes with Prince Charles for definitive Antichrist status as Satan is alleged incarnate yet again

Blogspot is now hosting the blog entitled Barack Obama the Antichrist.

It is a genuine attempt to express a view that the end of the world finally is nigh... or merely a nifty Republican campaign tool?

Either way, it's an age-old eschatopolitical (or did I make that word up?) trick. At this point I was going to attempt something all serious and scholarly in probing for parallels between the antichrist charges made against Obama in the US today and Charles I in Britain in 1640. As soon as I put "charles antichrist" into Google, however, I became sidetracked by the realisation that today's Prince Charles is also beset with antichrist allegations. Watch what follows... and weep.

in which Grace can't stop thinking about Satan

I've moved my post about him to The Crowded Handbasket. Do pop over and join the discussion!

Grace and Beloved's ChurchSeach Week 8.1: Grace seeks to discover the spirituality of homemaking

As in, homemaking, homemaking, homemaking...

If this weren't an anonymous blog, I'd upload you a webcam picture of my tongue poking ever so slightly into my cheek. I was brought up as a liberated young lady, a child of Madonna and Whitney Houston and the early 80s girls days school movement, all primed and Miss Jean Brodied to conquer the workplace with my shoulder pads and trek as a missionary to Darkest Africa. So the idea that I dedicate the next week to trying to find some connection with God through mere domesticity, it's all a bit, er, challenging.

But then, I need a challenge. New Job is not going to be commencing for another few weeks, Beloved is insisting (oh how harsh of him) that I don't busy myself with agency bum-wipings in the meantime and, yes, our Marital Home is needing some hardcore housework. And, as much as I take the mick out of such things, I do want to look after my Beloved.

And, more to the point, unless I can find some spiritual fulfilment in doing the "homemaking", it's not likely to happen to any reasonable standard. Honestly, I can't be bothered. I don't have the OCD-type drive to keep things in order, nor do I derive any particular pleasure or pride in tidyness, nor does Beloved ask, encourage, demand or complain about the state of Marital Home, nor does he take any particular delight in things being neat. So essentially, I'll need God to motivate me off my arse to get started. And I'll give Him a week, to start off with

My tasks for tomorrow then, are as follows
1. To do a big, economically-minded trip to the Budget Supermarket to stock up with 11p tinned tomatoes, Polish drain cleaner, recycled loo paper and the like.
2. To take our final few frame-requiring wedding items to the local frame shop.
3. To replace the teapot someone dropped last week.
4. To replace the sofa cushion someone weed on last year.
5. To scrub Marital Bathroom until it's all shiny.

And in the meantime, I'm sitting here blogsearching and reading about Christian homemaking and Biblical womanhood and the joy of housework and wondering whether, if I truly seek God enough, I could reach such a level of serenity and peace and warmth from scrubbing cat hair out from between the shower tiles

I will update you...

Grace thinks about Satan

[Post now at The Crowded Handbasket]

Grace and Beloved's ChurchSearch Week 7.5: Grace does a virtual tour of Hyles-Anderson College

... and decides that it would take a more trusting, deferential person than her to apply.

I mean, I'm sure they love God very, very much and I'm sure that God loves them too and that they're filled with grace and mercy and all good things... but an online tour really was enough for me for now.

Their promotional video is here.

And their student code of conduct is here. Aptly titled "Maybe you wouldn't like". I don't like the thought of requiring a male to accompany and guide and preserve me from my evil inclinations off campus, no. I deep respect female Muslim friends who've said to me that they feel that having a mahram (basically, a male guide/protector/advocate, proposed through various hadith) helps them learn humility and deference and draw closer to God... but I think I was brought up much more to value my, like, independence and freedom.

The main degree open to women, it seems, is the Associate of Science in Marriage and Motherhood (see p84). Whereas I'd very much welcome some guidance on how to be a better spouse to my Beloved and a more welcoming hostess of visitors and a better pastry-maker, I'm sure my antipathy towards sewing would seriously dent my grade point average.... not to mention my intellectual frustration.

What's really intriguing, though, is how such blog and message board and YouTube activity is generated by what is essentially a small and marginal college. Such as below, in which Principal Hyles explains how Satan composed the New International Version of the Bible. I'd always thought it was the 100+ translators working from virtually the same ancient texts as those who wrote the King James Version. But there you go. Compared to what happened to Salman Rushdie (who, in the Satanic Verses made a much milder but broadly similar allegation), Rev Hyles gets off very lightly...

Grace and Beloved's ChurchSearch Week 7.2: Grace goes Appalachian snake handling via Google

The Church of the Lord Jesus with Signs Following in Jolo, West Virginia, USA

This is the town, situated in one of the five most deprived counties of the whole United States.



This is their church website...

... and here's a YouTube clip I found of part of a service...


... and here's a documentary clip I also found about them...


... and here's a Wikipedia page about it all.

Is anyone else out there utterly intrigued?