Devout Christians seem alien and scary to me. Watch this vid!

[mwb970]

Try watching this video, a report from Pat Robertson's 700 Club about Christians who believe that Highway I-35 in Texas is mentioned in the Bible. I made it most of the way through it before throwing up in my mouth a little.

I watch something like this, I listen to all the savior talk (usually presented with a southern drawl) and I really can't help asking myself, What on earth is wrong with these people? When I listen to the people in this clip, I might as well be listening to space aliens from Neptune.

I recently read a long history of Mormonism, and the whole time I was reading the book I felt like I was reading about insane people, people who lapsed, sheeplike, into delusional thinking under the malign influence of uber-charlatan Joseph Smith. I get the same feeling watching this video.

[RebelOne]

1. Read the posts at RaptureReady.com.

These people are really delusional. They believe that Jesus is going to return soon and zap them all up to heaven.

[mwb970]

4. Wow, you're right.

That's some wacky website. Do you suppose that the things I believe in (science, facts, logic, experience, etc.) seem delusional to them in the same way? Can their problem be considered a mental illness or is it "just religion"?

And hey, why don't they have their stupid idiotic Rapture already and get it over with? They've been waiting 2000 years for Jesus to "return". How much longer? The people who would be Raptured are the exact same people I want to see removed from the American scene forever. So go already! Go!

[Vickers]

2. They should include photos of the homes and vehicles these "pastors" own

every time they run a story about them.

:eyes:

[Jester Messiah]

3. That's a normal reaction to brainwashed cultists.

They're faith-heads, high on their drug of choice. It's like the difference between a casual smoker and an out-and-out junkie. My only hope is that they'll be so busy praying that they'll forget to go vote.

[gratuitous]

5. Oh, I dunno

When my congregation is doing its annual Souper Bowl party, filling all those soup packets to be given away all year to our neighbors through Snow-Cap, I don't think we seem all that alien or scary. But maybe if I saw us on video, my impression would be different.

Never too early for a little Christian bashing at DU, though.

[mwb970]

8. Not all Christians are scary!

I'm sorry if I gave that impression. I used "devout" dogwhistle-style to suggest that I was referring to the "Rapture Ready" crowd, who have what I consider to be weird, far-out and even, yes, alien beliefs. These are people who believe an interstate highway was prophesied in the Bible, right down to its route number! Please.

Your Souper Bowl party sounds great! Let me ask you though, do you think of it in Dominionist terms of literalist end times, Rapture, apocalypse, etc.? If not, you're not who I am talking about. I'm sure your activity would come across just fine on video.

[skooooo]

11. Instead of making yourself out to be a victim..

...maybe you should emphasise that there are different kinds of Christians.

[Growler]

13. great post! n/t

[Growler]

14. Delete. Dupe.

[JVS]

15. You want them to call themselves non-devout?

[tuvor]

6. I don't think "devout" is the right word.

Neither is "Christian" come to think of it.

[rurallib]

7. just think what good these people could do if the time and money

they spend on all the hokum were focused on real problems.

[Subdivisions]

9. Sorry, I'm not feeling it here. But maybe that's just because I'm

seven miles away from I-35.

NOT!

[yellowcanine]

18. You need to get your butt over there to the side of the highway so GAWD-DUH can touch you .

[cynatnite]

10. It's in the bible, dude...

Between the chapter about Harry Potter the antichrist and license plates being the the mark of the beasts. Everyone knows that I-35 is the devils work. You ought to see the demons on it during rush hour.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

12. They believe it because the first step in creating fundamentalists

(religious--or political, as in North Korea) is to convince them that all unapproved sources of information are EVIL and trying to LEAD THEM ASTRAY.

Eager converts therefore limit their TV viewing to approved channels and approved DVDs, listen only to approved radio stations, and read only approved magazines. (Fundamentalists even have their own weekly news magazine, like Time or Newsweek.)

There's also tremendous peer pressure to think like the rest of the crowd, and if you have doubts, that's the devil talking to you.

[bobbert]

16. At 4:53 it seems like Pat Robertson is laughing at the story

That's how much bullshit it is.

[yellowcanine]

17. Never mind that the word "highway" in a OT text cannot possibly mean anything approaching a modern

interstate highway in the 21st century. Then you have the coincidence that it is mentioned in the 35th chapter. Yes these people are nuts.