According to The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, “An overwhelming percentage of Christians (79 percent) say they believe in the second coming of Jesus Christ.”
That statistic isn’t surprising when one considers that most Christians also believe in the devil, resurrection, angels, heaven, hell and other fairy tales. Irrational beliefs can be benign or directly harmful. For example, the silly assertion that Jesus was born of a virgin probably doesn’t negatively influence opinions on important matters and policies. The widespread belief in the “second coming,” however, can have significant public consequences.
Voters convinced the return of Jesus is imminent may find themselves rather unconcerned with solving problems requiring long-term perspective and commitment.
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An Associated Press poll, conducted in late 2006, found that 25 percent of Americans (and nearly half of white evangelical Christians) believed there was a good chance that Jesus would return in 2007.
Translation: Tens of millions of Americans expect Jesus any day now.
For these people, issues like energy independence, the federal budget deficit, sustainable environmental practices or global climate change aren’t a big priority. Instead, their attention is focused on religious “moral issues,” like protecting marriage from homosexuals or arranging burials for embryonic stem cells.
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That simply didn’t happen. Jesus was wrong. This creates quite a problem for Bible believers, which they solve in their normal way. Passages fitting their particular brand of Christianity are to be taken literally, whereas passages that disagree, make no sense, or are obviously incorrect need to be somehow “interpreted.”
Read the rest.
That statistic isn’t surprising when one considers that most Christians also believe in the devil, resurrection, angels, heaven, hell and other fairy tales. Irrational beliefs can be benign or directly harmful. For example, the silly assertion that Jesus was born of a virgin probably doesn’t negatively influence opinions on important matters and policies. The widespread belief in the “second coming,” however, can have significant public consequences.
Voters convinced the return of Jesus is imminent may find themselves rather unconcerned with solving problems requiring long-term perspective and commitment.
...
An Associated Press poll, conducted in late 2006, found that 25 percent of Americans (and nearly half of white evangelical Christians) believed there was a good chance that Jesus would return in 2007.
Translation: Tens of millions of Americans expect Jesus any day now.
For these people, issues like energy independence, the federal budget deficit, sustainable environmental practices or global climate change aren’t a big priority. Instead, their attention is focused on religious “moral issues,” like protecting marriage from homosexuals or arranging burials for embryonic stem cells.
...
That simply didn’t happen. Jesus was wrong. This creates quite a problem for Bible believers, which they solve in their normal way. Passages fitting their particular brand of Christianity are to be taken literally, whereas passages that disagree, make no sense, or are obviously incorrect need to be somehow “interpreted.”
Read the rest.
1 comment:
I hesitated writing about this, but it stuck in my craw. So here goes.
The knowledgeable Mr. Bice writes, "That simply didn’t happen. Jesus was wrong. This creates quite a problem for Bible believers, which they solve in their normal way. Passages fitting their particular brand of Christianity are to be taken literally, whereas passages that disagree, make no sense, or are obviously incorrect need to be somehow 'interpreted.'"
What he's referring to is Mark 9:1 and Matthew 16:28, which Mr. Bice contends show that "Jesus asserts that the end would occur within the lifetime of some he was addressing". Being courteous, I'll include the text he's referring to... along with some of the context, which, of course, Mr. Bice was not good enough to provide. You'll be able to quickly note that these are two different accounts of the same event.
(Passages from the Revised Standard Version - Catholic Edition)
Mark 8:34 - 9:1
8:34 And he called to him the multitude with his disciples, and said to them, "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take his cross and follow me. 35 For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's sake will save it. 36 For what does it profit a man, to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? 37 For what can a man give in return for his life? 38 For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of man also be ashamed, when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels. 9:1 And he said to them, "Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God come with power."
Matthew 16:24-28
16:24 Then Jesus told his disciples, "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 25 For whoever would save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. 26 For what will it profit a man, if he gains the whole world and forfeits his life? Or, what shall a man give in return for his life? 27 For the Son of man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay every man for what he has done. 28 Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom."
And we see the statement Mr. Bice is talking about, "there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom".
So are Christians really in trouble?
Consider Mark 8:35 and Matthew 16:26, which, as the author of Matthew writes, "For what will it profit a man, if he gains the whole world and forfeits his life?". In both passages, the word psyche in the Greek is translated as life in English. Compare this with St. Jerome's Latin Vulgate translation where psyche is translated into Latin as anime, which means soul in English. The wordplay in Greek becomes clearer; psyche can be seen as both mortal and immortal life. Thus when we speak of life and death, if life has a "double meaning", what then could we make of the statement "will not taste death"? Mr. Bice's take on the phrase falls a bit short in its understanding of the subtleties of what was actually being stated.
So here I am, one of those sketchy Christians, solving problems in my typical way... looking at what the Bible actually says, not just depending on a limited understanding of a translation.
I'm really not so annoyed at his flubbing at reading the Bible... it's pretty easy for the casual reader to get all convoluted and come away with some pretty bad ideas. It's mostly the arrogance I have a problem with. The idea that "Bible believers" will be in awe of his wit and have to use tricks to get out trouble. It becomes even more insulting when all I have to do to disarm an argument is a quick vocabulary check.
And I'm really annoyed at being drawn into a position where I can even be loosely associated to Evangelical "end of days" beliefs. That just irritates me to no end.
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