You would think that when the last guy to finish second in a presidential election rejected your endorsement, the next time around candidates for the nation’s highest elected office might be a little less willing to embrace you.
You would think. But you’re not Texas’ own John Hagee.
Last Thursday, former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich announced that he is looking at a run for the White House in 2012. The Miami Herald has the details of his announcement in a piece that contains the following, buried at the end of the story:
After speaking at the “Rediscovering God in America” event in Des Moines in late March, Gingrich is expected to travel to San Antonio, where he will speak at the Cornerstone Church, which has a congregation of 19,000.
While there, he is expected to meet with Cornerstone’s sometimes-controversial senior pastor, John Hagee. In 2008, Hagee apologized for comments that were considered to be anti-Catholic. Gingrich, who converted to Catholicism two years ago, has been reaching out actively to evangelical pastors for the last two years.
Yes, that John Hagee, the megachurch pastor who in 2008 endorsed John McCain only to have his endorsement returned to him when the pastor’s claims about Adolf Hitler being sent by God to force Jews back to Israel came under increasing scrutiny.
Unfortunately, the Hitler comment is just a small piece of Hagee’s hateful rhetoric. He has also claimed that the anti-Christ will be partially Jewish and called the Catholic church a false cult. The latter claim makes the Gingrich-Hagee meeting even more befuddling because, as the Miami Herald piece points out, Gingrich is a recent convert to Catholicism.
Then there was this Hagee statement about Hurricane Katrina that’s right out of the Westboro (“God Hates Fags”) Baptist Church playbook:
The newspaper carried the story in our local area that was not carried nationally that there was to be a homosexual parade on the Monday that the Katrina came, and the promise of that parade was that it was going to reach a level of sexuality never demonstrated before in any of the other Gay Pride parades. So I believe that the judgment of God is a very real thing. I know that there are people who demure from that, but I believe that the Bible teaches that when you violate the law of God, that God brings punishment sometimes before the day of judgment, and I believe that the Hurricane Katrina was, in fact, the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans.
Thank God for hurricanes? I wonder if the homosexual parade was back on a few weeks later when Hurricane Rita prompted the re-evacuation of New Orleans.
We would be kidding ourselves if we believed both sides will be playing nice during next year’s presidential campaign. But we hope this isn’t an early sign that candidates are willing to embrace just about anyone—including those who would use religion to divide and as a political tool—in an effort to secure the support of the fringe factions in a candidate’s party.
John Hagee is of the “Left Behind” brand of End-of-Times activist brand.
The Left Behind thesis, originally published in “the Late Great Planet Earth” by Hal Lindsey, and the Left Behind movies, books, comics, and videos by Tim Lehay and Jerry B Jenkins. A popular advocate of the end of times propaganda is Jank van Impe of Jack Van Impe Ministries.
http://www.jvim.com/
http://www.leftbehind.com/
This belief system is rooted in the original works of John Darby (1800-1882) in which a the belief system is called “premillenial dispensationalism” also called eschtological.
The core beliefs these days is that Satan aka Anti-Christ is already on earth an in the guise of the EU or UN is creating a new global order and that the end of time starts with the Rapture in which all Goodchristains go on R&R during a seven year period in which a handful of goodchristians are Left Behind to fight the Anti-Christ.
The Rapure and Tribulation are supposed to start with a peace Treaty with Israel which triggers plague, pestilence, and all sorts of bloody events that culminate in Satan rebuilding the Temple at about the half way point at which point all Jews go to Hell save for 144,000 who convert to Christianity. Things go from awful to wost until the battle of Megiddon aka Armageddon occurs between the forces of Satan and the United States. At the peak of the battle, Jesus returns and thows Satan into the pit.
That’s short version, but the love of evangelicals for Israel is based on the belief that Jesus won’t return until Isreal is united which starts the seven years of Tribulation in which Judaism is sent to Hell at mid Trib. All sorts of signs are warnings of the coming of the End times in which running score for the current week is on the weekly “rapture index”.
http://www.raptureready.com/rap2.html
The state of Israel and the Jewish community is totally aware of the duplicitous nature of the Left Behind movement, and uses these fools to advance Israeli state interests. While some of the Left Behinders are tying to quick start the Rapture by blowing up the Dome on the Roack in jerusalam, Israeli security forces are aware and have stopped repeated attempts.
It is my hunch that President George W Bush was a Left Behinder through his personal contacts with authors who aided him in battling alcohol. The invasion of Iraq was largely triggered by the Left Behind thesis that Satan was going to build a new GHQ in Babylon in Irag. Since Saddam was working to restore Babylon as part of Iraq’s history, W most likel came to the conclusion that Saddam was either Satan or one of his employees. Whe W said that the invasion of Iraq was a clear cut choice between Good and Evil, he was not using hyperbole.
I think George W Bush dropped that set of beliefs and decided to be President instead of Left Behind flunkey.
Keep in mind that there are millions of believers of the pre-mil thesis, as indicated by the huge size of their churches, and millions of readers.
They are to be taken seriously for they are seriously crazy.
I noticed that virtually no one has commented on John Hagee. It’s not that people are being unkind. I think it’s just the no one gives a flying chocolate chip waffle about anything he has to say.
Charles, you have ruined my vision of chocolate chips waffles and cookies.