Still More on Moyers' Moronic Tome

The second charge levied by Bill Moyers against Christian conservatives in There Is No Tomorrow is that they brought about the Iraq war in order to hasten the Second Coming of Christ. Once again misnaming the Book of Revelation, he says of Christians:

[Christians] are sincere, serious and polite as they tell you they feel called to help bring the rapture on as fulfillment of biblical prophecy. That's why they have declared solidarity with Israel and the Jewish settlements and backed up their support with money and volunteers. It's why the invasion of Iraq for them was a warm-up act, predicted in the Book of Revelations where four angels "which are bound in the great river Euphrates will be released to slay the third part of man." A war with Islam in the Middle East is not something to be feared but welcomed -- an essential conflagration on the road to redemption.

Couple this with his description of President Bush and his allies in Washington ("...the delusional is no longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat of power in the Oval Office and in Congress...") and you see that Moyers thinks there's no more reason for us to be in Iraq than there was for Teddy to charge up San Juan Hill ... unless it's to bring on the Second Coming.

I've been working on a novel for the last couple years that has to do with Moyers' thesis of hurrying up Christ's return. The characters don't start wars; rather, they evangelize and reach the unreached with the Gospel. Why? Because this is Christs' teaching. Paul could write well on the irony, sin and danger of bringing on war to bring on Christ; anyone who's read Romans can imagine the pointed direction he would levy on someone foolish enough to pursue that route.

Nevertheless, we have to ask ourselves as Christians if Moyers can justify his claim. He couldn't support his position that Christians are anti-environment; can he do any better now? No.


If we were all about furthering Armageddon, why is our Christian President pressuring Israel to work with the Palestinians and abandon their settlements? If Moyers' thesis is right, Bush would have sent in the Marines to protect the settlements.

If Jenkins and Lahaye were leading State and Defense instead of Rice and Rumsfeld, wouldn't we be pestering Putin, harrassing Hafez and aggravating the Ayatollas more than we are? We've kept the Russians out of the area, we've kept things cool with Syria and we're letting the Europeans take the lead with Iran.

The recipe for Armageddon Flambe involves whipping up all these forces, sprinkling with a little Whore of Babylon and serving it up to the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. The President is being much more cautious, settling one problem at a time to avoid conflagration.

Moyers is waving his arms and shouting, and unfortunately, many people are listening and their hatred and misunderstanding is growing, even as the speaker is making no sense at all.