Fundamentalists and the End Times

Apocalyptic expectations, religious ideas about the end of the world, are very important for the Christian Right. They play a particularly prominent and pernicious role in the Christian Right attitude toward Israel and Jews in general.

I just came across a good, brief description of fundamentalist apocalyptic views in Jessica Stern's Terror in the Name of God: Why Religious Militants Kill (2003). I think it's clear in the context of the quote that she's not implying that all or anything close to all fundamentalists that hold this belief indulge in violent extremism or support it. The Christian Identity movement that she mentions is a far-right version of Christianity that has more influence on the Christian Right and today's Republican Party than most of them would care to admit:

Like more mainstream Protestant fundamentalists, adherents of Christian Identity take the Scriptures literally and focus a great deal on the End times. A key difference is the understanding of when Jesus appears during the tribulation. "Pretribulation" fundamentalist Protestants believe that Jesus will save them from experiencing the Apocalypse through a "divine rapture," the simultaneous ascension to heaven of all good Christians. Followers of Christian Identity expect to be present during the Apocalypse. Christian militants who subscribe to "posttribulation" beliefs consider it their duty to attack the forces of the Antichrist, who will become leader of the world during the Endtimes. He will offer the people a false religion and a single world government. The strength of international institutions promoting world government, including the United Nations and the international banks, are indications that the Antichrist is already here, they believe. Identity Christianity has become the dominant religion of the racist right in America. Adherents include Gordon Kahl, a leader in the Posse Comitatus movement who died in a shoot-out with the FBI in 1983 and became the first Identity "martyr"; Randy Weaver, whose wife and son were killed in a government siege at his house in 1992; and Timothy McVeigh, who was executed for killing 168 people in the 1995 bombing of the Oklahoma City Federal Building.

Like other apocalyptic sects in the past, some Christian Identity adherents believe that they are now experiencing the tribulations as described in Revelation, that America is currently the equivalent of the corrupted and depraved Babylon. Others are not sure, nor are they certain how long the period of tribulation will last. I called up the Reverend Robert Millar, the leading cleric of the American racist right, to ask his views. "Armageddon could come anytime in the next thirty, forty, fifty years, it might come in 2160, or it might even be five years from now," Pastor Millar tells me. "We are not really hung up on the date."

Tags: authoritarianism, christian identity, christian terrorism, global war on terror, gwot, jessica stern, terrorism, war on terror

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