Birth Pangs of a Third Awakening

[hyphenate]

Birth Pangs of a Third Awakening
by eileen fleming
http://www.opednews.com

After Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's remarks at the U.N., during which he referred to President Bush as "the devil," and then held up and recommended Noam Chomsky's, "Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance" he told reporters, "The people of the United States should read this ... instead of them watching Superman movies." And they are, for as of last Thursday afternoon, "Hegemony or Survival," leaped into the top 10 on Amazon, and it had been ranked 20,664 the day before.

Could this be the beginning of the birth pangs of a Third Awakening? Could Chavez's book plug be the spark to ignite we the people to begin the painful questioning and confronting of our leaders about the real reasons why some people in the world hate us?

Not long ago, Pat Robertson called for the assassination of Chavez, a most un-Christ-like statement. Christ taught that God was already within every human heart and the commandment 'thou shalt not kill' was always meant to be taken literally. The illogic and irony of fundamentalism that knits together disparate, obscure and vague biblical passages into literal predictions of future events, while ignoring and defying clear commands is painful for thinking Christians, and Robertson has never spoken for them.

According to a recent poll for the German Marshall Fund reported that 57% of Europeans regard American leadership in world affairs "undesirable" and not just because of Iraq. Europeans worry that Bush's foreign policy is too influenced by religion, and that "America is undergoing a religious revival...evangelical Protestantism and hard-line Catholicism are growing rapidly while 'cool' mainline versions of Christianity are declining...It is also true that Mr. Bush frequently uses religious rhetoric when talking of foreign affairs...he sees the 'war on terror' as a 'confrontation between good and evil' and remarked, "It seems to me there's a Third Awakening".

While Robertson does Christ no favors by claiming to be a follower, the people of America are also subjected to the likes of Lt-General William Boykin, deputy under-secretary of defense for intelligence, who toured the country telling Christian groups that radical Muslims hate America, "because we're a Christian nation and the enemy is a guy named Satan."

If we really were a Christian nation, there would be no manufacturing of WMD and the poor would be housed and fed. The Christian values that Christ taught is not the heresy Boykin preaches, for whom would Jesus bomb? No one.

Rest of the article at: http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_eileen_f_060923_birth_pangs_of_a_thi.htm

[GeorgeGist]

1. How many times must Christians...

be awakened before they realize that a christ is a dream that will never come true.

[noonwitch]

3. Some christians just don't get it.

If you look at the Bible literally, then you will be disappointed. People always expect an armed messiah, who will come here and right all wrongs so they don't have to do the work themselves. The guy who rode a donkey into Jerusalem was never that kind of messiah. His message was about spirituality, not religion. The more militant followers had to have been disappointed when he didn't lead the Israelis to revolt against Rome. Instead, they decided he would come back someday and lead his army against satan and his minions for the future of the earth.

I do believe that there is an element within some branches of christianity that believes that Jesus will come back to earth and throw all "evildoers" into the lake of fire because they want to see the people they dislike suffer. This kind of thinking directly contradicts the actual messages taught by Jesus in the gospels.

[RebelOne]

2. They don't want to wake up. They want to keep dreaming

that the Rapture is coming and Christ will zap them all up to heaven.