22 May 2011

The carnival just left town...

For the second time, a few months back, some radio preacher decided to raise his spot on Warhol's 15 minutes of fame by declaring yesterday the day the second coming would take place, the beginning of the end times. It wasn't a miscalculation, he calculated that he would make a lot of money from his advertisers because of the increase of people tuning in to hear what he was going to say. The Howard Stern of christian radio, if you will. He succeeded even if it didn't come to pass.

Jesus said, no one knows the date. No one. No harm, we go on living, right? But, the good message was again aligned with a snake oil salesman, and the message of Jesus lost credibility. Because of these liars, when we try to tell those who don't know about the way, the truth, and the life of Jesus, they are skeptical. I don't blame them. When these carnies minimize the truth by exploiting the titillation of fringe doctrine, the central message of love and reconciliation gets lost and questioned.

It seems the mainstream churches have been focused and arguing over the fringe for years as well. Trying to keep pure, they spent their time sweeping out the corners of the room, while neglecting the center... Love God, Love your neighbor.

Yesterday WAS the end of the world for many. 100,000 lost their lives because of malnutrition, poor drinking water, malaria, suicide, domestic violence...