Is God To Blame For America's Collapse?

In hard times, people often turn to booze or religion or Snuggies or whatever, because of the tragic need for numbing comfort.

So it's no surprise that during this awful new Great Depression, many Americans are experimenting with Christianity and its holy books, such as the "Left Behind" adventure novels.

What does the author of the popular paperbacks have to say about the terrible decline of the United States? And what do Christian "Megachurch" preachers have to say as far as predicting the impending apocalypse? The answer may terrify you!

While the words "Southern California" may suggest a sunny land of sexy girls in bikinis and movie stars picking up hookers on Hollywood Boulevard, that is only a small part of the region's charms. Most of Southern California is actually a grim, sun-blasted stucco wasteland of foreclosed McMansions and gargantuan suburban churches where evangelicals go to hear preachers, dance to "Christian Rock" and even pick up a tasty Subway sandwich at actual food courts within the church's own mall.

This is the world of insanely popular Christian performer Rick Warren, the little pudgy fellow with the goatee and more money than even Ben Bernanke could imagine. Another huge SoCal church chain is the "Calvary Chapel" brand, which you can find everywhere from run-down rural areas in the Mojave Desert to gleaming new indoor stadiums in the better-off parts of Orange County.

It was at a fancy Calvary Chapel in the SoCal exurb of Chino that the Southern California Prophecy Conference was held last weekend. What an event!

Tim LaHaye, co-author of the "Left Behind" series, told the crowd that the world is very close to coming to a very terrible end, and America's financial collapse is one of the main signs! That is some exciting stuff -- you're not just losing your job and your house and your future, but you won't even need a future, because Jesus is coming back to kill us all.

"We're closer than we've ever been," LaHaye said. "I'm trying to rescue people to Christ before it's too late."

Oklahoma Pastor Mark Hitchcock also spoke at the prophecy convention, and whoa boy did he ever put the "fear of god" into the crowd. Hitchcock has discovered that there's no mention of the United States in the entire Bible. Think about that for a moment -- if a collection of Middle Eastern religious texts put together about 1,700 years ago doesn't talk about the USA, a country founded a little over two centuries ago, it is pretty clear that God and Jesus don't think much of this country. In fact, they hate it!

"The question is, why are we not mentioned?" Hitchcock told the Christians. "To me, that the greatest economic power in history is not mentioned in the Bible is significant."

He notes that with Christianity still popular in some parts of America, a catastrophic event called "the Rapture" will literally suck all of those Christians off ... right off the face of the planet Earth. Where they'll end up is anybody's guess -- "the Rapture" isn't in the Bible, either -- but the fact of the matter is, America will have a lot less people. And that will mean the national population (and the national waistline, ha ha) will dramatically decrease.

Islam will then take over the Earth, the end. Watch for details tonight, in Barack Obama's speech to his Congress.

"Joe six-pack has a sense something is happening," Pastor Hitchcock said at the prophecy meeting. "You don't have to be politically astute."

How true! Just read the comments below for solid proof.

Ken Layne was graduated from the Yale Higher College of Divinity in 1963. He publishes new translations from the Greek texts in the theology journal Wonkette.