fear and virgins

a friend of mine posted a video she found inspiring on facebook last week and i could not help but be intrigued.  it was of pastor raul ries of calvary chapel, (calvary chapel golden springs in diamond bar.) 

i used to attend his church intermittently in the '80s and went to his mentor's calvary chapel in costa mesa in the early '90s.  sometime thereafter i lost my faith, which of course is a euphemism for an utter rejection of an ideology and a belief system.  so it was interesting to see this preacher before me some 25-30 years older than when i had last seen him. 

i clicked on the embedded video and watched as ries began to discuss the end times.  his voice was as familiar as the sound of paper ripping around the seal of a can of chewing tobacco under my fingernail.  neither of these sounds have i heard in years but both of them i heard so many times they are unmistakable.  as a kid i liked raul's voice.  it had that gritty sort of smoky sound perhaps like someone who talked too much.  the familiarity of that voice washed over me as i sat at my computer watching and listening.

raul talked about ezekiel chapters 38 and 39 and he conjured horrific scenes, surely instilling large amounts of fear in the hearts and minds of his supplicants.  he talked of "islamofascists," who would commit acts of terrorism in hopes of reaching heaven where 77 virgins would presumably greet them with legs open and accepting.  raul actually talked about how in the '70s he thought he saw other signs of the end times that were quite different from the signs he saw in the present but he presented these new signs as if they were so much more valid than the earlier signs he saw. 

i remembered those earlier discussions.  raul was for me like a tape recorder i had pressed pause on all those years ago and here i found him again and i pressed pause again and he sounded just the same, saying all the same things but with different boogeymen.  as a younger man i was engrossed in raul's preaching.  i found him engaging as he would talk about his own checkered past and how he was redeemed by jesus. 

i used to wonder how so many people after all these years could still believe saddam hussein and iraq had attacked the united states on 9/11, or from whence islamophobia came?  i noticed just today there is a "birther," running for office in california and he has a serious chance of winning.  (a birther, of course, is someone who believes the president is muslim or that he was not actually born in the united states, in spite of all the evidence to the contrary.)

seeing raul ries preaching and hearing the audience respond from time to time helped me to understand these phenomenon.  fundamentalist christians of the calvary chapel ilk have little chance of knowing the truth.  every weekend, because they are good people who wish to be enriched and inspired by and through their faith, they march into these calvary chapels filled with positivity and open to learn all that god has for them.  and every weekend they likely hear ideology similar to what i heard.  it is indoctrination and worse.  it's laziness and fear-mongering.  it is raul ries and chuck smith and greg laurie and a slew of other modern day shaman capitalizing on the goodness of people, people who navigate the world daily with only the best of intentions and who are looking for something bigger then themselves to latch onto and help light there way.  instead of a positive message that encourages and uplifts them they are being spoon fed fear.

the end times are coming.  horrible things await those who reject this message including the lake of fire.  those who are different from you all want to kill you.  world war III is upon us.

it was quite the stroll down memory lane, too, as i heard the same message back when i attended the calvary chapel.  back then the end times were upon us because sin was running rampant, gay people were being accepted in society, (a sure sign of the apocalypse,) communist russia was the evil empire and one had better be ready because the lord was coming like a thief in the night and it would be real bad to be left behind.  i had forgotten how insidious it was. 

i got out and while i know few like myself, (i can't think of a single friend from those days who is not still a christian,) it just didn't occur to me raul ries could get away with this.  i was surprised he could preach this lazy doctrine of fear and maintain his place atop this still popular church, but then that is what fear does.  it paralyzes.  these people are afraid and they feel obligated to attend their church every week because it feels like part of their penance.  i remember feeling low as i arrived at church every week be it a sunday morning or night, or even on wednesday evenings.  i felt guilty just showing up there but i knew i had to do it and then by the time the service ended i felt like a champ primarily because i had endured the sermon.  i was earnest in my prayers throughout the service and then when the pastor made his call for salvation and the choir sang 'just as i am,' a good feeling of love swept over me and i was ready to go eat some lunch and to tackle another week.  after all, i was redeemed. 

i see now it is all a part of a formula.  the calvary chapel formula, as i recall it went like this:

• everyone shuffles into church in casual attire because this is just that kind of church, one where you can be yourself.
• there would be a welcome or perhaps an invocation to create some air of solemnity.
• next came the songs, those folksy, rock and rolley kind of hip songs but for jesus because this is just that kind of church, casual, where you can be yourself.
• every business needs funding; offering time, typically offered along with the sense of responsibility that it was to you to give 10% of your earnings to the church by god's order.  (not a bad business model.)
• next came the sermon.  i guess raul ries may be something of a specialist on end times because over the years it always seemed to be his go-to message.  it basically goes like this: the world is a dark and horribly sinful place with all manner of perversion and corruption but jesus is your savior.  accept him and live by his tenets and you will go to heaven for eternity.oh, and the end will be unbelievably ugly and intense and firey and painful an we're right there, right on the cusp of just that end so, well you know, you had better join this club, suit up every week and be sure to give us 10% of your cash.  that message would be capped with some quick word about how great it was to be a christian and to know one is saved...followed by the call to come on down to the altar and accept the lord.
• lots of emotions, crying, swaying back and forth with hands in the air, sinners going forward followed by flocks of supporters to insure the emotional connection and anchor.
• an advertisement of what will be featured in the sunday night service and the flock is bid adieu.

in retrospect i couldn't be more dismayed by this charade.  i am particularly appalled by a man who has been preaching the same message for 40 years, always telling his congregation the end is near and seemingly believing it himself, (near as in within the next 10 years but possibly next month,) not waking up one day and looking himself in the mirror and going wait a minute.  what am i doing?  some days i tell them to fear god, some days i tell them to fear the devil, some days i tell them to fear the world, and some days i tell them to fear islamists but always i tell them to fear.  how do you do that for 40 years without realizing you are a false prophet?  how do you live your own life without realizing fear is among the very worst conditions to live one's life under all the while selling fear?

i would have embedded the 35 minute clip i saw on my friend's facebook page but it is no longer available.  (whoever posted it has since deleted their youtube account.)  still, there are many examples of raul ries and other preachers, (many of them of calvary chapel,) doing their thing on youtube.