I’ve received some feedback for my first Ratpuregate post so I wanted to clarify my thinking on this issue. I also learned an important lesson: you should try to avoid heavier topics when looking out over San Francisco Bay from your executive suite at the Hilton – sometimes there is a time and a place for deeper thought. : )

Before I clarify my point it’s important to point something out. First – Mr. Camping should be pitied and also feared for his ability to mobilize the campaign he did. Pitied because he has squandered quite a bit of his fortune on such a foolish pursuit; feared because he was able to take so many other people with him, many of whom risked much more than he did.

The point I wanted to drive home which, upon further reading, I missed the mark on is this: why was the whole world so fascinated with this? Facebook, Twitter, Google News, TV news, print news have been frenzied over this prediction. Why?

There are some who think it was like watching a train wreck with Mr. Camping and his followers being the ill-fated train. Others who think this was a way for anti-religion to run amok.

My thesis is simple, different (and I strongly desire to restate it): we are hardwired for God, and this event – to me – proves it. Now this is not just some whimsical and romantic notion, it’s also a sobering one as well. There are parts of us – deep down in places that we don’t quite understand – that recognize our separateness from God and our need to reconcile ourselves back to Him (groaning, as it were, for redemption). How many times have you been in a conversation, heard someone make an off-colored remark, and say “Man you’re totally going to hell for that!” Judgement Day, our day of reckoning before God, has a way of subconsciously being in the midst of our culture.This prediction took that innate, subconscious thought and brought it to the forefront of our national (and even international) conversation unlike anything I’ve ever experienced in my life. For me I see this as opportunity. I see this entire episode as something that confirms that the harvest is plentiful – that people are still thirsty for God, and that we should not give up hope in our evangelical efforts. That, no matter how far our culture tries to run away from God, it is so very quick to bring our separateness to the front pages of our newspapers.  Certainly there have been many jokes, some of them vicious, about Christianity in general about this whole thing.  But I also think it’s a natural human tendency to joke and even vilify that which makes us the most uncomfortable.  Yet, beyond all of this lies the fact that news editors everywhere spent considerable resources to report this story.  I just can’t quite accept that this has had so much attention just as a means to hate on Christianity.

I genuinely believe there is a “good” spiritual aspect to this entire situation.  For me, I hear the groaning of creation crying out for redemption. And I hear it as a drum beat to be called to the battle of New Evangelization (because frankly we need to not let the Mr. Campings of the world guide the national discourse). This is my thesis and my argument, and I wanted to clarify it. This also helps you, dear readers, to engage in disagreement. This is my argument – feel free to agree or disagree, but at least (and I HOPE) it has been now well stated.

I hope this clears things up. And Josh, don’t give up yet….

The only thing more fascinating than someone spending $100 million on a campaign advocating a bunk prophecy is how much play this has gotten in the press. Flipping through the channels in my hotel room last night, talk about Harold Camping’s bold (and now, utterly false) prediction was inescapable. Now I know atheists are planning post rapture days on Sunday and those who utterly despise religion are using this to show the foolishness of the entire faith enterprise, but I think this points to an all together wonderful and escapable truth – we are created for God.

A recent study by a professor of psychology from Bristol Univrsity has put forth a proposal that our brains are literally hard wired for God. While I don’t propose to know the science behind this, I, for one, believe it. And I think this entire rapturegate (I hope I’m the first one to throw “gate” at the end of the word rapture in the history of media) is a fascinating case study in the inescapable metaphysical reality of God.

We are created by God, for God. It’s in the deepest parts of us. St. Paul teaches us that the whole of creation groans for the salvation found in Christ. It just so happens that every once in a while, an event so bizarre makes that groaning obvious and ever present for us. Jesus was spot on when he told His disciples “the harvest is plentiful.” So – while Harold Camping may be an absolute (and filthy, filthy rich) nut – even his insanity displays the glory of God.

Our world is crying out for our Creator. We, the poor banished children of Eve, desperately desire all we were created for. These are the stakes of the New Evangelization. You can decry our society and all of its ills, point out all of its flaws, and all together give up on it. Or you can flip on the television, hear this wonderful groaning, and wake up to the New Evangelization. The workers are few. Are you willing to sign up?

When I look at this picture, I see a kid with a huge smile on his face.  I see a teenage kid with his family posing for another family photo.  He could easily think he’s too cool for it, but he wants to get in on the fun. You can sense a closeness in this picture.  A genuine joy.

Almost 40 years after this photo was taken we have the one below, snapped as the news of that same kids’ assassination spread across the globe.

What happened?

How did this kid, smiling with his family on a bright sunny day, become responsible for the blood of 3,000 men, women, and children?  How did this kid become a man who could dream up using a passenger jet as a missile? How did this kid’s death become the cause for chants of “USA! USA! USA!” and waving American flags?

In looking at the contrast between these two photos one thing struck me, Osama Bin Laden was never just a man in the collective consciousness of our culture.  His name was a symbol the moment it first came into our living rooms.  It was a symbol of hate, of murder, of terror. Of evil, embodied.  And so Osama Bin Laden became larger than life, he became more than a man to us. This allowed many to gather and cheer when he was killed.  We held rallies, press conferences, and photo ops.  We all breathed a collective sigh of relief.  Our nation had slayed the boogeyman, we can now lay our heads back on our pillows and finally get some sleep.

And as we lay ourselves down to sleep, deep down inside of us, in that place we don’t like to always talk about, one simple truth remains: Osama Bin Laden was just like us.  He got in fights with his mom and dad, and with his siblings too.  He had to do menial chores like take out the garbage and do the laundry.  He probably tutored his brother in math, and helped tuck his little sister in at night.  No matter what propaganda teaches us, Osama Bin Laden was just a man.

I don’t write this to make Bin Laden a sympathetic character.  We know that this kid would soon become a religious zealot.  He would walk down a dark path of religious fundamentalism.  He would preach his message with the goal of gaining enough followers to unleash a “holy war” on the west. He became bloodthirsty, and eventually would concoct a plan of mass murder that puts him on a short list of human beings who have had their hands in treachery of unthinkable proportions.

We can label him a monster.  We can buy into the symbol of evil incarnate. In doing so, we  may be able to sleep easier at night.  But the truth is deeper.  Osama Bin Laden was a child of God, fearfully and wonderfully created in His image.  His birth was a gift to his parents, and to our world.  He was loved deeply by His creator.  He was a boy.  A teenager.  A man.  Never more, never less.

I still don’t have an answer as to how this happened.  I certainly don’t think I ever will.  But I cannot get over how deeply this picture has touched my heart.

It’s pictures like this that make the beatitudes possible.  Praying for our enemy seems heroic until you whittle it down and realize that our enemies are just like us.  When I see this picture I think to myself, I wish I was there that day, it seems like it was a lot of fun.  I wouldn’t mind meeting this family and that gangly kid with a green shirt and blue bellbottoms.  I think, if given time, we might have been friends.  I might have grown to love him.

If only…