Tuesday, May 03, 2005

God's Miniseries, Part Sixteen

“When the speeches ended, after several hours, there was an urgent break for the men’s room. Streaming downstairs in their tuxedos to relieve themselves came an extraordinary parade: John F. Kennedy Jr., and Mickey Rooney, Henry Kissinger and Joe DiMaggio, Louis Farrakhan and Tom Cruise and Norman Mailer and Kevin Costner and Billy Graham and Kofi Annan and Mel Brooks. Mummified celebrity disconcerts the eye. The shock of recognition is a shock indeed, and there was an impulse all through the evening to squint at someone and wish to ask, “Didn’t you used to be dead?” Jack Kevorkian was there, the doctor notorious for assisting people to commit suicide. I had the cruelty to wonder if he was there to look for clients. But the women displayed a certain gallant glamour – Lauren Bacall, for example, and Mary Tyler Moore.”

“But Leni Riefenstahl, Hitler’s favorite moviemaker, also attended – physically unrecognized, a potent name from long ago, famous for her film “The Triumph of the Will,” Hitler’s most artistic p.r. release. How does one make the right moral judgment about an artist whose work was not, people have argued, evil in itself, but whose dramatically sympathetic, Wagnerian images of triumphant Nazism at a Nazi rally in Berlin, and in her film “Olympia,” the 1936 Olympics in Berlin were at the time an instrument of evil, even if now the films are merely film school texts.”

- Lance Morrow – Commenting on the love of celebrities and the media for the anti-hero and for trivializing evil in his book “Evil: an Investigation”

My one man protest continues. I’m just not going to trivialize evil and the end of time by being entertained by NBC with half-truth.

God’s miniseries, part sixteen follows:

Revelation 16 (New Living Translation)

Revelation 16

1 “Then I heard a mighty voice shouting from the Temple to the seven angels, “Now go your ways and empty out the seven bowls of God's wrath on the earth.”
2So the first angel left the Temple and poured out his bowl over the earth, and horrible, malignant sores broke out on everyone who had the mark of the beast and who worshiped his statue.
3Then the second angel poured out his bowl on the sea, and it became like the blood of a corpse. And everything in the sea died.
4Then the third angel poured out his bowl on the rivers and springs, and they became blood. 5And I heard the angel who had authority over all water saying, “You are just in sending this judgment, O Holy One, who is and who always was. 6For your holy people and your prophets have been killed, and their blood was poured out on the earth. So you have given their murderers blood to drink. It is their just reward.”7And I heard a voice from the altar saying, “Yes, Lord God Almighty, your punishments are true and just.”
8Then the fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, causing it to scorch everyone with its fire. 9Everyone was burned by this blast of heat, and they cursed the name of God, who sent all of these plagues. They did not repent and give him glory.
10Then the fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom was plunged into darkness. And his subjects ground their teeth in anguish, 11and they cursed the God of heaven for their pains and sores. But they refused to repent of all their evil deeds.
12Then the sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great Euphrates River, and it dried up so that the kings from the east could march their armies westward without hindrance. 13And I saw three evil spirits that looked like frogs leap from the mouth of the dragon, the beast, and the false prophet. 14These miracle-working demons caused all the rulers of the world to gather for battle against the Lord on that great judgment day of God Almighty.

15 “Take note: I will come as unexpectedly as a thief! Blessed are all who are watching for me, who keep their robes ready so they will not need to walk naked and ashamed.” 16And they gathered all the rulers and their armies to a place called Armageddon in Hebrew.
17Then the seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air. And a mighty shout came from the throne of the Temple in heaven, saying, "It is finished!" 18Then the thunder crashed and rolled, and lightning flashed. And there was an earthquake greater than ever before in human history. 19The great city of Babylon split into three pieces, and cities around the world fell into heaps of rubble. And so God remembered all of Babylon's sins, and he made her drink the cup that was filled with the wine of his fierce wrath. 20And every island disappeared, and all the mountains were leveled. 21There was a terrible hailstorm, and hailstones weighing seventy-five pounds[
a] fell from the sky onto the people below. They cursed God because of the hailstorm, which was a very terrible plague.”

Footnotes:
Revelation 16:21 Greek 1 talent [34 kilograms].

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