LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY 1400scale)

For some time now, a number of us have intuited that the Rapture doctrine was key to understanding the dominionist mindset and motivation. The fear of being Left Behind is deeply ingrained and fostered by dominionist clergy, along with the belief in America’s “chosen nation” statues, i.e. if True Believers fail to “take America back for God”, they’ll miss the Rapture, and thusly have to endure seven years of Tribulations along with the rest of the world, up to and including thermonuclear war. This has essentially been confirmed by walkaways like Lihan and Dogemporer.

In addition, one of the things discovered in Bob Altemeyer’s research into authoritarianism is that, while authoritarian follower-types often hold a deeply supressed and/or subconcious fear that they’re beliefs are wrong, many authoritarian leader-types (particularly the social dominant and “double-high” varieties) also do not privately subscribe to the belief systems that they publicly espouse. Unlike follower-types, however, they are aware of it, and more importantly, are not bothered by that awareness. The writings of the neocons’ Leo Strouss, in fact, read like a handbook for the authoritarian leader, particularly regarding the recommendation of using a popular religion to mobilize support among the general public.

I’d expected this of the neoconservative movement, as it’s largely secular, but it was suggested last week that perhaps some in leadership positions WITHIN THE DOMINIONIST MOVEMENT may think that way as well.

The reason is inherent in domninionism’s present-day interpretation of Rapture doctrine. If one assumes that dominionist leaders don’t actually buy into that particular belief themselves, IT EXPLAINS WHY CURRENT RAPTURE INTERPRETATION HAS BECOME SO EVENT-SPECIFIC/CONDITIONAL. An example would be John Hagee effectively stating that nuclear strikes against Iran are necessary to start the whole ball rolling. Turn that upside down, and it translates as: “if Iran is NOT nuked, no Rapture”.

When follower-types hear this, and already feel threatened beyond all reason by the Satanic world around them, it’s not hard to imagine why they’d want the bombs to drop. More importantly, though, If the neocons bring events to that brink but cooler heads prevail, or (God forbid) something like it actually happens, and the Rapture doesn’t happen either way, it’s very easy to imagine the few hardcore True Believers concluding they’ve missed their chance, and kicking “Joel’s Army” into overdrive in retaliation.

BUT, if dominionist leaders don’t actually buy into Rapture doctrine themselves, then pshycologically mobilizing followers for “Plan B” would definitely be on the agenda, which would explain the increased military-style concerts and rallies and such. It was mentioned once that homegrown apocalyptic “Christian” militia groups effectively faded into the woodwork after Dubya took office, but there’s no way they’ve up and disappeared.

I think the Battle Cry events are one way that secretly NONbelieving dominionist leader-types are preparing their followers for being Left Behind, in the hopes that they’ll form “Theocratic Army” paramilitary (e.g. terrorist) groups.

Thoughts?