{"id":327,"date":"2011-04-06T08:15:34","date_gmt":"2011-04-06T06:15:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/?p=327"},"modified":"2015-04-27T16:12:57","modified_gmt":"2015-04-27T14:12:57","slug":"life-in-the-end-times-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/life-in-the-end-times-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Life in the end times, part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

Picture<\/span> this: Last October, a group of American exchange students is walking through a pedestrian plaza<\/span> in downtown Wiesbaden late at night. Suddenly, they’re approached<\/span> by a gang<\/span> of young ethnic Turks who don’t like the fact that one of the students is speaking English. “Hey!” the gang leader barks at<\/span> him. “You’re American, aren’t you?”<\/b><\/p>\n

“Keep walking<\/span>, Sam,” I say, and we do. We’re slightly outnumbered<\/span>, and we don’t know what they’re capable of.<\/p>\n

But Sam, who takes his role as cultural ambassador<\/span> very seriously, tries to calm<\/span> the guy down. He offers his hand in a gesture of friendship.<\/p>\n

“Don’t touch me!” the guy shouts. “You’re American. We hate you. You guys burn the Koran.”<\/p>\n

Sam had no idea what was going on<\/span>. When we got to safety, I explained to him that a few weeks earlier, a radical cleric<\/span> in Gainesville, Florida, had threatened to publicly burn the Koran<\/b> on September 11. It was meant as a protest against plans to build an Islamic center<\/a> in New York, near the site of the 9\/11 attacks<\/a>. Sam hadn’t heard about this because most of the American media hadn’t reported it \u2014 they’d wanted to avoid giving it any publicity.<\/p>\n

Although the Koran-burning was eventually<\/span> canceled<\/span>, however, word spread \u2014 to precisely those people who would blow their lids<\/span> over it.<\/p>\n

Fast-forward<\/span> to March 20 of this year. The same preacher<\/span>, Terry Jones of the ironically named Dove<\/span> World Outreach<\/span> Center, goes ahead<\/span> and burns the Koran. But again, the media ignore him. And again, the story gets out anyway \u2014 thanks mainly to Afghan leader Hamid Karzai<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This time, thousands of people protest<\/a> in southern and eastern Afghanistan, burning the US flag and shouting “Death to President Obama”<\/b>. A few of them have killed at least 12 United Nations workers<\/b>, from Nepal and Scandinavia and obviously not from Jones’s church.<\/p>\n

The Dove Center says it’s done the right thing because \u2014 you guessed it \u2014 we are living in the end times<\/b>. The organization describes itself as an “apostolic church”. This means that its followers believe in the same biblical interpretation, the same religious phenomena and the same call to action<\/span> as in the 1st century AD<\/span>.<\/p>\n

This comes with the expectation that Jesus might be back<\/b> very soon \u2014 though, according to some interpretations, only after a final showdown<\/span> between good and evil. Nearly all Christians are willing to wait this out<\/span>, but a few on the fringe<\/span> probably want to get the holy war started so that Jesus can finally set up shop<\/span>.<\/p>\n

What Turkish street gangs and Afghan mobs<\/span> need to know, however, is that the extremists aren’t representative of Americans or Christians, apostolic or otherwise. Here’s what typically happens<\/a> at Koran-burning events:
\n\u2022 Hardly anyone shows up<\/span>.
\n\u2022 Hecklers<\/span> and protesters greatly outnumber the organizers.
\n\u2022 Laws prevent anyone from starting outdoor fires in cities.<\/p>\n

When David Grisham of Amarillo, Texas, got around the fire law by putting the Koran on a barbecue grill, he was thwarted<\/span> by a 23-year-old skateboarder:<\/p>\n