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Oh look, another wise-cracking scoffer who didn't even bother trying to comprehend what Gio was getting at.

Is slander your only way to discuss a topic?

The Mark, as you well know, isn't a UPC bar code, market futures, tattooed body parts or anything else like that.

OK, so we add lies to that list of discussion skills. Hal Lindsey, who has sold millions of books on his speculation of all things "prophetic" has long asserted, and the modern Futurist community has long agreed with the assertion that the "mark" is a physical tattoo on the forehead or arm. A couple decades ago, with the advances made in RFID technology, the idea of "chipping" a person has been in vogue. I fondly remember Rapturenauts gushing about how how the calibration marks on the common UPC code were sixes and since the UPC is used in commerce, surely the "666" was a sign of barcodes being the "mark" that would be stamped on those doomed to the "Tribulation"

simply was pointing out that the current problems are so bad that they're even getting linked to the Anti-Christ's system by people and publications which normally wouldn't even think about that sort of subject.

That is a rather naive statement. Ridiculing Futurists warped and demented brand of biblical hermeneutic and resulting demonic eschatology is a time honored tradition that has been going on for generations now. With the internet becoming most people's primary source of information, the relentless barrage of reckless Futurist "predictions" only a blog away, the world is inundated with every troop movement, every social event, every weather phenomena as somehow being "prophesized in Scripture". Congratulations, your ilk has contributed greatly to the ridicule and mocking of Christianity because of the never ending train of failed "prophesies" such as the much heralded 1988 Rapture Event that never was, and most recently Harold Camping's failed May Rapture Event that left thousands dead because they believed your garbage and suffered persecution from their government.

Things are bad in the West because Christianity has been completely co-opted by the heretical and profane American vanity Religion and we now are suffering in a post-Christian era where our culture is returning to the violent barbarism and corruption that has marked all cultures since expulsion from The Garden.

Nevertheless, despite what your narcissistic leanings guide you to believe, history did not start the day you were born and only involve the things that you have influence or contact with. Things have been a lot worse, at every level, and in comparison to days past, we are living in the best of times.

There has never been a time in all of human history where endless leisure was available to so many people - entire generations of people never having to know what it is like to put in an honest day's work. The world is awash in wealth and creature comforts so common now that we forget that there ever was a time without air-conditioning and ATMs.

Diseases and pestilences that routinely killed hundreds of thousands have been eradicated. Where is anything like the Spanish Flu that killed millions in the early 1900s, or the Black Plague that wiped out a third of Europe? The billions spent now globally is mainly wasted on mitigating symptoms of venereal diseases like AIDS, syphilis and gonorrhea.

There are no wars of the WWI/2 Korean, Vietnam type. What globally significant nation has military-only conscription other than Israel? Israel's occasional reception of terrorist attacks, rocket hits and other assorted nuisances is absolutely nothing compare to the October 1973 fighting. The US could easily pull out of the Middle East and let it return to the tribal warring state that defined that region since Nebuchadnezzar.

People bitch and moan about Muslim uprising, but are completely ignorant of the fact that Islam once dominated the Mediterranean area for a thousand years. What do you think the Marine Hymn came from? "...the shores of Tripoli...". Do you think our ersatz Libya engagement is unique and new?

Where are the famines that wiped out tens of millions and forced us to endure repeated exposure to Sally Struthers shoving Snickers bars down the throats of starving African children? Obesity is now a global problem that requires billions of Federal expenditures to change people's eating habits over the entire planet. If anyone is hungry, its probably because the microwave is broken or they are on a self-imposed calorie restriction diet to drop fifty pounds before the Holidays.

I simply point out that we are living in the best of times, that none of the "markers" Futurist claim as signs of the Last Day are present - and yet in your profound arrogance and ignorance you dare call me a "scoffer"?

I submit that the primary reason why so many people think that things "are so bad" is because they are historically illiterate, have an unprecedented sense of entitlement and firmly believe in the narcissistic and vain notion that this Earth, right now, ought to be Heaven and they are robed and anointed royalty. Because life is not perfect, it must be because its The Last Day. The secondary reason is that the enemedia has decided to use the Progressive tactic to keep the masses constantly agitated, in fear and in panic so that Big Government can ride in to the rescue. We are upset because we are constantly pounded with people demanding that we live in a constant state of terror and fear.

I mock the insipid and profoundly insane ideas that come from today's Futurists because while you folks claim to be the epitome of Christianity, you folks don't even know the Gospel, and your reckless claims and decadent and profane lifestyles are offensive to all of us who know and have taken on the name of our LORD.

Before you go about condemning two thousand years of orthodoxy to be replaced by this profane and blasphemous circus called Dispensationalism, I strongly recommend that you at least look at what the Great Theologians of the past believed. I understand that they write in Latin, Greek and Hebrew and modern "evangelicals" can't be bothered with anything less convenient and and more mentally taxing than a comic book, but at least try. You never know, being exposed to Truth might lead you to someday getting saved.