Wow, it feels like a whole two months since I last noted an apocalyptic conflab among US Christians; from (as ever) WorldNetDaily (WND):
The major challenges facing American Christians in the coming months, “the Vatican, the pope and UFOs,” Islam in biblical prophecy and the Dead Sea Scrolls are among the fascinating topics slated for this weekend’s Strategic Perspectives International Conference.
It’s much the same fare as we saw in relation to the “Pike’s Peak Prophecy Summit” in August, and the line-up overlaps with that event. As before, it’s a convergence of conspiracy theories, fringe pseudo-scientific speculations (derived from pop science fiction), and “Last Days” Biblical interpretation. The conference is being organised by Chuck Missler, who I previously wrote about here. WND has some highlights:
Tom Horn, the author of “Petrus Romanus: The Final Pope is Here,” will discuss “The Vatican, Pope and UFOs – How Are They Linked?”
Joel Richardson, an expert on Islam and author of “The Islamic Antichrist,” “Islam and the End Times,” and “The Mideast Beast,” will address “The Impact of Islam.”…
William Welty, the executive director of the ISV Foundation, will talk about “When God Disciplines His Own.” David McAlvany of McAlvany Wealth Management will discuss “Can America Endure The Coming Years?”
Peter Flint of the Dead Sea Scrolls Institute at Trinity Western University will link the New Testament, prophecy and the ancient writings. Dan Stolebarger, the executive director of the Koinonia Institute, will lead a call to prayer.
Horn is the originator of a number of crank tomes and DVDs with titles such as Exo-Vaticana: Petrus Romanus, Project L.U.C.I.F.E.R. and the Vatican’s Astonishing Plan for the Arrival of an Alien Savior, and his speculations have been endorsed and promoted by Missler. Meanwhile, Richardson’s “Islamic Anti-Christ” claims have brought him plaudits from the likes of Robert Spencer, and he received wide attention after he was invited onto Glenn Beck’s TV show last year.
It’s difficult to see how the “Alien Savior” and the “Islamic Anti-Christ” theories can be synthesized with any coherence, but that’s probably not important: the main point is that self-styled “prophecy experts” purport to demonstrate special insight into Biblical mysteries in ways that give a general impression that there surely must very soon be a supernatural eruption into the mundane world. Details are less important than being “in the know”.
Welty and Flint are new to me, although they both have established associations with Missler. Welty has a website here, where he promotes a Bible billed as “the first conservative modern translation into any language that uses the Dead Sea Scrolls as a base text for Isaiah, Psalms, and Proverbs”, as well as gold coins which he believes will benefit Africa. Flint, meanwhile, is unusual in that he has published actual real scholarship on the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Also:
[Joseph] Farah will head a workshop on “Discerning Truth in a World Full of Lies.”
Other panelists and moderators will include Clint Robertson and Gordon McDonald.
Pre-conference workshops, which begin Thursday, include Steve Elwart on the threat from an electromagnetic pulse and Mark Gustafson on keeping the private private.
[Frank] Peretti, author of “This Present Darkness,” “Piercing the Darkness” and other major bestselling books, will be the speaker at the Friday night dinner.
Farah, of course, runs WND, where he peddles falsehoods in bad faith on a daily basis; his choice of topic is consequently risible and grotesque.
Peretti, meanwhile, made a name for himself in the 1980s for Christian novels that jumped on a bandwagon of paperbacks about Satanic conspiracies while easing a shift towards more supernatural notions of “Spiritual Warfare” against demons; Peretti said he was “alarmed” at people who were taking his work literally, but his works were eagerly seized on by neo-Pentecostal revivalist C. Peter Wagner as a template for his demon-infested worldview. Peretti’s best-seller status will perhaps help to move the kind of fringe material that Missler and Koinonia promote further into mainstream American evangelical culture.
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