“Heaven’s For Real” Rant

In my Jesus Loves You post of April 22, I mentioned how exclusionary and judgemental many “Good Christians” can be if you don’t exactly match their idiomatic religious expectations.  The more extreme the group, the more difficult that can be, since they almost contend with each other to be more rigid and unforgiving.  Several years ago, a Palestinian terrorist group began killing members of other Palestinian terrorist groups – because they weren’t killing enough Jews and Christians.

When I used WordPress to see what others were writing about “Christian”, I found this review rant about a feel-good little movie – titled, Heaven’s For Real- EXPOSED!

The Uber-Christians complain so often about Hollywood not presenting Christianity in a positive light.  I thought that a movie validating one of its basic precepts would be happily accepted and celebrated.  Once again I overestimated.  This sad little man’s screed was disturbing and depressing.

The movie kid claimed that Jesus had a rainbow horse, with lots of colors. Well, that sort of thinking just can’t be allowed.  To these Ultra-Christians, rainbow means gay, and gay is simply unacceptable.  This over-serious Bible-thumper claimed Christ has a “pure, white horse” to battle the Antichrist.  Apparently the thought that Jesus might possess more than one horse in Heaven, including a pretty, rainbow horse to please a six-year-old boy, wouldn’t fit into his narrow little mind.

The kid claimed that Jesus had a pink crown with a diamond in the middle, and wore purple.  The thumper insisted Christ would have seven stars in his right hand and a sword coming from his mouth.  He didn’t say whether the point was in or out, but declared that Christ would not wear pink, or purple – because they’re effeminate, and Christ can’t be effeminate.  He claims that Christ-in-Heaven wears gold, although the Bible passage he quoted only says that Christ has a golden sash across his robe.

He rails that the kid says that Christ has “markers.”  “What use would Christ have for markers?  They weren’t even invented!”  When?  The movie is set in the present day!  Not having read the book or seen the movie, I don’t know if he (again, narrow-mindedly) can only imagine felt-tip ink markers, but I can think of a couple of types of markers Jesus might use.

I know I shouldn’t bait the trolls, but I asked if Jesus was a sword-swallower in a carnival.  He came charging back with two more “sword from the mouth” Biblical references – one from the Old Testament, before Christ was even born.  He averred that, “Since Jesus is God; His word is the sword to cleave unbelievers.”

I replied that, since Bob is Richard, he hadn’t understood, but did now.  It was obvious that the Bible was not a book to be taken literally, since there were passages where what was clearly written was not what was meant.

I would have liked to be in the room with him, just to see steam spew from his ears.  It might have been dangerous though.  If the pressure was too much, his head might have exploded.  He didn’t exactly accuse me of misinterpreting.  What he said was, “So, you’re going to send me a $50 donation?  If words don’t mean what they say, then I can interpret your comment any way I want.”

Might as well, you’ve got this interpret-it-as-you-please thing going pretty well.  This is where the cognitive dissonance, and refusal to see – or think, kicks in.  He said: that a sword coming from the mouth was actually the word of God.  He said: that Jesus – is God.  Did The Kid get a promotion, or did he bump the Old Guy off?  He said: that the Word Of God was actually delivered by Jesus.

By his own editing and interpretation, he has said that the words he quoted don’t mean what they say – therefore, the Bible can not be taken literally, but he’s angry at me for pointing this out!

He admitted to another less-strenuous Christian commenter, that there is a Bible passage which describes a rainbow around God’s throne, but rainbow horses must be Satan’s work.  There’s a rainbow horse in The Wizard of Oz, and that’s an occult movie.  He claims that there is also a sodomite lion.  I don’t remember either of those.  Maybe I didn’t get the XXX version that he rented.

I am still bewildered by what purpose such unremitting negativity serves.  He’s in for a surprise when he gets to Heaven and finds that he’s not on the guest list, but assigned to the serving staff, holding the kid’s rainbow horse, and fetching him markers.

🙂

😯