Every time there's a disaster, someone figures out a reason why God would want to do this to us. It happened with Hurricane Katrina, and with the Haiti earthquake, and now it's happening with the Gulf oil spill.
A YouTube video lays out the case for blaming the spill on a change in U.S. policy toward Israel. The claim is that the Obama administration was signaling Israel that it would not use its veto on a U.N. Security Council resolution against Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem. The weeks-long back-and-forth over this issue turned up on Fox News' website on Israeli Independence Day, April 19 ... the day before the fatal April 20 oil-rig explosion that caused the spill!
There are alternative explanations, of course: The divine wrath could have marked the 15th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing on April 19, or Adolf Hitler's birthday and the 11th anniversary of the Columbine tragedy on April 20. But there's nary a mention of the mistakes that BP and other companies might have made before the blast. After all, those companies were merely doing God's work.
The oil spill thus serves in some quarters as yet another sign that the end times are nigh. On WorldNetDaily, doom-meister Hal Lindsey is quoted as saying "this is evidence that when you turn your back on Israel, especially when you've been a supporter, you're gonna see judgments come from God."
But the way Lindsey sees it, the disaster in the Gulf isn't the only problem.
"The current government is overturning our constitutional republic, turning into a socialist country," he's quoted as saying. "That's about as big a curse as you can get. We just have one catastrophe after another and then we have this big wakeup call in the gulf."
Lindsey noted that his concept of divine retribution in the Gulf is "not a popular view to take, by the way, as critics will say, 'There they go again.'"
I think that's one prophecy that will come true. What do you think?
More about the oil spill:
- 'God help us all': Oil on Pensacola Beach
- Louisiana, Texas declare day of prayer for Gulf spill
- Tips for stopping oil? Try corks, pillows, prayer
- Where to volunteer, how to donate
- Disaster in the Gulf: msnbc.com special report
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