Rolling Stone has a story about televangelist John Hagee’s church, written by Matt Taibbi.
The whole idea behind Christian Zionism is to align America with the nation of Israel so as to “hurry God up” in his efforts to bring about Armageddon. As Hagee tells it, only after Israel is involved in a final showdown involving a satanic army (in most interpretations, a force of Arabs led by Russians) will Christ reappear. On that happy day, Hagee and his True Believers will be whisked up to Heaven by God, while the rest of us nonbelievers are left behind on Earth to suck eggs and generally suffer various tortures.
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“In the name of Jesus,” continued Fortenberry, “I cast out the demon of astrology!”
Coughing and spitting noises. Behind me, a bald white man started to wheeze and gurgle, like he was about to puke. Fortenberry, still reading from his list, pointed at the man. On cue, a pair of life coaches raced over to him and began to minister. One dabbed his forehead with oil and fiercely clutched his cranium; the other held a paper bag in front of his mouth.
“In the name of Jesus Christ,” said Fortenberry, more loudly now, “I cast out the demon of lust!”
And the man began power-puking into his paper baggie. I couldn’t see if any actual vomitus came out, but he made real hurling and retching noises.
Now the women began to pipe in. On the women’s side of the chapel the noises began, and it is not hard to explain what these noises sounded like. If you’ve ever watched The Houston 560 or any other gangbang porn movie, that’s what it sounded like, only the sounds were far more intense.
It was not difficult to figure out where the energy was coming from on that side of the room. Some of the husbands glanced nervously over in the direction of their wives.
“In the name of Jesus Christ, I cast out the demon of cancer!” said Fortenberry.
“Oooh! Unnh! Unnnnnh!” wailed a woman in the front row.
“Bleeech!” puked the bald man behind me.
Within about a minute after that, the whole chapel erupted in pandemonium. About half the men and three-fourths of the women were writhing around and either play-puking or screaming. Not wanting to be a bad sport, I raised my hand for one of the life coaches to see.
“Need . . . a . . . bag,” I said as he came over.
He handed me a bag.