Global Weekly<\/em> credit card to buy a $100,000 Range Rover even though it was for personal use, not for work. (Buck stopped doing work in the last book, although he still collects his salary.) But he won\u2019t use the company credit card to replace the car he took from his employee. She\u2019ll have to make do with one of the Rapture-surplus cars Loretta had collected at New Hope.<\/p>\nI\u2019m sure Loretta and Donny Moore gave Buck a competitive price for the car \u2014 just like with the laptops. I\u2019m picturing them in the church office, counting the money, as Donny asks, \u201cDo you think Buck will ever realize we just sold him Irene Steele\u2019s car?\u201d<\/p>\n
Loretta, we\u2019re told, \u201cwas at the church office fielding the constant phone calls about Sunday\u2019s memorial service.\u201d<\/p>\n
And here\u2019s how I imagine those calls going:<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, it\u2019s just for Bruce. Only Bruce. \u2026 Yes, I realize that our church lost dozens of members in the bombing, and millions more are dead all over the country, but \u2026 no, no, you\u2019re right<\/em>. You\u2019re absolutely right, but it\u2019s not up to me. \u2026 Buck Williams<\/em> planned it. \u2026 Exactly,<\/em> yes. \u2026\u201d<\/p>\nChloe hobbled around on a cane, needing crutches but unable to manage them with her sprained wrist in a sling. That left Amanda to take Buck to the airport.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to ride along,\u201d Chloe said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAre you sure you\u2019re up to it, hon?\u201d Buck said.<\/p>\n
Chloe\u2019s voice was quavery. \u201cBuck, I hate to say it, but in this day and age we never know when we might or might not ever see each other again.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re being a little maudlin, aren\u2019t you?\u201d he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The last time Chloe left the house she was badly injured in a car wreck due to a nuclear bomb.<\/em> She also knows, for a fact, that the second, third and fourth seals of divine wrath are being poured out on the world, meaning that \u201ca fourth of the world\u201d will be dead in the weeks to come. So rather than seeming maudlin, her comment seems appropriate.<\/p>\nBut the authors have to treat this like a \u201cquavery\u201d bit of overly emotional thinking on her part because that will allow Buck to callously dismiss her feelings, after which the authors, through Amanda, can deliver yet another Lesson in Christian Marriage.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the point here, with this lesson meant to be some Mars-Venus business about men being too practical and unfeeling while women are overly emotional. The authors here are thus reminding good, godly husbands that they need to cater to the sensitivities of the weaker sex and pretend to be paying attention when their wives prattle on about their feelings. This is similar to the earlier Lesson in Christian Marriage in which godly husbands were urged to pretend to appreciate any \u201cfrilly,\u201d feminine knick-knacks their wives have used to decorate the home.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s my summary, but look at what the authors have written here and judge for yourself if it\u2019s accurate:<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re being a little maudlin, aren\u2019t you?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBuck!\u201d Amanda said in a scolding tone. \u201cYou cater to her feelings now. I had to kiss my husband good-bye in front of the Antichrist. You think that gives me confidence about whether I\u2019ll ever see him<\/em> again?\u201d<\/p>\nBuck was properly chastised.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The lesson here seems to be, roughly, \u201cHusbands, cater to her feelings<\/em> and make her think you\u2019re really listening when your wife talks about \u2026 oh, you know \u2026 whatever it is that wives talk about when they talk about all that woman-ish stuff.\u201d I can\u2019t figure out whether the authors are simply unaware of the way their lesson on listening reveals that they don\u2019t listen, or if this is actually meant<\/em> to sound patronizing. I<\/em> may think of \u201cpatronizing\u201d as a bad thing, but I\u2019m not sure the authors agree that it is. (If husbands are patrons, after all, why shouldn\u2019t<\/em> they be patronizing?)<\/p>\nAfter the lesson, Buck, Chloe and Amanda pile into the Range Rover \u2014 Buck driving, of course, because it\u2019s his car and because penis \u2014 and head toward Palwaukee Airport.*<\/p>\n
Buck was amazed that the built-in TV had survived Chloe\u2019s crash. He was not in a position to see it, but he listened as Amanda and Chloe watched. Nicolae Carpathia, in his usual overly humble manner, was holding forth.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Nicolae Carpathia, we have just been told, usually comes across as \u201coverly humble.\u201d He seems like a fake, in other words, a condescending phony.<\/p>\n
He is<\/em> a fake, of course. He\u2019s the Antichrist \u2014 a false messiah. But the thing about any decent false messiah is that he has to seem like<\/em> the real deal. That\u2019s the salient fact about actual phonies \u2014 they seem<\/em> genuine.<\/p>\nI think part of the problem here is that the authors simply do not trust their readers to dislike Nicolae without making him utterly unlikeable. This despite the title of the book: Nicolae: Rise of the Antichrist.<\/em> His rise, we are told, is due entirely to his charisma, his preternatural charm and superlative eloquence. Yet they\u2019re afraid to allow him to be or even to seem charismatic or charming or eloquent.<\/p>\nInstead what we get is every bad writer\u2019s favorite method of making one character seem smart: making everyone else seem stupid. Consider poor Chaim Rosenzweig. He\u2019s supposed to be a genius, but he comes across as clueless and dimwitted, utterly fooled by Nicolae\u2019s obvious fraudulence and \u201coverly humble\u201d phoniness.<\/p>\n
In this scene it\u2019s not just the foolish Rosenzweig who is fooled by Nicolae\u2019s obvious pretense \u2014 it\u2019s the entire world.<\/em><\/p>\nJerry Jenkins\u2019 provided himself with another way of handling this. Back in the first book of the series he went to great lengths to establish that the Antichrist has supernatural powers of mind control. I keep waiting for him to make use of that in scenes like this \u2014 to suggest that Nicolae is working his mojo on the whole world through this broadcast while only the redeemed, those who enjoy the magic of divine protection, can hear what\u2019s really going on.<\/p>\n
But Jenkins doesn\u2019t do that here. Instead, he falls back into the trap he set for himself by insisting that Nicolae is the greatest orator and most convincing speaker of all time.<\/p>\n
Again, don\u2019t ever do this to yourself as a writer. Don\u2019t ever give a key character any superlative skill that will at some point have to be demonstrated on the page. Robin Hood stories are fine \u2014 you can describe an arrow hitting its target without having to wield the bow yourself. But don\u2019t try to tell readers about the world\u2019s greatest poet, or the world\u2019s funniest comedian, or the most compelling orator of all time, because eventually you\u2019ll have to back that up by supplying the poetry, jokes or oratory that live up to such descriptions. And unless you are, yourself, the greatest poet, funniest comedian, or most compelling speechwriter in all the world, then you\u2019re trapped.<\/p>\n
Jenkins is trapped. He is not the greatest speechwriter in the world. He is, rather, a terrible writer of terrible speeches.<\/p>\n
And instead of great, or good, or even adequate oratory from Nicolae, what Jenkins gives us instead is this:<\/p>\n
\u201cMake no mistake, my brothers and sisters, there will be many dark days ahead. It will take tremendous resources to begin the rebuilding process, but because of the generosity of the seven loyal global regions and with the support of those citizens in the other three areas who were loyal to the Global Community and not to the insurrectionists, we are amassing the largest relief fund in the history of mankind. This will be administered to needy nations from New Babylon and the Global Community headquarters under my personal supervision.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
So New Babylon, the capital of the one-world government established after all nations were abolished, is going to oversee the distribution of \u201crelief funds\u201d to the various nations that need them. What?<\/em><\/p>\n\u201cWith the chaos that has resulted from this most sinister and unwise rebellion, local efforts to rebuild and care for the displaced will likely be thwarted by opportunists and looters. The relief effort carried out under the auspices of the Global Community will be handled in a swift and generous way that will allow as many loyal members of the Global Community as possible to return to their prosperous standard of living.<\/p>\n
\u201cContinue to resist naysayers and insurrectionists. Continue to support the Global Community. And remember that though I did not seek this position, I accept it with gravity and with resolve to pour out my life in service to the brotherhood and sisterhood of mankind. I appreciate your support as we set about to sacrificially stand by each other and pull ourselves out of this morass and to a higher plane than any of us could reach without the help of the other.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
It\u2019s difficult to imagine that banal, contentless speech uniting the entire world behind its beloved leader. I\u2019m not sure I can imagine anyone listening to the whole thing without changing the channel.<\/p>\n
Buck shook his head. \u201cHe sure tells \u2019em what they wanna hear, doesn\u2019t he?\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Set aside that the meaningless pile of throat-clearing noises above is being presented to us as an example of superlative oratory. Focus, instead, on the idea that this speech is also the authors\u2019 best attempt to convey an oily politician pandering to the masses and giving them exactly \u201cwhat they wanna hear.\u201d<\/p>\n
Who, ever, in all the long history of human experience, has ever wanted to hear that?<\/em> How are the masses being pandered to by that indecipherable puddle of rhetoric?<\/p>\nThis echoes the problem we saw earlier with the Lesson in Christian Marriage. Husbands are instructed to seem like they\u2019re listening to their wives when they say all that stuff they\u2019re probably saying, whatever it is. And politicians are criticized for pandering to the masses for saying all that stuff the masses want to hear, like \u2026\u00a0 you know,<\/em> whatever that stuff is that the people want.<\/p>\nThe authors have no idea what it is \u201cthey wanna hear,\u201d because they view \u2019em \u2014 the masses, the maddening crowd, the hoi polloi<\/em> \u2014 the same way they view their wives: as alien, inscrutable and unknowable. As a different, and subordinate, species.<\/p>\nAnd thus it doesn\u2019t occur to the authors that it\u2019s actually very easy to portray a politician saying what everyone wants to hear. Just have him say what you<\/em> want to hear. To portray a crafty Antichrist spinning words to deceive the entire world, have him say the kinds of things that would deceive you<\/em>.<\/p>\nSometimes the authors\u2019 lack of empathy is due to a lack of imagination. But here \u2014 with their world as with their wives, with the masses as with the Mrs. \u2014 they avoid empathy because they regard it as impossible. Empathy works by remembering the ways that you\u2019re just like everyone else, and the authors refuse to accept that they are.<\/p>\n
\u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013<\/p>\n
* This is not a long trip. I looked it up. Palwaukee Airport is only about 7 miles from Mount Prospect.<\/p>\n
Yes, they\u2019ll be driving through a post-nuclear wasteland, but we\u2019ve already seen that the roads are fine. The only after-effect of the nuclear attacks on Chicago\u2019s highways seems to be that there\u2019s less traffic than usual. And anyway that\u2019s downtown<\/em>, in Chicago itself. The city<\/em> was attacked with nuclear weapons, not the suburbs. If things that happened in cities were in any<\/em> way connected to life in the suburbs, then, why, suburban churches would have to change almost everything<\/em> they\u2019re doing. And that\u2019s just silly.<\/p>\nPalwaukee Airport is a good 18 miles<\/em> from downtown, so no problem there.<\/p>\nOh, and Buck Williams is certainly the only<\/em> person who decided to fly out of the smaller suburban airport after O\u2019Hare was destroyed in the bombing. So no need to worry about crowds or a riotous mob-scene when they get there.<\/p>\nIn real life, it\u2019s not called \u201cPalwaukee Airport\u201d any more, by the way. It\u2019s now \u201cChicago Executive Airport\u201d \u2014 they changed the name about 10 years after Nicolae<\/em> was written.<\/p>\nThere may be a lesson there for anyone writing stories with a near-future setting. It\u2019s probably best to avoid using the present-day names for any airports, stadiums, concert venues or convention halls. Those names are too likely to change, making your \u201cfuture\u201d seem oddly antiquated.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not criticizing Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins for failing to foresee this name-change. It\u2019s just a novel, after all, it\u2019s not like the authors claim to be prophets<\/em> or something. Oh, wait \u2026<\/p>\nThe fact that, 15 years after this book first came out, Palwaukee is now called \u201cChicago Executive\u201d does not undermine the credibility of their prophecy. What does<\/em> undermine their credibility as prophets is the fact that, 15 years later, the airport \u2014 and the rest of the world \u2014 is still here.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The lesson here seems to be, roughly, “Husbands, cater to her feelings and make her think you’re really listening when your wife talks about \u2026 oh, you know \u2026 whatever it is that wives talk about when they talk about all that woman-ish stuff.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[238],"class_list":["post-13455","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-left-behind","tag-left-behind"],"yoast_head":"\n
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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark1\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/141"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13455"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13455\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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<\/a>He abused it, blowing a tire, and then abandoned it. He\u2019d promised Verna to replace it with \u201ca better car,\u201d and, apparently, has fulfilled that promise as minimally as possible.<\/p>\n