Christianity’s week of magical thinking

As COVID-19 struck, the faithful were desperate to believe that God keeps you healthy.

I started to wonder if they really believe that God will “bless” them with health (and wealth) because they’re so damn good. Like when a big gathering of faith healers was cancelled at the news of COVID-19 being so contagious. Or when a megachurch known for its many “miracle healings” called off trips to the hospital. Maybe the Pope really thought, when he prayed to that special crucifix that maybe stops plagues, that it might work. He later says the virus is God’s payback for sin against the environment.

The Pentecostal talk show host Jim Bakker, of course, got on the bandwagon selling his ‘Silver Solution’ cure, until the state shut him down. Shouldn’t his followers have shut him down? When he says, “It’s like God created it in Heaven to help us”—I wish they’d laughed at him.

John Piper, of course, realizes that COVID-19 is God trying to get humans to “cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.” He uses the occasion to warn not to watch porn—as if it’s all connected.

And Christianity just feels a long, long way from reality.

They whipped out the apocalyptic thinking!—because for many Christians, the world is…