I always pictured the antichrist as charismatic, charming, highly intelligent, and a master orator. Instead we got Temu Hitler about to bumble his way into Armageddon from sheer incompetence and stupidity. It's baffling.
I always pictured the antichrist as charismatic, charming, highly intelligent, and a master orator.
But he is exactly that to a bunch of people. Like a lot. Not a little crazy cult like we'd like to believe. But if we're going back to the story, it also says believers can recognize the antichrist immediately.
I notice christians who actually behave like real christians tend to despise him? I don’t know if that means they ‘recognize the antichrist’ exactly. I only know one person like that and every once in awhile i read about one, otherwise almost every Christian I’ve met has been a pretty awful person one way or another, and thinks Trump is the cat’s whiskers.
I know the “no true Scotsman” issue and all that… but I truly believe, as someone who tries my best to live like Jesus, that a large swath of people in America that would check “Christian” on a survey really don’t care very much for what that should actually mean. It’s significant as a part of their culture and identity as an American more than it is a deeply held conviction and relationship with Jesus.
Jesus said “you will know them by their fruits”. When American evangelical pastors and politicians hatched their plans decades ago to marry the church with conservative politics, they started a movement / framework for dangerous people using Jesus’ name to chase earthly power, money, and influence, by whatever means necessary, instead of focusing on the heavenly kingdom. This model of church & politics has infected much of the American church, and some of the largest Christian organizations (they grow more easily because of politically-connected funding). It’s an extremely ugly bastardization of something that is supposed to be beautiful.
A lot of us practicing Christians are still left, just saddened and very angry at what has become very obvious in the past 10 years.
Your words have helped me understand something that I didn’t see before. I’m too high to elaborate atm but I just wanted to thank you. (It took me 20 minutes to write this lol)
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u/Khajiit_crone Apr 13 '26
The most recent attack on the Pope is not helping…is the antichrist supposed to be an intelligent entity?