Hillarycare II: A 'Mark of the Beast'?

Growing up in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains gave me a unique perspective on the world, for good or ill. Most of it, I will be quick to say, has been for good.

The values of mountain and Piedmont folk in the Carolinas, Virginia, Tennessee, and Georgia are solid as a rock and time-honored. Faith, family, honor, respect, courtesy, tradition are all words that describe this area of the country.

Part of the religious faith of evangelical Christianity, which runs deep in this neck of the woods, has to do with the 'the end of time,' or as theologians would put it, 'the parousia.'

Many Christians believe that at or near the end of time the forces of evil will take over the world in the name of peace, goodwill, and prosperity. Fooled into believing the rhetoric of these purveyors of hate and evil, the masses will help them usher in a new world order.

Part of that new world order will be a system of identification. 'The mark of the beast,' as it is called in the Book of Revelation in the Bible, will be the identifying emblem of this new system of government.

This mark involves the infamous number '666' that each person will be required to wear on their person, engraved into their skin, in order to make purchases such as food, clothing, beverages, and other goods. Those who refuse to accept the mark will be simply out of luck when it comes to acquiring life's necessities.

Today as we were treated to further information about Hillary Clinton's proposal for universal healthcare, we learned that she envisions a time in America when it will be necessary to show proof of health insurance before one can get a job.

Thus, if you are out of a job and have no health insurance, you are barred from being hired for a new job.

And, without a job you can't buy food, beverages, clothing, or the other necessities of life.

Do I believe that Hillary Clinton is the anti-Christ and that her healthcare plan is the 'mark of the beast?' No. Contrary to many of my brothers and sisters in the evangelical Christian world, I believe that the book of Revelation was written primarily to first century Christians in code to warn them about coming dangers within the Roman Empire, particularly with regard to Nero's impending scourge.

In no way does this mean, however, that there are no parallels between Hillarycare II and the book of Revelation's frightening scenario of a dominant world government where people must tow the party line in order to live.

For years many of us have been sounding the alarm concerning the dangerous 'slippery slope' of the expansion of government control over various sectors of our lives. The creeping crawl of government power is very jealous and protective of its territory. It only relinquishes power as citizens successfully fight it. And if citizens do not fight it, it continues gradually infecting and infesting every single area of human life, until one day George Orwell's nightmare in '1984' is a reality.

Thomas Jefferson recognized the danger during the era of our nation's founding, and stated that the natural state of affairs is for government to seize power and that eventually, and periodically, citizens must go to battle to preserve liberty.

And it is at this precise point that the book of Revelation in the Bible may not be so narrowly limited to circumstances in the first century.

If one looks at Revelation through a symbolic lens instead of a literal one, we can easily see that perhaps the story of the anti-Christ and the mark of the beast refers to circumstances that repeat themselves in the course of human history.

Thus, perhaps Hillarycare II is a type of mark of the beast, if indeed she intends to prevent citizens from getting a job unless they have health insurance. Further, perhaps the mammoth government bureaucracy required to regulate and enforce such measures is a type of anti-Christ.

In no way is this possibility intended to impugn the character of Hillary Clinton personally. Here we are speaking purely of concepts, ideas, and institutions rather than individuals. Reading the book of Revelation with a symbolic lens yields an interesting array of possibilities if the anti-Christ, the mark of the beast, and other such terms are viewed as metaphors for totalitarianism.

Oppressive and omnipotent governments certainly embody every single manifestation of evil known to the human race. Consult your history on the reigns of terror of the Communist Party in the USSR, particularly under Stalin, the Third Reich in Germany, the Communist government of Fidel Castro in Cuba, and the scourge of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia after the Viet Nam War.

Certainly the Founding Fathers of the United States of America minced no words in describing the danger and rottenness of a government that meddled too much in the lives of the citizens.