“An apocalypse is a literary report of an amazing, often fearful, violent vision that reveals truths about past, present, and/or future times in highly symbolic and poetical terms. The writer may represent himself as being transported into a heavenly realm, or the vision may be unveiled—and even interpreted—by an angelic messenger. Apocalyptic exhortations are aimed at chastening and reforming their hearers with promises of rewards and punishment in the coming end times.”

New World Encyclopedia

In Apocalyptic literature dragons and monsters, angels and demons are prominently featured, and the writer takes the reader on a roller coaster ride from the heavenly realms to a dystopian future to the seven circles of hell.

The last book of the Bible, the Book of Revelation is a prime example of apocryphal literature, and even the most erudite theologian on LSD finds it difficult to discern more than the basic fact that it teaches that good will prevail over evil in the end.

But that doesn’t stop evangelical prophets and televangelists from proclaiming that the Book of Revelations reveals all sorts of fantastic events that will take place in the End Times: The Rapture of the Church, the rise of an Antichrist, the Mark of the Beast and on and on ad infinitum.

Evangelical ministers can convince their followers to believe in all sorts of nonsense as long as they claim that’s what the Book of Revelation teaches. I’ve heard several evangelical ministers claim that the COVID vaccine is the Mark of the Beast, and as a result hundred of thousands of evangelicals are afraid to be vaccinated.

The Book of Revelation is a first century genre of literature that as the title suggests, is meant to reveal spiritual truths, but it was never intended to be a roadmap of the future.

So, if you hear a televangelist rant about the COVID vaccine being the Mark of the Beast or that the Book of Revelation teaches that Trump is a messiah figure who will rescue thousands of children from the hands of pedophiles, turn that shit off.