Yesterday, a close friend from Ohio sent me an email. Then she called to ask me what I thought of it. So I opened the email and read it.
It listed a series of 13 historical events, starting with Bobby Kennedy's death in 1968 - "shot and killed by a Muslim male extremist." Each subsequent listing ended with a fear-inducing phrase: Muslim male extremists.
Then the real kick in the teeth.
"According to The Book of Revelations," the email said, "the Anti-Christ will be a man, in his 40s, of MUSLIM descent, who will deceive the nations with persuasive language, and have a MASSIVE Christ-like appeal."
By now, I was a little disturbed.
"The prophecy says that people will flock to him and he will promise false hope and world peace. And when he is in power, he will destroy everything."
The email ended dramatically.
"And now: for the award-winning Act of Stupidity of all times, the people of America want to elect to the most powerful position on the face of the planet - The President of the United States of America - a Male of Muslim descent who is the most liberal Senator in Congress, and in his 40s. Have the American People completely lost their Minds -?"
I stopped for a moment. I thought about my youngest brother's casual assertion earlier in the year that "Obama is a Muslim."
I opened up Snopes.com. I clicked on the words Obama and Muslim.
And then I realized the genius of the email. The assumption had blown right by me. When someone quotes the Bible, who am I to dispute it? It's the Bible!
Ever hear the one about Hezekiah 5:9? Yeah? I did too. Except Hezekiah isn't a book in the Bible. It just sounds like one. If you use biblical language, your audience will believe it's a Bible verse. Even when it isn't.
This fear-inducing email counts on that reaction.
"First, it's the Book of Revelation - not REVELATIONS," Mr. Snopes says on his website. "Second, the Book of Revelation does not provide a laundry list of signs for identifying the appearance of the Anti-Christ."
In fact, you don't even find the term "Anti-Christ" in Revelation - nor a human description of such a man. Revelation 13 describes a beast, an animal. In fact, the only time the phrase "anti-Christ" appears in the Bible is in First and Second John. And none of those passages describe the anti-Christ figure.
Mr. Snopes then lays bare the email's duplicity.
"NOTHING in the Bible - in Revelation or elsewhere - describes the anti-Christ as being 'a man, in his 40s, of Muslim descent." Evangelical Christians believe the book of Revelation was written by 70 AD - and Islam was founded about 600 AD.
Do the math.
There's another question that confuses me about this email. Obama openly confesses that he is a Christian. So why are Christians so suspicious of him? Could it be the color of his skin?
When I was young, I sat through a lot of church services. When someone got up and confessed his faith, everyone in the audience rejoiced. No one got up and said, "Hey, you're lying." They accepted his declaration. So why do they distrust Obama when he insists that he "is not and has never been a Muslim"?
Perhaps there's a secret signal you have to give to prove you're a Christian? Just to make sure, I pulled out my Bible and checked with the Apostle Paul. Nope. No secret code. Romans 10:9 says "That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved."
Obama's done that - so he's a Christian, right? Not so fast. Over 12% of Americans still think Obama's a Muslim.
I checked back with my youngest brother. I was curious. How do you explain the distrust? My youngest brother tried to explain. People think Obama is a Muslim because they believe his father was a Muslim. Never mind that the senior Obama never practiced his faith.
So Obama comes to his Muslim faith genetically? Is this why people always remind us that Obama once attended a Muslim elementary school?
Let me see if I understand. If you're born Catholic, you're always a Catholic. Right? If you're born Mormon, you are forever condemned by the Magic Underwear label? Right? And if you're born German, you are forever at risk of being the next Hitler?
Somehow, this paranoia doesn't seem very American.
Perhaps this view would be harmless if Americans believed that Muslims are peaceful. But more and more believe that most Muslims are suceptible to extremism - that they don't play well with others - at least if you look at the growing rash of books such as While Europe Slept, which argues that Europe is already lost to Islam. Or if you watch Obsession, the new documentary film that lays out a frightening view of the extremist war between Islam and the West.
Are these fears causing Americans to fear that Obama is a sort of Manchurian Candidate? That extremism lies within Obama, just waiting to be awakened by his election as President of the United States? Is this the fear that drives a viral email like this?
This is not the first time the Republicans have used this type of fear. It is precisely the ruse Dick Nixon used to fight Kennedy back in 1960, when Americans feared that if they elected a Catholic, the Pope would be setting up in the White House. Fortunately, Nixon failed - and we had Camelot, albeit briefly.
Patriotic Americans do not believe they are limited by the past. They believe a man can become anything he wants to become - whether he's near the bottom of his class at the Naval Academy or from a single-family home in Hawaii. They believe a woman can break through the glass ceiling of American politics - whether her last name is Clinton or Palin.
That's what I fought against by leaving my own insular religious community.
We are not trapped by the thinking of the past. We can choose to say NO to authoritarian thinking. And we can choose to say YES to the American Dream.
By tapping into our worst fears to fight the opposing candidate, we limit ourselves -- whether we are Republican or Democrat. We should reach for a future that embraces our highest dreams.
Not one directed by our worst nightmares.