Tulsa, OK--Scientists in the Department of Creationist Meteorology at Oral Roberts University here today offered a Scripture-based explanation of the event they are calling the "pseudo-rapture," Tuesday afternoon.

In that event, thousands of people around the globe, living and dead, rose into the air, hung there for a moment, then vanished upward, as if sucked up by a giant vacuum cleaner.

Mike Riddle, President and Founder of Christian Training and Development Services and a recent hire in the Oral Roberts Creationist Meteorology department, explained what must have happened:

"In the 38th chapter of the Book of Job, God spoke to Job out of the whirlwind, and said: 'Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowing?' Here we have the meteorological explanation for what happened Tuesday. It wasn't the Rapture at all; it was another whirlwind such as the one out of which God chastised Job and his misguided friends for their 'words without knowing.' The people who were taken up were in fact precisely such people, utterers of blasphemy and other words without knowing."

Riddle went on to link Tuesday's pseudo-rapturous whirlwind to the collision of fully seven storm centers in the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean.

"Is it so farfetched," he asked, "that God should have descended to earth in the form of Hurricane Francis and Hurricane Ludwig, and Tropical Storms Gaston, Hudibras, Imogene, Jasper, and Krissy?"

When asked how a convergence of storm centers in one part of the globe could have instigated a global event like the "pseudo-rapture," Riddle smiled knowingly.

"Here we have a perfect example," he said, "of the darkening of counsel by words without knowing. Obviously God speaks to all of us everywhere, no matter where his whirlwinds might touch down. It's pretty obvious to anyone who reads the Bible that this convergence of storms is not just unprecedented in human history; it is a divine miracle of absolutely stunning magnitude."

Professor Riddle's appointment to the department this past summer caused a bit of a stir in the metereological community when it was learned that he has no degree in meteorology. His bachelor's degree is in mathematics, and he has a master's degree from Oral Roberts in education. His work experience has been almost exclusively in the computer business.

The Rev. Oral Roberts himself defended the hire, noting that as there are as yet no graduate programs in Creationist Meteorology in the United States, it would have been impossible for Professor Riddle to obtain the necessary credentials. And his computer expertise has proved invaluable in running meteorological searches on online Bible Study sites.

# posted by Doug Robinson @ 3:15 PM