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Sarah Palin, one 72-year-old heartbeat away from the presidency if John McCain somehow wins Tuesday’s election, scares me.

And not just because of what she is unprepared to do, namely, meet the many simultaneous and complex challenges which daily assault our country’s chief executive. A President has the ability to call upon virtually any expert for help and assistance, if they are so inclined. FDR was so inclined, and set up his brain trust. Our current President… not so much. He was the “Decider.” Anyway, it’s not as if a President Sarah Palin would be making all the tough calls without (potentially) some of the greatest advice available to a political leader. She would simply be the one getting all the credit (and blame) for the decisions made in her name.

No, what scares me about Palin is her Christianity, and since I myself am a Christian, that statement probably confuses people who know me. Allow me to explain.

My Christian belief system is heavily influenced by Bible prophecy, especially those prophecies concerned with events at the so-called “end times,” also known as “last day events.” The prophecies in the Biblical books of Daniel and Revelation have much to say about the events surrounding the second advent of Christ, and one line of prophecy predicts that the United States will be pivotal in setting up a worldwide religious movement which ends up restricting the religious liberty of citizens who refuse to line up behind its efforts to enforce a certain kind of worship.

My scoffing fellow Christian citizens may think that religious persecution could never happen on American soil, but I remind you that persecution has a long history on this continent. I thank God that the framers of the Constitution learned the lessons from the Massachusetts Bay and Rhode Island colonies. Although Massachusetts Bay was established with Christian principles in mind by Puritans eager for religious liberty, it was a persecuting power to anyone who dared attempt to worship God differently than their leaders commanded. Roger Williams set up Rhode Island colony to be a haven of religious liberty, creating the freedom of conscience only possible by refusing to set up an official state religion or to allow any church to meddle in the affairs of civil governance. By the time it was necessary to create a nation from those colonies, Americans had rejected the Massachusetts model of church and state connectedness, and, especially in the Bill of Rights, enshrined the Rhode Island model of complete separation of church and state.

The First Amendment is the genius of American rule of law. And because of this wealth of religious autonomy enjoyed by Americans, my spiritual forefathers (the founders of the Advent movement and the Seventh-day Adventist Church) were able to freely teach the Bible prophecies which predict that, contrary to our beloved Law of the Land, someday this country would sacrifice religious liberty for the sake of some future crisis. This country has never lacked for crisis, and one only has to consult the stock market these days for fresh sources of panic.

The book of Daniel predicted the rise and fall of many empires which are now long gone, but also a religious power which would rise from the ashes of the Roman Empire and has indeed become the most visible and politically powerful segment of modern Christianity. The Roman Catholic Church and its leadership, the Papacy, were a bloodthirsty persecuting power during the Dark Ages. The book of Revelation teaches that someday the now dormant and docile persecuting Church will take up the sword again, bolstered by the religious and political authority of the gem of the New World, the United States.

Since the religion most commonly practiced within the United States has always been Christianity, it has always seemed to me that the prophecy in Revelation 12, 13, and 14 foresees a time when this country’s leadership will be taken over by Christian politicians who share a fundamentalist worldview with the many voters who sweep them into office and then somewhat mindlessly allow them to erode away the religious and civil liberties which made this country a uniquely free society. Sarah Palin, of all the four candidates (Presidential and VP), is the most likely to be that fundamentalist leader.

Most Presidents of this country have been church-going Christians. But very few have dared to make their religious faith a prominent part of their political agenda; this is wise, since the First Amendment so forcefully warns us away from institutionalizing any religion, and a President embodies in their person the very institution of the Executive Branch of our government. Lately, though, more Christian voters have willingly taken on the political agendas of their religious leaders, and of organizations like Focus on the Family, the Heritage Foundation, the Discovery Institute, and the Republican Party itself, which more and more looks and behaves much like a Christian institution. The twin issues, abortion and homosexuality, are the deciding factors for many Christians when it comes to deciding which political organizations to support or be influenced by.

And so the Republican candidates this election include Sarah Palin, a born-again believer from the Pentecostal and charismatic end of the Christian spectrum. She has strong ties to the popular and explosively growing Third Wave and dominionist movements in fundamentalist Christianity. These movements promote a very politicized set of beliefs and fervently pray, and work, and vote, for the Christian politicians they bless and send into campaigns in order to transform nations and other political entities all over the world into Christian “dominions.” They practice a complex form of spiritual warfare, battling demons at many levels which they perceive to be the barriers preventing Catholics, Jews, atheists, other Protestants, etc., from joining their particular movement.

The scary part of all this is what the media has not been bothering to find out regarding how much Palin is likely to be influenced by this extremely motivated, and fiercely political group of power-hungry Christians. One website dedicated to documenting these very questions is called Talk To Action. I recommend to all that you spend time studying their findings before you vote.

Barack Obama is a Christian, (not a Muslim, as the Republican rumor-mill has successfully gotten many of their flock to believe), and thus shares in this potentiality whereby he could be influenced by Christians in this country to do similarly damaging things to religious liberty. He just doesn’t seem to be as openly and obviously beholden to his spiritual mentors as is Palin; he seems more interested in political solutions than religious ones. And that makes good sense to me, in light of the wall of separation between church and state that we should preserve and defend to the end.

As an academic and an intellectual person (as most teachers, I suppose, are), I am drawn to Obama’s thoughtful, intelligent approach to tough issues. When others were complaining about his hesitation to make bold campaign pronouncements, I was respecting his sense of reserve, knowing that all the campaign rhetoric that gets you elected amounts to little more than access to a seat at that table where many, many others are also empowered to wrangle with you over the pressing problems of the moment. I would much rather have someone at that table who has the skills to unite, to compromise, to imagine solutions to problems from the perspective of one who has advocated for the neediest in the community (which is what his years as a community organizer gave him), than one who has only been a chief executive (mayor, governor) and who has mainly dealt with the needs of the least needy in the community (oil companies doing business in Palin’s Alaska).

Ultimately, I really don’t care who wins on Tuesday. Part of me wants my Lord to hasten His coming and take us home to heaven, and knowing that the prophetic events which Palin is very likely to set in motion makes me a little excited at the prospect of the end coming that much sooner, rather than later. But another part of me always wishes for the best for my home and country, for the sake of my family and the work God gave my church that remains so very unfinished, and thus I also hope for a little more time, more time to pray and work and watch my daughters grow up in a country they haven’t yet seen the best of.