{"id":17469,"date":"2021-09-07T12:21:28","date_gmt":"2021-09-07T16:21:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/?p=17469"},"modified":"2021-09-07T12:21:28","modified_gmt":"2021-09-07T16:21:28","slug":"we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html","title":{"rendered":"\u2018We Are in the Birthing Point of the Mark of the Beast\u2019: Christian Singer Slams Vaccine Mandates"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_17475\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-17475\" style=\"width: 721px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2021\/09\/48299909727_bc1ec55d59_c.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-17475\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2021\/09\/48299909727_bc1ec55d59_c.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"721\" height=\"449\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-17475\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ashley Diener\/Flickr.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Christian singer Danny Gokey recently expressed his opposition to vaccination mandates on Twitter, along with his concerns that the \u201cmark of the beast\u201d is approaching, FaithWire reports.<\/p>\n<p>While the \u201cJesus People\u201d singer is vaccinated against COVID-19, he said that people shouldn\u2019t be forced to get immunized if they don\u2019t want to. He also slammed those in the news media and government who call the vaccine \u201ca cure\u201d when it isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n<p>The former American Idol contestant addressed his fears, mainly that people no longer have conversations saying, \u201cthe only topic discussed is COVID, and the only acceptable thought is vaccination.\u201d This phenomenon is very dangerous, Gokey said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe fact that I\u2019m even talking about this comes at a great cost to me,\u201d Gokey tweeted. \u201cI could be identified as an extremist, and my music get pulled down from radio and other platforms because of this. People are threatening my livelihood, saying they won\u2019t buy my music and won\u2019t stream it. Some want to cancel me for asking questions and are even calling out my Christianity because I post these questions.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Gokey continued, \u201cThey tell me, \u2018Jesus would get the vaccine,\u2019 which is manipulative. Scripture says that He healed everyone that came in contact with him. Jesus did not run away from people who had diseases but ran to them to heal them. He didn\u2019t divide and demonize anyone. Although he did rebuke those in power, who were controlling people and those who forced burdens on them. He was confident in God\u2019s love and never walked in fear of anything.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Though Gokey was cautious about saying that he doesn\u2019t believe the vaccine itself is the \u201cmark of the beast,\u201d he did say that we\u2019re in a cultural climate we\u2019re in is an indicator that \u201cwe are in the birthing point of the mark of the beast.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen I was younger, I always wondered how when the Bible mentions in Revelation that, in the last days, people will not be able to buy or sell without the mark of the beast,\u201d Gokey said. \u201cBut now I see \u2014 it will be accomplished through a crisis that will make people think they are not safe unless they get it. And many will think that those who don\u2019t have the mark are very dangerous to society. Sound familiar?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Gokey wrote, \u201cIt\u2019s already happening in some areas of our country and the world, but it starts subtly and has a birthing point,\u201d the recording artist continued. \u201cI fully believe we are in the birthing point of the mark of the beast. Let me stress this \u2014 I don\u2019t believe it\u2019s the mark of the beast yet. It\u2019s so subtle and cunning how division works. It starts as a moral argument that convinces you to believe that you\u2019re an immoral person and don\u2019t care about others unless you put the serum in you.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He was clear about his concerns that our country is becoming more divided in subtle but cunning ways. He also fears that more of his concerts will be canceled because they will be considered \u201csuper spreader events.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cResearch proves that idea as incorrect,\u201d Gokey said, \u201cyet I\u2019m seeing concerns being canceled, and makes me wonder if mine are next. The weird thing about this is that the COVID vaccine does not prevent transmission. CDC COVID vaccines won\u2019t stop transmission. Fully vaccinated can still get, spread Delta strand it\u2019s specifically designed in that way. Don\u2019t believe me, research it for yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While it\u2019s commonly suggested that most Christians are against the COVID-19 vaccination and not inoculated, a new <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/politics\/meet-the-press\/nbc-news-poll-shows-demographic-breakdown-vaccinated-u-s-n1277514\">NBC News poll<\/a> found that nearly 60 percent of white evangelicals have received a vaccination.<\/p>\n<p>This comes in the wake of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration\u2019s approval of the Pfizer-Bio-N-Tech shot.<\/p>\n<p>Newly released data indicates that vaccines against COVID-19 provide strong protection against hospitalizations, along with protection against severe illness from the Delta variant of the virus.<\/p>\n<p>According to the report published in the New York Times, vaccines are 94 percent effective in stopping hospitalizations. CDC data also shows that more than 99.99 percent of those who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 have not experienced &#8220;breakthrough&#8221; infections.<\/p>\n<p>What are your thoughts? Are you for or against vaccination mandates?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Christian singer Danny Gokey recently expressed his opposition to vaccination mandates on Twitter, along with his concerns that the \u201cmark of the beast\u201d is approaching, FaithWire reports. While the \u201cJesus People\u201d singer is vaccinated against COVID-19, he said that people shouldn\u2019t be forced to get immunized if they don\u2019t want to. He also slammed those&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":565,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[4323,4222,4237,5028,5022,5025],"class_list":["post-17469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-television","tag-christian-singer","tag-coronavirus","tag-covid-19","tag-danny-gokey","tag-vaccine","tag-vaccine-mandates"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>\u2018We Are in the Birthing Point of the Mark of the Beast\u2019: Christian Singer Slams Vaccine Mandates<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, nofollow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u2018We Are in the Birthing Point of the Mark of the Beast\u2019: Christian Singer Slams Vaccine Mandates\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Christian singer Danny Gokey recently expressed his opposition to vaccination mandates on Twitter, along with his concerns that the \u201cmark of the beast\u201d is approaching, FaithWire reports. While the \u201cJesus People\u201d singer is vaccinated against COVID-19, he said that people shouldn\u2019t be forced to get immunized if they don\u2019t want to. He also slammed those&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Idol Chatter\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-09-07T16:21:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2021\/09\/48299909727_bc1ec55d59_c.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"511\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Lesli White\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"\u2018We Are in the Birthing Point of the Mark of the Beast\u2019: Christian Singer Slams Vaccine Mandates","robots":{"index":"noindex","follow":"nofollow"},"og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"\u2018We Are in the Birthing Point of the Mark of the Beast\u2019: Christian Singer Slams Vaccine Mandates","og_description":"Christian singer Danny Gokey recently expressed his opposition to vaccination mandates on Twitter, along with his concerns that the \u201cmark of the beast\u201d is approaching, FaithWire reports. While the \u201cJesus People\u201d singer is vaccinated against COVID-19, he said that people shouldn\u2019t be forced to get immunized if they don\u2019t want to. He also slammed those&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html","og_site_name":"Idol Chatter","article_published_time":"2021-09-07T16:21:28+00:00","og_image":[{"width":768,"height":511,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2021\/09\/48299909727_bc1ec55d59_c.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Lesli White","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html","name":"\u2018We Are in the Birthing Point of the Mark of the Beast\u2019: Christian Singer Slams Vaccine Mandates","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2021\/09\/48299909727_bc1ec55d59_c.jpg","datePublished":"2021-09-07T16:21:28+00:00","dateModified":"2021-09-07T16:21:28+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#\/schema\/person\/4f72f240cbc397de345b4a72c0109413"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2021\/09\/48299909727_bc1ec55d59_c.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2021\/09\/48299909727_bc1ec55d59_c.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2021\/09\/we-are-in-the-birthing-point-of-the-mark-of-the-beast-christian-singer-slams-vaccine-mandates.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"\u2018We Are in the Birthing Point of the Mark of the Beast\u2019: Christian Singer Slams Vaccine Mandates"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/","name":"Idol Chatter","description":"Beliefnet Entertainment blog, TV blog, Movie blog, Religion in entertainment blog","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#\/schema\/person\/4f72f240cbc397de345b4a72c0109413","name":"Lesli White","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/849\/84981da9ba200c133618a7ef53be589dx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/849\/84981da9ba200c133618a7ef53be589dx96.jpg","caption":"Lesli White"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/author\/lwhite"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/565"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17469"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17469\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17478,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17469\/revisions\/17478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}