Pre-tribulation rapture

In Christian eschatology the rapture refers to a purported end time event when all Christian believers—living and resurrected dead—will rise into the sky and join Christ for eternity. Some Christians believe this event is predicted and described, using the Greek word "harpazo", "rapio" in Latin, meaning to snatch away or seize, in Paul's First Epistle to the Thessalonians in the Bible 1 Thessalonians 4:17. The term "rapture" has come especially to distinguish this event from the event of the "Second Coming" of Jesus Christ to Earth, as some think is predicted elsewhere in the Bible, in Second Thessalonians, Gospel of Matthew, First Corinthians and the Revelation.

The term "rapture" is especially useful in discussing or disputing the exact timing or the scope of the event, particularly when asserting the "pre-tribulation" view that the rapture will occur before, not during, the Second Coming, with or without an extended Tribulation period. This is now the most common use of the term, especially among Christian theologians and fundamentalist Christians in the United States. Other, older uses of "rapture" were simply as a term for any mystical union with God or for eternal life in Heaven with God. Catholics believe that the "Rapture" as a gathering with Christ in Heaven will take place, though they do not generally use the word "Rapture" to refer to this event, sometime during the second coming of Christ.

There are many views among Christians regarding the timing of Christ's return (including whether it will occur in one event or two), and various views regarding the destination of the aerial gathering described in 1 Thessalonians 4. Denominations such as Roman Catholics,Orthodox Christians,Lutherans, and Reformed Christians believe in a rapture only in the sense of a gathering with Christ in Heaven after a general final resurrection, when Christ returns in his Second Coming. They do not believe that a group of people is left behind on earth for an extended Tribulation period after the events of 1 Thessalonians 4:17.

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