Imagine that you wanted to foster among the public and the press the impression that Christians are ignorant, mean-spirited buffoons. How might you go about it, were you a clever person? Rather than attack Christians directly, you might instead find yourself a puffed-up, theologically ignorant preacher, and give him a nationally televised cable program focused on current events. Maybe you'd even have him run for president a few times, so everyone could enjoy his ill-considered ruminations, delivered in the smarmy, self-righteous tones of a Hollywood actor doing an over-the-top impression of a Christian. You might invent, in other words, Pat Robertson.

Now the right reverend Robertson delivers us his 2007 prediction, straight, he says, from the lips of the Almighty: a terrorist attack on U.S. soil that will yield "mass killing." Scary indeed. The problem is, Robertson often gets it wrong. In 2006 he predicted that storms and "possibly" a tsunami would batter the U.S. coasts. In 2005 he prophesied Social Security reform. (I am not making this up.) "I have a relatively good track record," Robertson says, but "sometimes I miss."

This is a fascinating admission, for those of us who bother to read the Bible, because it turns out that the good Lord anticipated the likes of Robertson. To wit, Deuteronomy 18:21-22: "You may say to yourselves, 'How can we know when a message has not been spoken by the LORD ?' If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the LORD does not take place or come true, that is a message the LORD has not spoken. That prophet has spoken presumptuously. Do not be afraid of him."

Unfortunately for Pat, the Bible also calls for false prophets to be put to death. Robertson, you might recall, is a bit harsh toward those he perceives to be outside God's favor. He famously claimed that Ariel Sharon's stroke was a punishment from God, that Hurricane Katrina was God's judgment (raising the question: are Hugh Hefner's live-in girlfriends evidence of God's blessing?), and that tinpot dictator Hugo Chavez ought to be assassinated.

I wonder how he might respond to the news of his own Old Testament-mandated execution for being a false prophet. Fortunately, true Christian teaching asks us to extend grace and mercy even toward those who deny it to others.

Still, it would be nice if he would pay a little more attention to the book of Job: "Men listened to me expectantly, waiting in silence for my counsel." If only.