Jesus Christ Man Is Here To Save

Meet the Puerto Rican minister who has captured the hearts and minds of thousands of worshippers as the new Messiah, all thanks to some celestial "integration" with a couple of beef cake angels who suddenly materialized next to his bed in 1972. His name? Jose Luis de Jesus Miranda, otherwise known by his congregation as Jesus Christ Man!

A native of Puerto Rico, de Jesus, 60, spent his youth drifting from the Roman Catholics to the Pentecostals to the Baptists. Then one night in 1973, he says, he awoke to a vision of two hulking men at his bedside who announced the arrival of the Lord, who, says de Jesus, "came to me and integrated with me." In the early years after founding Growing in Grace in Miami in 1986, de Jesus didn't claim to be Christ. Instead, he worked as a pastor spreading his doctrine: that under a new covenant with God, there is no sin and no Satan, and people are predestined to be saved. But as his following expanded, his claims did, too. In 1998, de Jesus avowed that he was the reincarnation of the Apostle Paul. Two years ago at Growing in Grace's world convention in Venezuela, he declared himself Christ. And just last week, he called himself the Antichrist and revealed a "666" tattooed on his forearm. His explanation: that, as the second coming of Christ, he rejects the continued worship of Jesus of Nazareth.

There seems some concern amongst religious scholars that Mr. de Jesus is going to pull another Jim Jones. Let's hope not: like all superheroes, Jesus Christ Man should know that with great power comes great responsibility.

He Calls Himself God [Newsweek]