Mormons And Other Christians Fast And Pray For Rain To Relieve California's 500-Year Drought, Storm Now On The Way. Atheists OWNED!

California and much of the American West has endured a severe and prolonged 500-year drought, so much so that many people have prayed and fasted for rain. Not only have ranchers and a group of Catholic bishops importuned the Lord to end the drought, but many of the 775,000 members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in California participated in a special day of prayer and fasting held on Sunday February 2nd, 2014. The first Sunday of every month is normally a day of fasting for Mormons, who donate the costs of the missed meals to the Church in the form of a fast offering. Even more details were published in the Murrieta Patch.

Guess what? Not only has it already rained, but a series of approaching storms are expected to bring as much as four inches of rain to parts of Central California, while two feet or more of snow may fall in the California Cascades and parts of the Sierra Nevada Mountains during the upcoming weekend of February 8-9. Victor Murphy, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Dallas, said he expected the northern half of California to see 2-4 inches of rain over the next week with as much as 4-8 inches in some locations.

The storms are tapping into a phenomenon known as an “atmospheric river,” which is a relatively narrow stream of moisture-rich air extending from the tropics northeastward across the Pacific. Atmospheric rivers have helped end California droughts before, according to research by Michael Dettinger of the U.S. Geological Survey and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Dettinger found that most droughts in the West end abruptly, with one very wet month pulling the state from a significant precipitation deficit to a surplus. But this is offset by the fact that California is in such a deep precipitation hole that it would take a statewide average of at least a foot of rainfall to climb out, which forecasters do not see as likely before the end of the wet season on March 31st. In fact, the upcoming storms may just be part of a short-term break in the weather pattern that has favored drought conditions in the West. So celebration may be premature.

Nevertheless, the break in the dry pattern, occurring so soon after a massive fast-and-prayer campaign, cannot be ignored. Even if we cannot specifically explain how and why prayer works, it's obviously had an effect in this case. Fasting can magnify the effect of prayer. The prayers of the righteous can stave off or mitigate judgment; it's only when a city or other jurisdiction completely casts out the righteous that the full measure of judgment will be experienced. An example of this from the Book of Mormon (beginning with Alma Chapter 8) is the Nephite city of Ammonihah, where Alma had journeyed to call the people to repentance. Only one resident, Amulek, responded to his call, and promptly joined Alma on his mission. The remainder of the people rejected and reviled Alma and Amulek, boasting that their city was so great it could not be destroyed in one day. However, it was not until after the people of Ammonihah chased out or murdered those who believed the words of Alma and Amulek that an invading Lamanite army attacked the city and destroyed it -- in one day (Alma Chapter 16).

And as for you atheists who scoff and walk after your own lusts, I have just one word for you: