Caught Up in the Rapture/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Basic Trope: The faithful (Christian) followers of God are taken up to Heaven and spared the tribulation to come as a reward for their faith.
  • Played Straight: Alice and Bob are out and about, when a holy light comes upon them, and gently lifts them out of their clothes and into the sky.
  • Exaggerated: Alice and Bob go to Fluffy Cloud Heaven when they are taken up by the light.
  • Justified: Certain people are being spared the horrors of The End of the World as We Know It because God loves them, and wants to reward them for their religion, their merits, etc.
  • Inverted:
    • Alice and Bob are out and about, and fall through a trap door to Hell at the start of the Apocalypse.
    • Alice and Bob are, although not Christian, good people, and thus taken up to Heaven.
  • Subverted:
    • Alice and Bob don't get into Heaven right away; they have to go through Purgatory first, because as decent, but flawed, humans, Alice and Bob are not "pure" enough for full admission to Heaven.
    • Instead of God, it's aliens that engage in a mass abduction of humans.
  • Double Subverted: But, after their purification is finished, Alice and Bob are warmly welcomed into Heaven.
  • Parodied:
    • Jesus is seen wielding a vacuum hose, vacuuming up His followers with it.
    • The abductees are Bound and Gagged to chairs by God, while Jesus negotiates their ransom on the phone.
  • Deconstructed:
    • Not everyone gets into Heaven, either right away or at all. Those who do not ascend to Heaven are left on Earth, and things go downhill from there. Alice and Bob and others who made it are (naturally) concerned about their friends and relatives that (for whatever reason(s)) didn't get taken up with them.
    • The sudden disappearance of so many members of society leads to rapid economic and social collapse. By the time The Antichrist makes his presence known, he has a hard time uniting even part of the world due to the fact that world conquest is now beyond the means of any single army due to their lack of resources to accomplish such a task.
  • Reconstructed: Except for those few people that are completely irredeemable, those left on Earth repent for their sins, possibly even have a Heel Faith Turn, and survive Hell on Earth. They are rewarded by being admitted to Heaven to join their family and friends.
  • Zig Zagged: Some people are taken to Heaven, others are left to face the Apocalypse.
  • Averted:
    • No one is taken to Heaven before the Apocalypse, either because Humans Are the Real Monsters and no one is "good enough," or because God doesn't play favorites.
    • There is no God in the first place.
    • The Rapture is an incorrect doctrine, and the good Christians have to survive the tribulation along with the sinners.
  • Enforced: A program to be shown in a Sunday School class, in a denomination that believes in The Rapture.
  • Lampshaded: "So, we've been left behind..."
  • Defied: God doesn't want to "play favorites," and doesn't do this.
  • Invoked: The Doomsday Alarm Clock (tm) goes off in Fluffy Cloud Heaven, and God takes up His faithful.
  • Discussed: "So...that's what happens to the faithful?"
  • Conversed: "Yeah. Or at least the ones God likes."
  • Played For Laughs: See "Parodied"
  • Played For Drama: Those left on Earth try to get it right this time, and earn passage into Heaven.

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