That fun little acronym means it's the end of the world as we know it. In case you haven't heard, some fun old man named Harold Camping, who runs a Christian radio conglomerate, says that the end of days starts tomorrow.
Specifically, Mr. Camping (Not Rev. because he claims all Churches are apostate and has hence not been ordained by any) has said that the rapture will occur at 6 p.m. local time on May 21, sweeping the world time zone by time zone.
This will begin the tribulation that will end Oct. 21, 2011 when God destroys the world. About 200 million will go to heaven, everyone else will not go to hell but will cease to exist.
When 6 p.m. hits each time zone there will also be earthquakes.
Got all that?
Let me say Mr. Camping may be right, but if he is it's by coincidence. I've read how he interprets the no man knows the day or the hour bit from the Bible and he's kooky about it.
Jesus Christ will return to earth. There will be earthquakes and tribulation. There will not be a magic rapture. The damned will be damned and those saved will be saved at the end of the age. There will then be a new heaven and a new earth and we really don't know much about what that will be like.
And it could happen tomorrow at 6 p.m. I'm guessing God doesn't want to validate this guy so probably not but it could happen before you finish reading this blog.
President Kennedy allegedly once asked Billy Graham "If Christ is coming back, why do we hear so little about it?"
A fair question Mr. President.
There are four sets of people when it comes to the end times. Those who eagerly want it, those that hope to avoid it, those that don't care and those that don't know.
The ones who are eager come off as too eager or even crazy, and the rest don't talk about it.
I fall into a mix of group 1 and 2. I know Christ will come again but aware of my failures and frailty and sinful ways, I can't say the final judgment excites me.
So while I don't believe I've got a little more than 24 hours left to talk to any saved people I know, I'm going to run down some things I might just do if I really believed the end was that close.
1. Remind my wife I love her and...you can figure it out.
2. Swing by Church for a confession.
2. Call Friends, family, quick goodbyes though, time is of the essence.
3. Slap everyone I don't like right in the face.
4. Spend every dime I could on the best night out ever.
4a. As part of said night I buy patrone tequila, exquisite cigars and possibly rent a fast car.
5. Burn down something
6. Since I know the exact hour of things, work in one more confession
Now say the rapture comes and I get all "Kirk Camerony" and left behind.
1. Loot. Anything. Always wanted to join a looting mob.
2. Make quick inventory of which people I slapped are still here.
3. Kill those people, I'm damned anyway at this point right?
4. Burn down all kinds of things.
5. Spend time until annihilation doing things I wouldn't have had the balls to do (Skydive, punch a pro boxer etc.)
This is an incomplete and hasty list of course.
I assume tomorrow night Kelli and I will be just getting home from mass or maybe still there when 6 p.m. rolls around. If I gotta go out then, it's been fun world. If not, see soon when I blog about his reaction to the world not ending.
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New blog policy.
All blogs will end with "The stupid thing PETA actually believes"
Today's Entry
"Are there spiders sharing your home? If you must evict them, carefully trap them in an inverted jar and release them outside."
All PETA info taken from their web site.
You scoff at Mr. Camping, but your reasons for belief are much the same, even if your beliefs themselves are very different. You see, both of your beliefs are derived from faith.
ReplyDeleteYou claim that his biblical justifications are silly, but your own biblical interpretations were derived from the Church through the power of revelation - in other words, faith. The same.
I am free to criticize this guy on the grounds of logical non-compliance, but you cannot, since you do the same exact same thing yourself. Your beliefs just aren't as overtly goofy, and they aren't as easy to disprove. That doesn't, however, change that they are based on faith.
I recognize that this is a light hearted kind of blog, but you kinda went out of your way to pick through the nitty gritty of what this guy's on about. For my taste, you seemed to relish it a little too much. I had to point this little inconsistency (hypocrisy?) out. You are making fun of this guy because of his wild, unhindered faith. But you yourself claim to value faith, and you know that true faith isn't subject to logic. How then can you make fun of this guy so easily - considering that he is, after all, sincere in his beliefs - without even batting an eye?
His are based on math....and math that he made up because 5=atonement, 10=completeness and 17=heaven.
ReplyDeleteI can make fun it logically because while we're both based on faith, he's trying to come from the same starting point in essence.
He gets it from a book put together by people (Catholic church) with no authority to do so. His faith is in something he denies....this is the case with most protestantism in my mind.
I don't think the Bible counts for much if one discounts the Church totally. It was complied and safeguarded by Catholics over centuries. If we're as evil as they say, we'd have messed with it and it would be useless.
There is some method in my madness here.
Dude, you still don't get it.
ReplyDeleteHis point of view doesn't have to make sense logically, since it's validation is his personal revelation and faith.
How many times have you thrown up your hands in a logical argument and said "look, I can't explain all of this, but I know it to be true because of my personal faith". You can't argue against something like that with a logical point like "well you got your book from us, therefore etc etc". It's FAITH.
So because I believe in my personal faith I am required to believe others?
ReplyDeleteI should point out that I believe his beliefs are valid to him. I don't doubt his sincerity. If he feels this was revealed to him he is justified in believing it. It's still nuts to me.
ReplyDelete"So because I believe in my personal faith I am required to believe others?"
ReplyDeleteThis is classic John Stegeman defense-mode. Oversimplifying the attack and reducing it to the absurd. If you ever had your hand slapped for sneaking into the cookie jar, I believe you must have asked your mother in righteous indignation, "What? So you think I should never eat again? Why are you condemning me to starve!?"
No, I'm not saying you have to believe what this guy believes.
I'm saying this guy has some strange beliefs that don't all make sense logically. He holds these beliefs because of some monumental faith, or as I would describe it, suspension of disbelief.
You also hold some beliefs that don't make sense logically. Your beliefs also require faith. They don't require the same effort at belief, and you have a wide support network in the Church, but still.. The nature is the same. For you to mock this guy on grounds which you yourself have done, and will continue to do, is, in my opinion, a dick move.
We're all in agreement that this guy is a nut, I think. That's a given. But I can't believe you can be so unabashedly quick and thoughtless in making fun of him. His faith, while not identical to yours, is at least similar. At any point did you not say to yourself "You know, what this guy does, I myself do sometimes"? Especially after all the logical wrestling we've done in the last several months, and the inquisition I've put you through.
Is it an oversimplification? Maybe. But you seem to be saying because my beliefs are based in faith that I need to give others some benefit of the doubt or something.
ReplyDeleteThere are people that believe, on faith, Scientology. I put Mr. Camping in that kind of crazy camp almost but because he has his basis in Christianity I feel Christians are most qualified to explain his insanity.
Also I didn't really think I was making fun of him. I was explaining his beliefs and yes, scoffing. My faith tells me his is wrong.
Back in Meriwhether's class I wrote a paper called "The rational justification of belief based on personal experience" or something like that.
My point was that if a person, thinking themselves to be sane and able to trust their own faculties is justified in believing in the Divine based on their own personal experience.
So if Mr. Camping had some revelation, or even just thinks he did, he's justified in believing and spreading his kookiness.
But just as my Eucharistic experience years ago helped solidify my belief in God, no one else needs believe on that reason.
The gyst of your criticism seemed to be that his beliefs didn't make logical sense. Yes?
ReplyDeleteWhile they do not make logical sense, my criticism is simply that he was wrong, and he was wrong before we lived to today to prove it.
ReplyDeleteFrom a Christian perspective I can show why they don't make sense to me or most Christians.
From a secular perspective they obviously don't make sense.
But really I was just laughing and saying ha ha he's wrong.
And for the record, in my second response I veered to attempting logical criticism and I now acknowledge that I should have said what I just did.
ReplyDeleteDoesn't matter. He's wrong.
A few responses ago you said you "really didn't think" you were making fun of him. Now you say that "really [you were] just laughing and saying ha ha he's wrong."
ReplyDeleteKay. Despite all the explanations and (in my opinion) evasions, I think you were really just using this as an opportunity to rag on non-Catholics in general, and protestants in particular. I obviously can't prove that, it's just my perception.
It's really disturbing to me how you can compartmentalize these things in your brain, so that you and your experiences are of a completely different species than other believers, and that you're free to criticize them on whatever grounds seem to be convenient at the time, with little consideration of the fidelity of your own motives, or consistency of your behavior. Prejudice and hypocrisy are ok as long as they're directed against protestants.
I hesitated to mock this guy, and was slightly averse to the near universal laughter, even though I knew this guy was a nut as well as anyone else. The reason I avoided laughing at a clearly nutty guy is that I myself believed some pretty nutty stuff (mormon) at one point in my life, and although I reject it now, I remember my intentions at the time, which were not altogether corrupt. I meant well, I was just mistaken. I would feel like a bit of a hypocrite to mock this guys faith, when I myself was not able to justify every point of faith which I held at one point or another in my life.
It's obvious to everyone that this guy's beliefs are not in keeping with Catholic doctrine. So I have to call bullshit on that explanation. This guy's experiences with personal revelation, while wildly out of proportion, probably bear some resemblence to your own experiences. His motivations may have been someting like your own. He wishes to serve God, as you do. He has put himself in a vulnerable spot by opening his heart and putting his inhibitions aside, as you once did. He may be very mistaken, and that's truly a pity, but how can you mock his faith without feeling (at least a little bit) like you've mocked your own?
bla this is frustrating.
ReplyDeleteLook, my faith is logical to me. Harold's is probably logical to him.
He considers me some kind of heretic in an apostate church. I consider him a heretic as well.
We're both right from our own perspectives but we're not both objectively right.
We both have to proceed from what he know. I know he's nuts. He knows I'm damned.
I don't deny an over-compartmentalization of my brain. That's true. Sometimes it's a good thing. Sometimes it is not.
Also I was not ragging on protestants. Most protestants thought the same thing about this guy I did.
I will say this. Harold Camping, if sincere, did right by himself and, in his mind, did right by God, by publicizing this and opening himself to ridicule.
When I consider that a little more, I guess I do feel kind of bad about being a dick. Sorry Harold.
I don't really care at all about Harold Camping. He's just some crazy person. I don't care whether I or you or anyone hurts his feelings. I don't care what he does, or how he feels.
ReplyDeleteWhat I care about is how I act. How I respond to him. Whether I'm acting in good taste or not. That's really what I care about. If I have to debase myself in order to mock a laughable man, I don't think that's worth it. It's beneath the dignity of ones such as us. It's vulgar, and poor form.
I would feel a bit like a hypocrite if I mock something that I once valued (faith). But if I (like you), still value it today, I would feel that much more like a hypocrite.
Sorry to drag this out, just wanted to clarify my position.
I won't chastise you, John. After all, Mr. Camping deviated from the norm, and though there may be plenty of Christians that believe the apocalypse will be happening "soon-ish," few are foolish enough to try to predict the exact date and time. And, of course, end of the world predictions don't necessarily have the best track record.
ReplyDeleteSo, I don't think you are totally unjustified in making fun of this man.
Matt, don't encourage him.
ReplyDeleteYou may not realize it, but you're taking sides in a religious dispute. John isn't attacking a fool, he's attacking a heretic (and a fool). John is, in part at least, shooting at this fish in a barrel because he's an anti-catholic protestant for one, and because he's an easier target than most protestants for another. He's hoping to score points for his church, off of a guy who's already a worldwide laughing stock, and hopes to get some applause from the gallery since we're all in agreement that this guy is a fool anyway. Do not play into this, simply because you also find Mr. Camping laughable. Understand that all levity and humor aside, this is really just a dispute between two faiths (although Mr. Camping isn't here to defend himself).