Apocalypse? No.

[mdlbear]

Baffled is more like it. Baffled, and biting my tongue. I mean, people carrying signs that say "The End Is Nigh" have been a cartoon staple for as long as I can remember, and presumably long before that. I guess the only reason I'm not making fun of them beyond the occasional wry comment is that I find other people embarrassing themselves acutely painful rather than funny.

How can anyone possibly believe that crap?

Just like every other time, some people have wrecked their lives, in the mistaken belief that tomorrow really wasn't coming. It's sad.

It's also rather horrifying, to realize that these are the kind of people who overwhelmingly vote Republican, or the equivalent in other countries. You'd think that blind acceptance of total nonsense was something that the conservatives are actively trying to encourage.

Oh. Right.

These are the kind of people who are going to go right back to wrecking the educational system, the health care system (what little there was of it), and the federal and state budgets so that the 500 richest people can keep getting richer, and the 500 biggest corporations can keep getting bigger. It's enough to make me wish they were right about Judgement Day.

OK, so maybe I'm not baffled. Or sad. Maybe I'm just angry.

Comments

[kayshapero]

And to think that most of 'em have, right there in their own homes, a copy of the very Book that if they'd actually READ it would tell them that this is not on. Ah well, most of the net now knows what it says in Matthew 24. Sigh...

OTOH, I like the group of "dedicated atheists" promising to pick up and protect people's pets. Especially after hearing about one guy who was detected planning to kill his until Animal Rescue found out and intervened.

As a plain old ordinary Christian non-nutcase I've been pretty much ignoring this, but I did join in on the Tin Foil Hat Day celebration someone cooked up in Facebook. See my LJ entry for pictures.

[mdlbear]

Some people have trouble distinguishing metaphor from description, apparently.

I had to look up Matthew 24 just now. Not a Christian.

[kayshapero]

That and it says specifically that nobody knows when He's coming back and so a designated date was going to be WronG...

[thnidu.livejournal.com]

36 "But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father." (New Int'l Version)

Therefore (ISTM) anyone claiming to know is committing blasphemy of the highest order.

[mdlbear]

Thanks for clarifying.

OTOH, 34 "Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled." -- so wouldn't it have already happened some 1950 years ago? That would tend to render speculation about when it's going to happen kind of moot.

[kayshapero]

Rather a lot of what was predicted seems to have had more to do with the fact that Jerusalem was going to get clobbered but good after which everybody got dispersed far and wide. Which makes sense - do YOU write detailed instructions as to what people 2000 years later are supposed to do? As a preacher friend of mine once pointed out, most of Revelation, read in that light, comes across rather like political cartoons, full of symbols which if you don't know what they mean make the thing unreadable.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

What a pity the bible wasn't really the word of God. It would apparently have benefited enormously from a competent editor who understood what it was trying to say.

[robin-june.livejournal.com]

Actually, the Bible is purported to be "the inspired word of God," which means that the Holy spirit inspired, but did not dictate, the words that the human authors wrote down.
As for actual dictation by God, it is my understanding that that is a claim surrounding the Koran, but not the Bible or Torah.

[elf]

They had a specific explanation getting around that, involving (of course) other bible verses.

Ecclesiastes 8:5: Whoso keepeth the commandment shall feel no evil thing: and a wise man’s heart discerneth [better translation: will know] both time and judgment.

In the Bible a wise man is a true believer, to whom God has given a profound trust in the authority of the Bible. True believers have been in existence since the beginning of time. But the timeline of history as it is revealed in the Bible was never revealed to the hearts of the true believers. ...

However, it was not until a very few years ago that the accurate knowledge of the entire timeline of history was revealed to true believers by God from the Bible.

(He places creation at 11,013 B.C.)

There's also much explaining why the verse in Matthew means something else and only applies to unbelievers, or something like that. Earth logic, he has it not.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

*hug*

I think (weird as it sounds) that some people really *needed* to believe the world was going to end, and that they were heroes to warn the rest of us.

I'm sad that their lives are so wretched they would want the world to end. And if you want to be a hero? Go give blood. Seriously. Works every time.

[mdlbear]

Alas, I started on a blood thinner one pint shy of my 10th gallon. But, yeah.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Wow, congratulations! You probably saved a lot of lives.

My mom was 2 pints short of her tenth gallon when she died.

You do realize that means you've given every drop of blood in your veins to strangers? Four times over?

[mdlbear]

Something about wanting all their problems to disappear by magic, I guess. That's easy to understand, just like wanting God/Jesus/the church to make all decisions for them.

But wanting everybody else to come to a horrible end? I still don't understand that part.

[kayshapero]

Nor I. The thing is, it is part of the religion that he IS coming back some day, just that we do not know when, nor are we supposed to waste time worrying about it. (Sheesh, it's been 2000 years - who's to say it's going to be anywhere in MY lifetime?) As for the end.. actually I'm reminded more of something from Dark Crystal (a good movie, which I recommend highly) wherein a triple conjunction of the planetary suns or moons or something is due and Aughra, a prophet among other things says it means "The End of the World. Or the Beginning." With the general implication that it's really the same thing. He comes back, it gets better, very little is told us as to how that works. We are, however, told to a) treat other people well and b) tell as many people as possible that they are invited to the party - because you can't go unless you accept the invitation. What people have added to that over the years makes me want to hide under the bed sometimes but really, that's it. *I* sure don't want anybody to come to a horrible end.

Incidentally, that abundant life Christians were promised is supposed to be Right Now, not just in the afterlife. And y'know, for the most part I find it IS that way. Love is really good stuff after all...

[themangoavenger.livejournal.com]

Well said.

[mdlbear]

Thanks.

[osewalrus.livejournal.com]

It's also rather horrifying, to realize that these are the kind of people who overwhelmingly vote Republican, or the equivalent in other countries.

That's why I was kinda hoping they would go.

[admnaismith.livejournal.com]

This.

Well, at least they won't come running to the government to bail them out for their foolishness, right? Right?

[mdlbear]

One could hope.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

+1

[tagryn]

Well, not just messianic Christians. A fair amount of the beliefs of "Twelver" Islam about the return of the Twelfth Imam (the Mahdi) are along these lines, also. And, there's a lot of non-religious folk who put serious stock in what Cayce and Nostradamus had to say, which is why publications like Weekly World News are able to stay in business. Not to mention those who believe that natural disasters are ways that Gaia retaliates for environmental violations...and I'd bet most of the last group are Democrats, if we want to slice things down by political side.