Well I’m still here and if you’re reading this, you are too! The predicted global earthquake never came and all the resulting hoopla was for naught. I did hedge my bets, by having a great meal last night. Why not leave on a full stomach? But then, haven’t we all gotten used to these prophets of doom and gloom that spread their messages of fear and damnation?
Howard Camping, a minister and president of the US conservative group Family Radio, was the catalyst for the latest prediction. He boldly claimed that the Bible guaranteed the destruction of the earth and it seems that he was able to determine the apocalypse due to his ability to calculate various other horrors starting with the great flood that he believed happened in 4990 BC. Of course, there was going to be a certain subset of the population that would be saved, about 200 million according to Mr. Camping. The rest of us would go to hell in a hand basket. If during the conflagration, we had a change of heart and embraced Camping’s ideologies then, voila, we too would experience the “rapture” and be saved.
Family Radio received 80 million dollars in contributions between 2005 and 2009 and a big chunk of that was spent on billboards and media to alert the populace to the impending catastrophe. This type of insanity seems to be at the core of some religious groups. But it can be seen as a metaphor for a great deal of humanity. It seems we spend a lot of time alienating our species from one another by trying to elevate ourselves by putting others down. We do it with racial discrimination, religious arrogance ,railing against sexual preferences, gender bashing, and a host of other toxic beliefs.
Years ago I happened to be attending a lecture by the Dali Llama. When asked what was the essence of his faith, he replied” Loving Kindness”. I believe the message put forth by the creators of most of the world’s major religions is pretty much the same. Unfortunately, it often begins to unravel ,when over time the message becomes convoluted by individuals whose egos have no boundaries. I wonder what would happen if we all woke up with the intention to simply be kind to one another and to ourselves. It seems simple enough, but if it were that easy, Mr. Camping and those like him, would have spent their time spreading love instead of fear.
I continue to think it’s possible and I’m sure many of you do too, so don’t give up!
I think you are FABULOUS Loretta!..I have your DVD ‘Life is short wear your party pants” and it is so wonderful uplifting and positive!..we need more women like you in this world to keep it positive!….and we need much less people like Harold Camping, a 90 yr old very senile old man, who likes to do nothing but waste his time and life spreading lies and false prophecies around the world..
I never believed this would happen either..I just feel sorry for these fools that were his followers, who gave up everything in their lives including their houses and life savings because they were so convinced they would be zapped up by the rapture!…
I hope camping decided to move himself into a nice nursing home now that he has been proven wrong(AGAIN!) by God 😉
Love you and God bless
Annette
Amen…
Take care…
That is a super-peachy-keen post. Thanks for really blathering on like that! Seriously, I don’t think I could have spent more effort wishing for something heavy to fall on me to erase that nonsense from my mind!
I believe that there is another layer to this “phenomena” and it is not a desire to experience “loving kindness”.
Along with the desire to “experience the rapture and be saved…themselves…there is also, I believe a sense of moral superiority and a desire to see others “punished” for not recognizing their inferiority to the “true believers”.
We have seen this “mentality” time again rear its ugly head. When the planes crashed into the WTC the Rev. Jerry Falwell got out his horn and trumpeted that it was not the fault of the Arabs, but the fault of the feminists. According to the good Reverend, God was angry at America because women were going out to work instead of staying home making dinner. He wanted to see the American people take their revenge, not on the people who had attacked them, but to “punish” those people who didn’t think the way he did.
Believing that you personally are in good standing with the Lord is one thing and believing that you can see past a mystery in life because of that faith is not inherently bad. But when you take it upon yourself to go door to door trying to get others to believe as you do then you have to consider that at least in the back of your mind you do consider yourself to be spiritually superior and perhaps by seeing “inferiority” in others you do hope that you wish them to suffer to justify your superiority over them.
If you truly want to be taken up to a heaven with only people that think exactly like you, then you may find yourself all by yourself.