O Rapturous Day Callooh Callay

My apologies to Lewis Carroll.I just couldn't let May 21 pass without commenting on things. If you're an American, you've probably heard about Harold Camping claiming the Rapture is tomorrow. Unless you live under a rock. It has been on the news, it's been in all sorts of blogs, the Huffington Post, Bible study sites and of course, Harold Camping has been encouraging his followers for the last two years to spam chat rooms. Which is how I first heard about it.Most reports are taking the same mocking tone. Most reports are also coming from those who believe in some form of Christianity. That's not to say atheists and pagans aren't getting their digs in. Trust me, they are. Everything from Facebook events such as, "Jesus Is Not Coming Back," and, "Post Rapture Looting," to the people at the Interactive Bible broadcasting live all day tomorrow from Jerusalem. Why? To prove the Rapture is false doctrine.Yep. All those believers aren't even following biblical doctrine. They are following in the footsteps of John Nelson Darby and the Plymouth Brethren. Who were NOT New World settlers in Massachusetts. They were an apocalyptic sect that invented the Rapture in 1830. Before them, the Rapture didn't exist. No church taught of the Rapture before the Brethren. No one. It. Did. Not. Exist.The Plymouth Brethren were formed in 1827, in Ireland. It traveled across to England in 1831, where it became rather popular with well-to-do men. Here, these men who were going to have a harder time getting into Heaven than it would be to pass a camel through the eye of a needle were suddenly offered salvation.The Brethren were called that because they called each other "brother." Simple as that. Most of the followers were people who were pious, but were disenchanted with the Church of Ireland and the Church of England. They felt that they weren't strict enough, that they had gotten away from the roots of Christianity. They were an evangelical group, with no real leadership. Many wrote literature that became part of the belief system. Among the most influential was John Nelson Darby, the father of Dispensationalism. When he dreamed up the Rapture in 1830, he said it just popped into his head.Just popped into his head. Think about that.But many believed him. Back in the 1830s, the Brethren were convinced that they were living in the end times. Sound familiar? They were the first end times cult. And of course, only they would be raptured.Well, most of them lived to be old men and the Brethren are still active in Ireland and England, although their numbers have been shrinking in the last 60 years.The doctrine of this group gave birth to all those Born Again groups, the Pentecostals and all those modern day preachers who are making a mint off of fear. They interpret the Bible as they see fit and use passages out of context. All to convince people to become "Christians", because if you're just your run of the mill Methodist, or (god forbid,) a Catholic, you are not a real "Christian" and you have not been saved.If I could go back in time and hit anyone with a baseball bat, it would be John Nelson Darby. Without him, Hal Lindsey, Bob Jones, Jack Van Impe, Tim LaHaye, Harold Camping and so many others would have had to have gotten real jobs. So now we have Harold Camping and his followers telling us that tomorrow evening, at 6 PM in every local time zone, there are going to be earthquakes like you have never seen before. They will start in the Pacific Ring of Fire. Now, given the last few months, an earthquake in New Zealand isn't that big of a longshot. It is in one of the first time zones that will see 6 PM. They've been having a bitch of an autumn down there. Christchurch is still in ruins and then a few weeks ago, tornadoes hit the North Island. So, not a long shot.This is a very bold statement by Camping, in my opinion. He's not taking into account that Southern Hemisphere countries are on Standard Time at this time of year and Northern Hemisphere countries that observe it are on Daylight Savings Time. Then you have the pockets that don't bother with DST. As a matter of fact, Asia doesn't even bother with DST. Arizona doesn't observe DST in most of the state. Nor does Saskatchewan. A good bit of Africa is in the Northern Hemisphere. Only Morocco and Western Sahara observe DST. Nor is it observed in the parts of South America north of the Equator. So it's going to get confusing tomorrow, as the true believers try to observe in every single time zone, as they wait to be lifted into Heaven. Never have I seen so many people so happy at the thought of death.But anyway, rolling earthquakes as the clock strikes 6 PM, as the tectonic plates scream. You know, this is a trick I want to see. Every single place on the planet, no matter how remote, suffering earthquakes. Is that even a geographic possibility?What really bothers me in all of this are all the people who are defaulting on their mortgages, quitting their jobs and spending their last penny because tomorrow the world ends and they won't need money. I believe in sharing the wealth, but that's just stupid. They are going into debt to pay for billboards to spread the word of their cult leader. They are fearful that their loved ones won't be raptured with them. They're also inflicting themselves on strangers, believing they are attempting to save their souls.This has happened once before in my lifetime. In 1975, the Jehovah's Witnesses were so sure it was 6000 years after the creation of Adam and Armageddon. People sold their houses, their possessions, they went through their savings. They went into the ministry full time, Witnessing, so they could save people. Nothing happened.These days, the Jehovah's Witnesses are claiming that they never predicted Armageddon in 1975. However, this video has audio from a speech Fred Franz, then VP of the Watchtower Society, gave at a Watchtower convention.So, does any of that sound familiar to anyone? It would if you've been paying attention to the Rapture believers running around now.It doesn't surprise me that Camping preaches what sounds like it came straight from the Watchtower Society. Depending on who you listen to, he either left his post as a Reformed Church Elder in 1988, or he was "asked" to leave. He then created Family Radio Stations and I'm told that in certain markets he had a TV show. He started preaching a form of Christianity that is half a step away from the Jehovah's Witnesses, mixing in some Mormon doctrine for good measure.The Watchtower Society says that 144,000 are getting into Heaven at Armageddon. Camping preaches that 2% of the population will be raptured. Those 2% are roughly his followers. Both claim only their followers will get into Heaven. The rest will be left to suffer.Camping has also done away with the 7 years of Tribulation, followed by Jesus Christ ruling a perfect Earth for 1000 years. At least the Watchtower believes in that 1000 years of a perfect world. Camping says that those of us who are left behind will die on October 21. Tomorrow won't be the first time he got it wrong. He wrote a book in 1992 that claimed the Rapture would be on September 6, 1994. Granted, he did add a little caveat in the book, saying that he could be wrong and the date could be May 21, 2011. So, when he was wrong, he announced that it wasn't the Rapture in 1994, but the end of the Church Age. Yep. Go to church on Sunday instead of listening to him? You're an unsaved heretic who is going to go through 6 months of hell on earth starting tomorrow. Jewish? You've got until tomorrow to start believing in Jesus if you don't want to get left behind.Really, this is the crap the man preaches. I would add a video of him going on about it, but his voice is sleep inducing and he takes FOREVER to get to the point. So I will spare you.He did give an interview to New York Magazine, in which he said, "when we get to May 21 on the calendar in any city or country in the world, and the clock says about - this is based on other verses in the Bible - when the clock says about 6 p.m., there's going to be this tremendous earthquake that's going to make the last earthquake in Japan seem like nothing in comparison. And the whole world will be alerted that Judgment Day has begun. And then it will follow the sun around for 24 hours. As each area of the world gets to that point of 6 p.m. on May 21, then it will happen there, and until it happens, the rest of the world will be standing far off and witnessing the horrible thing that is happening."When asked what happens on May 22, if he and his followers haven't been raptured, he said, "I'm not even thinking about that at all. It. Is. Going. To. Happen."That reminds me of a scene at the end of the original Wicker Man. When Sgt. Howie tells Lord Summerisle to tell his people that a sacrifice won't keep the crops from failing, Summerisle replies in an authoritative voice, " I know it will."Faith, it is all about faith. However, by 7 PM in local time zones, Camping's followers will have lost their faith. Just like all the Rapture dates before this one, we will go about our Saturday nights as we normally do. We will wake up on Sunday morning. I feel for the people who are so lacking in their personal lives that they lived for this doctrine and have basically destroyed their lives in preparation for death. They will have spent their savings, many won't have jobs to go to anymore on Monday morning and some will only have the vans they bought to advertise the end to live in. It is going to be a mess for his followers, who are going to have to deal with the fact that they are going to have to learn to live. Not to mention that most states only pay unemployment if you're let go.If Camping really doesn't know what he's going to tell his listeners when they tune on on Sunday morning, he's kind of screwed. These people are going to be looking to him for answers as to why their god has forsaken them. There are those among them who will have nothing to live for, come 6:01 PM in their local time zones. Will Camping decide that he was wrong yet again and change the date for the Rapture to October 21? That is what my money is on. I just know, it's going to get weird fast for a lot of people. I'm willing to bet a number of them will lose their faith immediately.Speaking of lost faith, let's go back to the Plymouth Brethren for a moment. There is a story of an adolescent lad named Alexander, or Alick, which was his nickname. Alick's father would take him on trips to other towns in England as he evangelized. He said his father spoke with great authority. His father published tracts that he handed out as he went out among the people. Alick followed the doctrine to the letter, just like his father. Until his father died, then young Alick became a misotheist, his hatred of a god who would let his father die such a horrible death from cancer drove him away. That young boy grew up, started publishing his own tracts, but before he did he changed his first name to Aleister. His last name? It was his father's name and his father before him. His last name was Crowley.I do wonder if any of the adolescents who are waiting to be with god tomorrow who will be disappointed will end up taking that route. The law of averages says yes.Let's also not forget, you're not going to find a thing on the CDC website about Rapture readiness. They have a page up that explains the real threat to public health. It's not the Rapture, oh no. It's the zombie apocalypse.http://emergency.cdc.gov/socialmedia/zombies blog.asp