We Can Know tract--why May 21 is the end of the world

[AnnoDomini]

Found this tract in my parents' bathroom. UGH. This is the kind of stuff my parents preached to me and others. I just can't understand why it never seemed to occur to them that THIS STUFF RUINS LIVES. That it would very probably seriously affect their kids. I think my father might have written this too. I'm pretty sure he's authored other tracts.

http://www.ebiblefellowship.com/outreac ... wecanknow/

Look at that ending sentence. It basically says that if you don't believe in May 21, you're not a Christian! This is EXACTLY the sort of... teaching that caused me to spend the last several years living in fear of the end. Not able to follow/believe the studies, but too afraid to not believe, and afraid of the fact and reasons why I might be afraid.

[maybeizfundie]

Harold Camping (who started this whole nonsense) is a long-time cult leader and has multiple failed predictions to his record.

I'm sad for those who are his actual followers, but completely ashamed of those Christians outside his group who fell for it.

[kpmom]

I wonder how anybody (an adult I mean) continues to believe these predictions as they never come true.

AnnoDomini, what is your relationship with your parents currently, if I may ask? I wonder what their answer would be if you asked them why these predictions never seem to come true.

[Kitty]

Maybe it's me, but I always thought Revelation was a metaphor for the decline of the Roman Empire (makes a LOT of sense that way), which is one of the reasons I don't trust the Bible, or any English translation of it at least.

The part about how Jesus can't possibly "come like a thief in the night" cracked me up. Jesus won't "come like a thief" because thieves are EVIL! THEY STEAL! AND KILL! AND DESTROY! What the fuck is supposed to happen in Armageddon, then? STEALING! AND KILLING! AND DESTROYING! You know who's going to be doing all of this? GOD! JESUS' DAD! :doh: If they had a brain in their heads, what logical conclusion would most people come to? I thought it meant that Jesus would come quietly and unexpectedly, not that the fucking Prince of Peace would break into my house, steal my stuff and kill me in my sleep!

[Kitty]

I wonder how anybody (an adult I mean) continues to believe these predictions as they never come true.

AnnoDomini, what is your relationship with your parents currently, if I may ask? I wonder what their answer would be if you asked them why these predictions never seem to come true.

Cognitive dissonance. "Well, he is only human..."

Also, once doomsday predictions hit the news, you'll find a lot of people who believe them, no matter how ridiculous the reports (rightfully) make them sound.

[AnnoDomini]

My relationship with my parents is much the same. I've realized though that I can no longer completely accept my father's spiritual leadership. And I'm doing things I never did before. And to his credit, the day after the end failed to happen, we had a Bible time in which he read the account of Ninevah being spared, and acknowledged that he was 'surprised we're all still here' and that he didn't know why. Though he also believed in 1994 being Judgement Day (I grew up with the nightmarish image of the world being destroyed on that book cover--and a lack of talk of heaven). Years later when we began to believe the church age was over, he explained that 1994 was actually when the church age was actually over, and that da te predicted signified God's final judgment on the churches. It may or may not be true. I can't put a lot of stock into things that require a lot of timelines. There is so much lost over history, you know? Like how Jesus was not born in Dec.

maybeiz, what do you mean about being ashamed as opposed to pitying?

[maybeizfundie]

Um, I think the "thief in the night" thing is a metaphor for "quietly and unexpectedly" rather than a literal description. :D

Which makes all the trumpeting all the more silly, since it is directly opposed to what Jesus said would happen.

[defrauding]

Found this tract in my parents' bathroom. UGH.

What's the issue? They put the tract in the one place it might be useful.

[AnnoDomini]

Ha. No, I think it was left there for 'a bit of light reading'. Didn't make me feel like producing waste, just like throwing it away. Which I think I did. At the least I hid it where they couldn't bring it out to give to the younger kids.

[mirele]

What's the issue? They put the tract in the one place it might be useful.

+1000 Internets!

[anniebgood]

What's all this with the 21st of May and the 21st of December. It's my brother's wedding anniversary in May and mine in December.

Are we the cause of this anomaly in the celestial plane or what?

[AnnoDomini]

According to the tract, Biblical fact that is irrefutable and undeniable and if you don't believe it you must not be a Christian who's headed for hell which has been described in half the sermons every Sunday. If you do believe it you *might* be a Christian and headed for heaven, which has barely been described in services at all. It's like 'that nice place you go to IF YOU MANAGE TO ESCAPE HELL which you probably won't'.

[Kitty]

What's all this with the 21st of May and the 21st of December. It's my brother's wedding anniversary in May and mine in December.

Are we the cause of this anomaly in the celestial plane or what?

Yes.

[anniebgood]

Well then I guess I'll go in the prayer closet and ask for forgiveness. Does it make a difference if my husband is an agnostic and my brother and SIL are LCMS?

I'm the liberal one in the family. :geek:

[AnnoDomini]

I think you'll need to do some self-flagellation in the prayer closet, just to be sure.

...Anyone feel like watching the Paul Bettany scenes in The Da Vinci Code?

[bananacat]

I wonder how anybody (an adult I mean) continues to believe these predictions as they never come true.

I can't speak for others, but I believed the first time (as a teenager) simply because I had never known of a failed prediction. It was the Y2K thing, and it didn't ruin my life and I didn't really lose any sleep over it, but I was genuinely concerned. Fortunately I was teenager and my worry was tempered by the belief that I was invincible. But after that I learned that these things have been predicted constantly throughout history and have failed. But it's really not common knowledge to many people. Unless you are really interested in learning about that stuff or have insomnia and surf the web too much, a lot of people just don't realize how many failed predictions there have been.

As to why people will continue to believe after one failed prediction, that's a little more complex. But the more they've invested (not just financially but emotionally), the more they will be committed to the idea so it's especially easy for them to believe a new prediction from the same person who can come up with any flimsy excuse. It's based on the weird human desire to hold onto things that we've invested a lot in, even if they are clear losers.

[CanadianHippie]

What's all this with the 21st of May and the 21st of December. It's my brother's wedding anniversary in May and mine in December.

Are we the cause of this anomaly in the celestial plane or what?

It's December 12th of next year, with slightly more... Well, slightly more to it. Personally I think people are just obsessed with "the end" in general and they can't be bothered to wait until the sun blows up or it's gravitational pull draws earth into it.

[Guest Anonymous]

I can't speak for others, but I believed the first time (as a teenager) simply because I had never known of a failed prediction. It was the Y2K thing, and it didn't ruin my life and I didn't really lose any sleep over it, but I was genuinely concerned. Fortunately I was teenager and my worry was tempered by the belief that I was invincible. But after that I learned that these things have been predicted constantly throughout history and have failed. But it's really not common knowledge to many people. Unless you are really interested in learning about that stuff or have insomnia and surf the web too much, a lot of people just don't realize how many failed predictions there have been.

As to why people will continue to believe after one failed prediction, that's a little more complex. But the more they've invested (not just financially but emotionally), the more they will be committed to the idea so it's especially easy for them to believe a new prediction from the same person who can come up with any flimsy excuse. It's based on the weird human desire to hold onto things that we've invested a lot in, even if they are clear losers.

What I've never understood, is why the people making these predictions beg so feverishly for donations. If you're not going to be here after a certain date, what do you need money for? Are the donors' critical faculties so impaired, that they don't recognize this as a giant red flag?

[marmalade]

Harold Camping (who started this whole nonsense) is a long-time cult leader and has multiple failed predictions to his record.

I'm sad for those who are his actual followers, but completely ashamed of those Christians outside his group who fell for it.

I sat in on some Camping bible studies during my last two years of high school. He hadn't gone BSC quite yet, but I knew the guy was full of crap and tried to convince my parents of this (they had just joined the church, and he was a big part of it...Christian radio celeb and all that...this was before he started his own "church").

I was so happy to tell my parents, "I told ya so...neener neener neener!" after Camping left their church (Dutch reformed) and the crazy came out.

I was already moving towards being areligious; Camping's bible studies - what I heard of them...I read a bible to entertain myself during his pontifications - sealed the deal for me. Even the peace of Buddhism couldn't erase the damage that church, especially Camping, did to me.

[AnnoDomini]

Marmalade, I too saw him speak. Went to at least two Family Radio conferences and retreats. (Met a cute guy too, not that anything came of it.) I couldn't follow what he said but at the time I had great respect for him. All I really remember him saying though, was something about 'for all you here who are still unsaved, I don't know how you can live'.

I'm so sorry that church and that man damaged you, though I don't quite understand why. You seemed to have a good head on your shoulders even then.

[doggie]

Found this tract in my parents' bathroom. UGH.

wipe your butt with it and leave it in the toilet to show what you think of it.

[marmalade]

Marmalade, I too saw him speak. Went to at least two Family Radio conferences and retreats. (Met a cute guy too, not that anything came of it.) I couldn't follow what he said but at the time I had great respect for him. All I really remember him saying though, was something about 'for all you here who are still unsaved, I don't know how you can live'.

I'm so sorry that church and that man damaged you, though I don't quite understand why. You seemed to have a good head on your shoulders even then.

We'd moved to another city and in their midlife crisis the parents wanted something closer to home and more conservative (my childhood church was very active in Amnesty International, etc). At any rate, in those days before the interwebz, I lost touch with a lot of my old friends before I found many again on facebook. I knew a few of the kids from the new church from school, a couple very well and at their request I went to one youth group meeting and found it very insular (like being the only black kid in the entire school). My parents forced me to go to Sunday morning bible study and church, but thankfully, didn't force Sunday/Wednesday nights on me as well. I think that even as blind as they became in that place (they didn't really loosen up until they were well into their 60's), they realized that I would put up a real stink about abuse - I had an adult mentor who had told me about spiritual abuse and they knew it. The crazy of Camping to which I was exposed was icing on that cake!

Needless to say, it was a very rocky two years before I got the hell out of that house to practice whatever religion/non-religion I chose. I alluded to studying Buddhism for a time, but never went to a temple. Reading the bible keeps my husband sane and I support him if that's what he needs. It's the proselytizing (see my MIL horror stories...I may as well be red, with horns and a pitchfork as far as she's concerned) that I can't stand.

If you criticize me, I'll use this forum to criticize you and your ilk right back; I really don't want to get into it with an 80 year old woman who has a hearing problem and even if she could, would just plug her fingers in her ears and give me the "LALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!" treatment.