We hope you enjoy your visit.

You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.

Join our community!

If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
'Rapture' believers perplexed after prediction fails
Topic Started: May 22 2011, 10:00 PM (688 Views)
Riverwide
Member Avatar
Administrator
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
Followers of an evangelical broadcaster who declared that Saturday would be Judgement Day are trying to make sense of the failed prediction.

Some believers expressed bewilderment or said it was a test from God of their faith, after the day passed without event.

Meanwhile, the evangelist at the centre of the claim, Harold Camping, has not been seen since before the deadline.

He had predicted that Jesus Christ would return to earth on Saturday.

True believers would then be swept up, or "raptured", to heaven, he had pronounced.

The 89-year-old has used broadcasts on a Christian network and billboards to publicise his ideas as part of a campaign that went global.

He said biblical texts indicated that a giant earthquake on Saturday - which he said would begin at 1800 at various time zones around the world - would mark the start of the world's destruction, and that by 21 October all non-believers will be dead.
'Some scepticism'

Robert Fitzpatrick, a retired transportation agency worker in New York, said he had spent more than $140,000 (£86,000) of his savings on advertisements in the run-up to 21 May to publicise the prediction.

After 1800 passed and nothing had happened, he said: "I do not understand why... I do not understand why nothing has happened."

"I can't tell you what I feel right now. Obviously, I haven't understood it correctly because we're still here."

Other followers said they had had their doubts about the prediction.

"I had some scepticism but I was trying to push the scepticism away because I believe in God," said Keith Bauer, who travelled 4,830km (3,000 miles), from Maryland to California, where Mr Camping's Family Radio is based, for the Rapture.

"I was hoping for it because I think heaven would be a lot better than this Earth," said Mr Bauer, a tractor-trailer driver, who took the week off work for the voyage.

Other followers said the delay was a further test from God to persevere in their faith.
'No Plan B'

US media reported that there has been no sign of Mr Camping since the prediction turned out to be false, while calls and e-mails to Mr Camping's Family Radio went unanswered on Saturday.

The Washington Post reported that suicide prevention hotlines were set up in case believers fell into depression after the apocalypse failed to happen.

A group from the Calvary Bible Church in Milpitas, California, organised a Sunday morning service to comfort believers in Mr Camping's preaching, the New York Times reported.

"We are here because we care about these people," the newspaper quoted James Bynum, a church deacon, as saying. "It's easy to mock them. But you can go kick puppies, too. But why?"

Many Christian groups however dismissed Mr Camping's ideas, with some describing him as a "false prophet".

US atheists held parties to celebrate the failed prediction, while a group of non-believers gathered outside Mr Camping's Family Radio International headquarters in Oakland, California, as the deadline passed.

"It was probably one of the saddest things that I'd ever read, the idea that there's kids out there whose parents spent their college savings funds, who sold their homes," one woman told the BBC.

Earlier, Mr Camping has said he knew "without any shadow of a doubt" that "judgement day" was arriving, and said there was no "Plan B".

He has predicted an apocalypse once before, in 1994, though followers now say that only referred to an intermediary stage.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13489641
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
bulgar
Pensioner
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
:rotfl:
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
GimmeSomeRiver
Member Avatar
When I lay in bed I touch myself and I think of you
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
I was listening to The Edge of Glory all day Saturday JUST IN CASE
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Riverwide
Member Avatar
Administrator
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
:lmao:
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Beautiful Stranger
Member Avatar
Pensioner
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
Posted Image
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Riverwide
Member Avatar
Administrator
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
:rotfl:
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Deelightful Bitch
Member Avatar
Teenager
[ *  *  *  *  * ]
I find all this "the world is ending" a form of terrorism and--to speak in religious fanatic terms, "the devil's work"--quite the opposite of what life is about. There were actual paid ads on the subways for the end of the world. And pamphlets. Really? How's this pamphlet going to help me if a tsunami did come after me?

One's not supposed to be overly concerned about "the end." One should be spending that time living and learning, and perhaps inventing things to help us make it through catastrophes. And "God" is not going to whisper a date to random people. He will end it when he will end it. Well at this point, we are doing a good job at destroying the world ourselves/each other, and missing out on all the opportunities life has to offer.

:/
Edited by Deelightful Bitch, May 25 2011, 04:02 AM.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Deleted User
Deleted User

stumble upon
May 25 2011, 04:01 AM
I find all this "the world is ending" a form of terrorism and--to speak in religious fanatic terms, "the devil's work"--quite the opposite of what life is about. There were actual paid ads on the subways for the end of the world. And pamphlets. Really? How's this pamphlet going to help me if a tsunami did come after me?

One's not supposed to be overly concerned about "the end." One should be spending that time living and learning, and perhaps inventing things to help us make it through catastrophes. And "God" is not going to whisper a date to random people. He will end it when he will end it. Well at this point, we are doing a good job at destroying the world ourselves/each other, and missing out on all the opportunities life has to offer.

:/
I agree with this. They're not about "live to your best potential", but "God's mad at you and there's nothing you can do". I honestly think that religious bastard should be tried and jailed for this, you know he doesn't really believe it but is just trying to scare people. If you can be arrested for posing as a cop or doctor, why not trying to con millions of gullible people into believing you know when the end of the world is.
Quote Post Goto Top
 
scrowfan
Member Avatar
Teenager
[ *  *  *  *  * ]
I saw this morning that OOPS, he had the wrong date and it's now October 21.

On one hand, i feel sorry for those people that emptied their savings and sold their houses because of this prediction but on the other hand, what kind of boobery is going on in your head that you do something like that to begin with???

I think stumble's characterization of stuff like this as "a form of terrorism" is completely accurate here.

Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Beautiful Stranger
Member Avatar
Pensioner
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
Posted Image
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Beautiful Stranger
Member Avatar
Pensioner
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
:shock:

The old bastard had a stroke!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2002816/Doomsday-pastor-Harold-Camping-suffers-stroke.html

A comment from an atheist/agnostic messageboard that I frequent:

Quote:
 
At least now he has an excuse when his next prediction fails.


:rotfl:
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)
ZetaBoards - Free Forum Hosting
ZetaBoards gives you all the tools to create a successful discussion community.
Learn More · Register for Free
« Previous Topic · News & Current Affairs · Next Topic »

Theme by Sith of the ZBTZ and Outline