If the World DOES End at 6 PM Today (UPDATED WITH POLL)

Posted By: Peter DavidPosted On:

I hope it’s 6 PM Pacific Time. Because the Mets/Yankees game starts at 7:10 Eastern, and if the Rapture is at 9 PM Eastern, they could probably get five innings in so it would be an official game.

UPDATED at 7:32 PM: It appears a massive religious end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it has not transpired. This leaves us with the question: Who prevented it? Was it:

Buffy the Vampire Slayer?
Sam and Dean Winchester?
The Doctor?
Someone else and, if so, who?

PAD

UPDATE GH 5/23: There’s a real live poll up now on ComicMix’s Facebook page. Go vote.

111 comments on “If the World DOES End at 6 PM Today (UPDATED WITH POLL)”

  1. Even if it’s Pacific time, I’m likely to miss my CAKE concert, it’s supposed to start at 9pm Eastern.

    I haven’t seen anyone ask if it’s 6pm Standard time or Daylight Savings time…that would have been my first question, if I was a reporter…

  2. Note that it’s only the rapture, which means only the rising of the worth. And frankly, I’m sure I won’t be in that number. And I’m sure that no politician will be in that number.

    1. They’re your dad’s team in what sense? There’s no one in the roster named Sanmiguel so I figure he doesn’t play for them. You mean he works for them? In that case, sure, that seems reasonable that you’d be rooting for them. Or you mean they’re just the team he roots for, so you do, too. I can still understand it, but it’s not quite as convincing.
      .
      PAD

  4. Actually, I believe it is supposed to be 6 PM New Zealand time. According to the Comcast home page, that time has come and gone with no cataclysmic earthquakes in the offing. So I think the Yankees are safe. At least from global armageddon.

  5. Well, depends. Someone said it was going to be cascading rapture (which sounds, well, dirty). In other words, Everyone will rise up at 6pm in their timezone.
    .
    Personally, I have a list of people that could be called forth and I would have no issue with it.
    .
    TAC

  6. .
    Guys, the world doesn’t exactly end. All the “worthy people” go away and we get to live through the mess that’s left in the wake of the Rapture. Outside guess would be 15% to 20% of the world’s population goes poof. Not a big change, but enough that there should be at least a little free stuff in it for everyone.
    .
    I’ve already sent in my RSVP for the official local “Post Rapture Looting Party.” Gotta have some fun when it hits the fan.

    1. I think it would be interesting if everybody’s clothes disappeared but the people stayed put.
      .
      Now THAT could be a party.
      .
      PAD

      1. One website I frequent said to find people who believe and leave a pile of clothing with dry ice smoldering out of it.

    2. Just to be clear (and this is a common misconception, even among Christians), Biblical salvation, unlike “Fear Itself,” it not about the worthy. Rather, it is about being humble enough to admit that one is not worthy, and acknowledging that the sacrifice of Jesus was both necessary and sufficient to offset that unworthiness.

  7. So, everybody is mocking the “rapture,” and I have trouble with that, but don’t you guys get scared that there are so many people in the world that are batshit, stonecold, bûgfûçk crazy?
    .
    And worst is, the only difference between these nuts and most Fundies is that these guys believed they could predict exactly when God would whisk them away while condemning all the rest of us to frikking ETERNAL TORTURE.
    .
    At times like this, I can’t get in a joking mood. It seems like I see more clearly than ever how used we are to tolerate toxic madmen.

    1. Oh, there will be eternal torture, regardless. Since this is yet another hoax perpetuated by an idiot, and he won’t have the gall to remove himself from the gene poll, we’ll continue to suffer his nonsense moving forward.
      .
      As I said elsewhere, one of the drawbacks of the internet: stupidity goes viral.

    2. Well, seriously speaking, how are you going to keep religious lunatics from believeing anything they want, short or totalitarianism or, you know, beating them regularly? It seems if you want a free society that tolerates dissent and is open to new ideas, you have to put up the lunatics. Just feel free to point out the lunacy of their ideas. Frequently.

  9. I actually had a similar thought involving the Red Sox/Cubs game. I hope the Rapture doesn’t happen, ’cause I have tickets to tomorrow’s game (not that I at ALL think there’s any chance I wouldn’t be here for it, but even if both teams come out entirely intact, I suspect they’ll cancel the game…)

  10. My favorite thought on the latest Rapture (this preacher also made the same prediction back in 1994; how many times do you have to be undoubtedly wrong before people stop listening to you?) is at Dork Tower on the 4/19 entry http://www.dorktower.com

    BTW, is it wrong that I wish I knew some of the people who really believed the world was ending, so I could have had them give me all their worldly possessions? If they’re too stupid to hold on to them…

  11. Sinc I hate the yankees, I am betting that none of them will be raptured so the game should be able to continue until completion.

  12. .
    Well, either I missed it or it ain’t EST.
    .
    So, do I get to start looting now or do I have to wait a little longer?

  13. Keep in mind…This is just a tiny bit of craziness compared to what is going to be coming around Janurary 12th of next year. I think thats just going to be your plain old world coming to an end no rapture involved. No looting, no finger pointing and all just because a bunch of Mayans got tired of making a calender.

    1. .
      Pat’s January 10th, 2012 instructions – Express mail everyone on the blog a Jucy Lucy. We’re talking about the “arrives the same day” type of express mail here. Spend as much money on the shipping as you can, Pat, you won’t need the cash for long after that anyhow.
      .
      Don’t worry about the fries. I’ll just raid Five Guys for a large order of theirs.

      1. Man, thats what I’m going to miss the most Jucy Lucy’s (Dont tell my wife)We just got a Five Guys earlier this year so I can help out with the fries. Now if I can just remember which neighbor has all the money hidden.
        .
        All joking aside, about 45 minutes ago the sky turned black and started dropping tornadoes all over the west Twin Cities, we got golfball size hail and more rain than even Noah would like to see. The direct TV, of course, has gone black so we will miss the new Doctor Who episode. ÐÃMN!!!!!! pray for usI:);):)

    1. Well, assuming that there is a Hëll, looks like she just took all the guesswork out of her ultimate destination…

      1. I don’t think so, Jonathan.
        .
        I’m no Sigmund Freud, but if you allow me some long-distance psychoanalysis, I’d say anyone who attempts to murder her own kids because the end is near is fûçkìņg crazy.
        .
        And any God, real or invented, that would send a woman this sick to an eternity of boiling fire is many times more monstrous than any human being ever was.
        .
        This poor woman is sick, but she isn’t the only one who is sick.

      3. No one. No one deserves an eternity of boiling fire and torture. Not Hitler, not Osama, and certainly not this woman, this woman the least of all.

  15. .
    This leaves us with the question: Who prevented it?
    .
    The one, the only, the original (accept no substitutions or bad remakes) Carl Kolchak.

    1. Nope it was the recently departed Macho Man Randy Savage that landed a flying elbow drop from the top rope to pin Jesus to prevent the Rapture!

  16. I think the Rapture did occur, but luckily Captain Kirk went back in time and prevented it from happening so it never really happend. Temporal Investigations are en route.

  17. My friends theory is that the Rapture was prevented by Randy “The Macho Man” Savage .

  18. Well, it’s obvious to me…whoever saved the world is the lowest rated/selling character or team…..

    1. That was when she was on TV. Now she’s in comics, and can only save the world on new comic Wednesdays. 😛

  22. No one prevented it — they just got the date wrong. As any member of the Church of the Subgenius can tell you, the final day — the X-Day — the “Rupture” — will be on July 5, 1998. So mark your calendar.

    http://www.subgenius.com
    All hail J.R. “Bob” Dobbs!

  24. Sam and Dean convinced our new lord to spare us…because Dean just learned there is no pie in the afterlife. Just loads of cake. I didn’t know you watched Supernatural Peter.

  25. Aaron — yes, yes it is. So very wrong.
    .
    The poll — I’ve gotta go with the Doctor. The Rapture was rejiggered so that it only took people who own fezzes.
    .
    And while we were out at a Weird Al Yankovic show (a perfect end-of-the-world event, I think), our babysitter called to tell us that a friggin’ huge tree limb had come down in our front yard. Nobody was hurt and no damage to the house (and better still, my daughter slept through the whole thing), but it’s definitely an odd occurrence for the day. Seems one tree branch decided to ensure it was Left Behind.

    1. Interesting date for a Weird Al show, given that the title of his new album (coming out next month, y’all!) is Alpocalypse…

      1. Oh, we know. In fact, with signs up where they were selling shirts/etc. saying “Alpocalypse on sale June 21,” I realized far too late that I should have protested and demanded it immediately. “Alpocalypse Now! ALPOCALYPSE NOW!”

    2. BAH!

      If the apocalypse isn’t prevented by giant japanese robots, I just don’t have any reason to care about it at all.

  26. I’m thinking it was the Spectre, by putting his body between the Earth and the Heavens and pushing, like he put it between Earth-1 and Earth-2 so many times.

  27. The end of the world was prevented by an as yet unknown DC/Marvel crossover, perhaps another JLA/Avengers?

    I have heard a theory that the Rapture actually happened in the 14th Century as part of the Black Death.

    NPR, on “All Things Considered,” asked people to select what music should if the end of the world did take place. There were lots of suggestions involving various heavy metal tunes, etc. But what got the most votes, dating NPR’s audience horribly, was “We’ll Meet Again.” (Doesn’t Slim Pickens have to ride the bomb to the ground first?)

    Personally, I would’ve liked to have stood on top of a mountain, tall building, somewhere in Vegas, with a group of people singing “The Best Of Times” from “La Cage aux Folles.”

    1. There’s only one song for me: “Always look at the bright side of life”.

  28. Obviously, the Rapture was prevented by whoever turned the TV on. Because the man from Mars won’t eat up bars when the TV’s on. And now he’s gone back up to space where he won’t have to hassle with the human race.

  30. An observation. Everyone seems to be making fun of this silliness. Folks of all religious persuasions and those with none, are having a good time mocking this. And well they should.
    But, what of the “respect for others beliefs” I have always been regaled about when an agnostic or atheist questions some of the illogical beliefs of other religions.
    I have seen Stephen Hawkings lambasted for calling belief in Heaven a fairy tale. Why, when someone points out the lack of evidence for events in the Bible, or even the existence of God, are they told they are being disrespectful?
    So is it just a matter of what and whose beliefs are the target?

    1. .
      “But, what of the “respect for others beliefs” I have always been regaled about when an agnostic or atheist questions some of the illogical beliefs of other religions.”
      .
      I think there’s a bit of a dif between making fun of a deeply held belief and making fun of a group of idiots following a Rature date set by a guy who blow the date before, is sitting on mountains of cash he’s fleeced off of the faithful and who has a church with a radio program that had it’s programming schedule posted with programs set post-Rapture.
      .
      But, hëll, that could just be me.

      1. So eating and drinking from the body of someone who lived 2000 years ago and following a man wearing a dress and living in opulence in Italy is different?
        Not eating bread for a week to commemorate and event that mostly likely did not happen 3500 years ago about a man who didn’t exist is different?
        Belonging to a religion founded by a con man, and lead by a mass murderer and child rapist is different?
        Believing that your religions founder flew to heaven on a winged horse is different?
        Why?

      2. Up to a point, the majority gets to determine what is sane.
        .
        But it’s also a matter of consequences, like James said. My brother and my aunt are Christians, and their faith has had a very positive impact on their lives and others around them.
        .
        That some aspects of that faith are illogical to my skeptical mind is a lesser consideration if everyone’s lives are improved.

      3. There is the point to be made that the idea of the Rapture isn’t even a part of actual Christian dogma, it’s only something gleaned through very selective interpretation. It’s been promoted by any number of American-specific denominations, the study of which led a Catholic friend of mine to once ask “have these people ever even read the Bible?” Somebody someday will write a no doubt excellent thesis paper that examines how the vast majority of people who call themselves religious believe things that are not even remotely taught by their religious texts but are more the creations of popular folklore (beliefs about angels, Hëll, the devil, the Rapture, and loads of other things). Now, of course, any sub-faith is free to add or subtract to religious dogma as they choose (who are we to tell them what to believe?). An athiest friends of mine once commented, in response to the above Catholic friend’s discussion of “official” dogma, that “it’s all made up anyway.”

    2. I think you raise some valid points. As I see it, there is a tension here between two ideas.
      .
      On the one hand, no one should be ridiculed for beliefs that they genuinely hold. And Christians, who espouse love and who know a thing or two about being ridiculed for their beliefs (along with plenty of other people, to be fair), should be setting a positive example in that regard. Of course, it is possible to genuinely believe something that is absolutely false. But open ridicule, where the intent is to make the ridiculer look good at the expense of the ridiculee, is not a loving way of addressing that.
      .
      On the other hand, it can be quite effective to use humor to make a point. And I think it can be used in a loving, respectful way with the intent to build up, rather than tear down, the person or people in need of correcting. But that can be a fine knife’s edge to walk, and it is very easy to fall into ridicule.
      .
      One guideline that I think can help distinguish between hurtful ridicule and constructive humor is to consider what the target of the punchline is. Is it the idea, or is it the person or people who hold to the idea? Ideas have no feelings; they can tolerate being laughed at, especially if they are laughable. But people should be treated with love and respect at all times.
      .
      To get back to the examples you gave, I think Christians (myself included) should be thicker-skinned about criticisms of our beliefs. We should welcome critical evaluation as an opportunity to engage in dialogue; after all, the Bible itself says to test everything and keep only what is good or true. we should not try to silence our critics by crying “Foul”, launching personal attacks, or employing censorship.
      .
      And we should make sure that we ourselves are not ridiculing people when they believe differently than us. It is a laughable notion to claim that the Bible has secret clues that indicate the exact timing of the Rapture, when the Bible states explicitly that no one will know the timing. But that is no excuse for tearing down the people who make such a claim.
      .
      Thank you for your observations. And please feel free to correct me if I am ever guilty of these types of hypocrisies, which are unfortunately easy to fall into.

      1. Yes, I think I want to make a distinction here. I see the open ridicule of Camping from all quarters, and probably deservedly so.
        But I also see people of faith asking for special consideration. The very questioning of their faith is seen as ridicule. As if these ideas cannot be challenged the way political or philosophical ideas are. Yet now, many of these same people are openly ridiculing the beliefs of Camping.
        I don’t advocate ridicule as a general response. The tone of that questioning should be respectful if the ideas are given so.
        If some one is describing their belief, the response should be in a critically reasoned way.
        Of course if someone is telling you you are going to hëll, or why you are evil, ridicule is an apt response.

      2. You’re right, of course. Still, if mockery is the worst of what one has to bear for one’s faith, then, considering history, one has gotten off pretty easy.

      3. But I also see people of faith asking for special consideration.
        .
        I’m sorry; perhaps I wasn’t clear. One of my points was to agree that people of faith should not expect to be exempt from criticism. If an idea cannot stand up to examination, then it is not worth believing in.

    3. That has been on my mind too, Ed. Are you less crazy than Harold Camping only because you think the rapture will happen some other time? Are you less crazy than him when you believe that some ordinary person that is not a believer is doomed?
      .
      But, as a skeptic, I try to see religion in terms of utility. Plenty of people hold illogical beliefs but they don’t impact that negatively on their lives, and they even have positive impact at times.
      .
      But there are Harold Camping followers out there who spent all their money, cancelled plans, etc. on a fool’s errand. That is a different level of crazy.
      .
      Camping was also naive. He made the mistake of tying his religious fantasy to a specific date and an easily disprovable event. Note to prospective messiahs, never open yourself to situations where reality can disprove you. Invent invisible spirits, angels, and sky men with long white beards, devise all kinds of šhìŧ that supposedly happens AFTER you die and can’t return to tell how it was, but do not ever put yourself in a situation where facts can show you wrong.

    4. There’s also the matter of the consequences of that belief, both for oneself and for others. Many folks on this site, and elsewhere, have discussed the problem not of religion itself, but of extremists when it comes to religion. Some of them wish to impose their beliefs on others, regardless of the others’ beliefs (gay marriage and stem cell research come to mind). Some are quite happy to kill others, or themselves to kill many others, in the name of their religion.

      I’d love to know how many of this pastor’s followers gave all their money to his church and quit their job, in anticipation that this world wouldn’t exist by Saturday evening. I strongly doubt the church will give back all the donations — those billboards ain’t free! — and, speaking from experience, jobs aren’t exactly dangling from the trees for anyone to just pick a good one.

      1. If you believe you and your church-going fellows are going to be raptured, why would you give your money to your church? What do they need it for if they’re all going to Heaven?

    5. I had a similar thought when I saw The Book of Mormon on Broadway. A lot of the jokes in it weren’t really jokes at all, but simply listing actual Mormon beliefs, and the audience always laughed. But of course no one laughed at the basic Christian beliefs, even when they were discussed in the same sentence as the Mormon ones. So I’m thinking, why is believing that you get your own planet after you die any sillier than believing that you’ll either go to a magical fairy land in the sky or an underground dungeon where you’ll burn for all eternity? It kind of left a bad taste in my mouth.
      .
      I say all beliefs are fair game for mockery, or none of them are.

      1. Yes, some of the basic Christian beliefs are as far-fetched and illogical as Mormon, Scientologist, or Millenarianism ones. But so what? It isn’t really about logic, it’s the power of indocrination.
        .
        I am not religious myself, but I’ve grown into a Christian society, with plenty of Christian relatives, with all the cultural norms and taboos and the very presence of this huge institution that is still very powerful, even in our secular age.
        .
        So I can’t help feeling some resonance and respect for the basic Christian dogma, even though I’m not a believer. It’s almost instinctive. It’s the same for most people. Mormonism or Scientology lack this power of indocrination, so we see them more easily for the fairy tales they are.

      2. Mormonism probably possesses this power for people who grew up in Utah.

      3. Yes, some of the basic Christian beliefs are … far-fetched and illogical
        .
        May I know which these are? I haven’t reached the same conclusion, so I’d like to know if there is a flaw in my reasoning.

      5. Well, meaning no disrespect, angels and demons are no less far-fetched than Cthullu. Heaven is no less far-fetched than Narnia or Valhalla. The immaculate conception and, specially, the nature of God that is 3 beings in one, are very far-fetched.
        .
        Illogical… isn’t the very idea of Heaven a sort of Catch-22? How can you enjoy Heaven while knowing that relatives, friends, or even acquietances that are good people but haven’t accepted Jesus are going to Hëll? Heaven cannot be Heaven while your sister, best friend, father-in-law, whoever is in a dungeon being tortured.
        .
        I am not a believer in spiritualism and reincarnation either, but it seems a lot like basic Christianity “corrected” to be more logical. You got lots of spiritual planes, and spirits in the superior planes spend time helping and guiding the ones still in the inferior planes.

      7. Well, pretty much all of them.
        .
        Fair enough. I appreciate the candor. But I hope you will excuse me if I start from the more specific points mentioned by Rene.

      8. Well, meaning no disrespect, angels and demons are no less far-fetched than Cthullu. Heaven is no less far-fetched than Narnia or Valhalla. The immaculate conception and, specially, the nature of God that is 3 beings in one, are very far-fetched.
        .
        No disrespect taken. I asked a question, you gave an honest answer; I would say that is rather respectful, actually. So thank you for that.
        .
        Furthermore, I would actually agree with you. Many theological concepts, such as the notion of God as a trinity, are apparently paradoxical and far-fetched. However, being far-fetched or even paradoxical is not at odds with being true. One might similarly list the particle-wave duality of light, quantum entanglement, or relativistic time dilation as concepts that sound far-fetched and lead to apparent paradoxes, but are nevertheless true phenomena. Now, I’m not claiming that trinitarian theology can be proved empirically in the way that physics can; I am merely trying to demonstrate something can simultaneously seem far-fetched and yet be true.
        .
        You also compare angels & demons to Cthullu, and Heaven to Narnia and Valhalla. And again, I think that’s a valid point. A priori, the concept of Biblical heaven is no more or less credible than Valhalla. But again, that doesn’t tell us anything. Just because they are similar concepts from different traditions doesn’t mean they both have to be made up; in fact, even if we could prove beyond doubt that one such concept was made up (and, in the case of Narnia, I think we reasonably can do that), that doesn’t mean they are all made up. Of course, it doesn’t prove that they aren’t, either, but that’s my point – it doesn’t prove anything at all.
        .
        So, far-fetchedness (sorry, English language) isn’t sufficient to decide truth. And neither is the existence of equivalent but fabricated concepts, as with Heaven and Narnia or even God and the Flying Spaghetti Monster. So how do we decide if there is enough truth to allow us to believe in any of these far-fetched notions?
        .
        To answer that question, let’s consider another example of something far-fetched: the Second Punic War. More specifically, consider the campaign which Hannibal brought elephants from Africa through the Alps and into Italy. It’s a fairly incredible story, and yet few doubt that it was an actual historical event. Why? Because we have enough sufficiently old copies of writings from that era that record those events.
        .
        Which brings me to the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. We have lots of very old copies of these documents; more, older, and more complete copies than we have of the writings chronicling the Second Punic war or any other event from antiquity. Some of these copies are old enough to make it credible that they were actually written in the first century AD (or CE, if you prefer) by people who were actually present first hand at the events they describe. By contrast, the two chronicles of the Second Punic war were written by people born after the war ended.
        .
        So, if we believe that Hannibal brought elephants to Italy, isn’t it also reasonable to at least consider the possibility that what Matthew, Mark, Luke and John wrote about also happened? Yes, resurrection is more incredible than elephants in Italy, but the documentation is also more exceptional. Four first-person accounts, and the number of copies we have of them, is an uncommon amount of documentation for events 2000 years ago.
        .
        Yes, there is a lot of other theology and doctrine connected with Christianity that doesn’t immediately follow from those Gospels. But the historical life, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth is at the core; deal with that first and worry about the rest later. To (ab)use the physics analogy again, it’s similar to how an understanding of Newtonian mechanics can help with grasping relativistic time dilation.
        .
        Illogical… isn’t the very idea of Heaven a sort of Catch-22?
        .
        Another very good, very hard question; one I still grapple with myself. First, I would point out that the image of eternal torture in a dungeon owes more to Dante than the Bible. Second, as for who will be in Heaven, I believe that (a) none of us are good enough to get there on our own merits, (b) God nevertheless wants as many of us there as possible, and (c) Jesus’ substitutionary sacrifice is sufficient to make it possible for any and all to be there. I know that doesn’t completely answer your question. On the other hand, in my experience if one doesn’t accept the core story of Jesus, then the other details won’t really fall in place either.

      9. If you want the definitive take on Christianity, religion, and any of it making sense, I refer you to this:
        .
        Thanks; that’s a good bit that I hadn’t seen before. But Eric Idle has made plenty of things sound absurd over the years. The fact that Monty Python and the Holy Grail is brilliant comedy doesn’t change the fact that the Middle Ages actually happened.
        .
        Also, at some point doesn’t the truth is stranger than fiction principle come into play at some point? Who exactly would make up something like the trinity?

      10. “Who exactly would make up something like the trinity?”
        .
        Grant Morrison.

      11. Actually, truth is not stranger than fiction. When people say that, they mean that one particular bit of truth is as strange as fiction, and the fact that it’s true makes it seem stranger.

      12. Thanks for the thoughtful reply, Andy.
        .
        Like you’ve said, extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. Supernatural miracles a lot more than trained elephants. I am a skeptical that doesn’t feel great pleasure in doubting. I want to believe in something, if not Christianity, another religion, but I just can’t, not with honesty.
        .
        We could also invert your argument. You seem to be saying that, since the life of Jesus happened more or less as indicated in the Bible, that is a point in favor of the Bible’s credibility, and we should accept the whole thing. But, conversely, if some other very important portions of the Bible are obviously false, then some would feel tempted to reject the whole thing too.
        .
        Adam and Eve, the Creation in 7 days, Noah’s Ark, the supposed age of the Earth, the way man and all animals were created in their final, definitive forms… Even many Christians admit that those are allegorical, at best. Those who don’t have to perform great feats of logical contortionism to accomodate those view with science, and spurious science at that. Some don’t even bother and just reject all evidence.
        .
        If all of that stuff is not real, whatever else in the Bible is real?
        .
        What you say about Dante is interesting. If Heaven and Hëll do exist, it’s likely that they’re beyond our mortal understanding. I think that describes my personal outlook on a lof of this stuff. It’s all beyond us. Who can say what happens after we die, what life is all about? I can’t.
        .
        I can’t help but seeing religion as ultimately tied to human beings’ own expectations and preconceptions.

      13. Actually, truth is not stranger than fiction. When people say that, they mean that one particular bit of truth is as strange as fiction, and the fact that it’s true makes it seem stranger.
        .
        Since PAD’s citation of “Nuns on the Run” seemed tongue-in-cheek, I was opting to reply in kind. But there was a kernel of a point in there, so let’s unpack it a little further.
        .
        Yes, there are plenty of strange and outlandish ideas in fiction. And yes, much of real life is mundane. We’d be more accurate to say “some truth is stranger than some fiction, and vice versa”, but that’s not nearly as catchy.
        .
        However, what I was really getting at is that, when people fabricate things that they want to be accepted as true, they place an emphasis on making them plausible. Thus, unlikely details actually tend to be a hallmark of the truth.
        .
        And that is the situation we are dealing with in this example. Either the concept of the Trinity is true, or it was made up by someone(s) who wished it to be taken as truth. And experience with human tendencies suggests that someone who wishes to be taken seriously (but knows they are making things up) would try to avoid something like the Trinity, which is so far beyond human experience.
        .
        This is by no means a conclusive argument; I’ll freely admit that. But since we wound up down this path, I figured I’d offer it up as food for thought.

      14. Well, you know what Hitler said: “The greater the lie, the greater the chance that it will be believed.”
        .
        That being said, I don’t think the Trinity was necessarily made up by someone deliberately trying to get people to believe a lie. But I do think it’s logical to assume that it came about as a result of early Christians wishing to worship Christ without breaking the First Commandment.

      15. Considering all the theological disputes and heresies about the nature of the Trinity, and the sheer weirdness of God, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost being one, but also being separate, and Jesus being at once totally human and totally divine, it all makes me think of comic books and complicated retcons.
        .
        You know, when someone like Roy Thomas or Kurt Busiek does a piece of continuity pørņ that seeks to reconcille contraditory facts and no one who’s not a expert can understand the “fix”? So Immortus is Kang is Rama-Tut, but they’re also have been replaced by Space Ghosts at various points and stuff, all to make stuff written by different people across diferent periods seem to fit.
        .
        Christian theology looks like that some of the time.

      16. Thanks for the thoughtful reply, Andy.
        .
        You are quite welcome, Rene. It’s my pleasure.
        .
        Like you’ve said, extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.
        .
        It gets thrown around a lot as a justification for not believing in the Gospels. Unfortunately, few people seem willing to commit to just what constitutes extraordinary proof. To me, the quantity and quality of the documentation of Jesus’s life is rather extraordinary, particularly if he was just another itinerant Jewish teacher. None of his contemporaries can claim such extensive chronicling.
        .
        Out of curiosity, what would suffice, for you, as extraordinary proof that Jesus was resurrected, as is claimed in the Gospels, the Book of Acts, and many of the epistles?
        .
        You seem to be saying that, since the life of Jesus happened more or less as indicated in the Bible, that is a point in favor of the Bible’s credibility, and we should accept the whole thing.
        .
        Actually, that’s not what I was saying and I was trying to be careful not to say that; I’m sorry I didn’t make that clear enough. What I was actually trying to say was the following. (1) The historical life, death, and resurrection of Jesus are the main concerns; if one is not prepared to accept those, then there is little value in arguing over more technical, theological concepts such as the trinitarian nature of God. (2) The Gospels, taken as four separate documents (which is what they were originally), stand up to the criteria required of credible documents of history from that era.
        .
        However, I would not make the claim that, if one takes the Gospels as credible history, one must accept the rest of the Bible as credible history. That does not follow at all. The Bible is not a monolithic work; it is a collection of many documents written by many authors over a long period of time. Not all of those documents were intended as literal histories, so there is no reason to read them as such. The Psalms is a collection of poems. Proverbs is, well, what it says on the tin. To treat them as historical records would be misguided, at best.
        .
        You mention Genesis (indirectly, at least), and rightfully so. It is a challenging book to interpret. It may very well be that Genesis itself is not one work by one author, but more of an anthology. That opens up the possibility that some of it may be allegorical, and some historical. We should approach that determination the same way we do the rest of the Bible, by asking about the writing style, the writing intent, the content, and so forth. It’s not a simple, cut and dried answer, but I think it’s a more intellectually honest one.
        .
        If all of that stuff is not real, whatever else in the Bible is real?
        .
        Again, I don’t think the Bible needs to be an all-or-nothing proposition right from the outset. Rather, it should be approached like any learning experience – start with the basics, in this case the Gospels, and see where that takes you.
        .
        If Heaven and Hëll do exist, it’s likely that they’re beyond our mortal understanding. I think that describes my personal outlook on a lot of this stuff. It’s all beyond us. Who can say what happens after we die, what life is all about? I can’t.
        .
        I think you are on to something here. Heaven and Hëll (and a trinitarian God, etc.) are beyond our normal experiences, and as such may not be fully comprehensible at this time. But even if full understanding isn’t possible, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to get as close as we can. And if Heaven and Hëll do exist, it seems reasonable that we should get some clue about that, rather than having it be a complete surprise. And if the Gospels are in fact true, then God indeed has given us an indication that Heaven and Hëll do exist. Even better, He’s already paid the price of admission, as it were, on our behalf.
        .
        I can’t help but seeing religion as ultimately tied to human beings’ own expectations and preconceptions.
        .
        I can understand that perspective. None of us are approaching these questions as a blank slate – we all bring our personal history and cultural context with us, and that informs our understanding. But that doesn’t mean that there isn’t real truth to be learned.
        .
        Furthermore, the Jesus of the Gospels embraces this concept openly. He has many one-on-one interactions throughout the Gospels, and he deals with each person as an individual with a unique set of experiences. His parables are firmly rooted in the cultural context of his audience. He doesn’t expect anyone to be something they aren’t, but he also challenges people to not be limited by their past and their culture, either. For just one example, look at the story of Jesus and the woman at the well in the gospel of John, chapter 4.

      17. But I do think it’s logical to assume that it came about as a result of early Christians wishing to worship Christ without breaking the First Commandment.
        .
        That may very well be the mechanism by which that doctrine came to be understood. However, that says nothing about whether or not it is true.
        .
        Incidentally, I’m also raising the Godwin alert level to “burnt sienna”. 🙂

      18. …it all makes me think of comic books and complicated retcons…
        .
        …all to make stuff written by different people across diferent periods seem to fit…
        .
        Christian theology looks like that some of the time.
        .
        In a lot of ways, that is a perfectly apt analogy. After all, as I said above, the challenge IS to take things written by different people over a long span of time and work out how it all fits together.
        .
        The main difference is that, with at least some of the comics examples, we know from external sources that there was no organizing principle driving the whole thing. As a result, sometimes there just isn’t a satisfactory way of making it all fit; in frustration, all you can do is punch reality.
        .
        That may also be the case for the Bible. But there is also the possibility that it resulted from God inspiring various people at various times to ultimately produce something that reveals his plans and purposes for the world. Deciding between those two alternatives is the challenge before us.

      19. “That may very well be the mechanism by which that doctrine came to be understood. However, that says nothing about whether or not it is true.”
        .
        Maybe not, but it does explain why someone would make it up, which was your original question (well, actually your question was who would do it, but there’s an implied “why?” in there).

      20. Maybe not, but it does explain why someone would make it up, which was your original question (well, actually your question was who would do it, but there’s an implied “why?” in there).
        .
        Of course; right. Sorry I failed to carry your line of reasoning all the way through.
        .
        Unfortunately, that still leaves some questions. First, that only gets us 2/3 of a trinity; how did we get from 2 to 3? Second, what was it about Jesus that caused a group of Jews to want to expand their notion of monotheism so that they could worship him in the first place?

    1. They just can’t tell anyone they did it.

      Now put your sunglasses back on and get that Winnebago moving…

  32. Nah, yer all wrong. It was Jamie Madrox. He split himself into so many copies, some of whom were worthy of being Raptured but most of whom weren’t, that God got confused and said “Screw this, I’m going home and taking my bat with me!”

    1. Except that these days, She has changed His bat for a tennis racket 😉 (and yes, I meant She and His. PADawans will get it).

  33. Oh, I’m positive it was Aziraphale and Crowley from Good Omens. They’ve already got experience in halting apocalypses. (apocalypsesese?)

  34. I think the difference between MOST Christians is that they are living their normal daily lives and NOT going out and taking out billboards, radio ads and tv commericals and saying rapture is happening on May 21,2011 at 6 PM. Like most people they dont know what tomorrow is going to bring. So when this nut job and his followers get the kind of press THEY asked for. Then THEY deserve to be made fun of. Just my humble opinion.

  35. Fittingly, it was the combined efforts of Prophet and Callsign “Alcatraz,” USMC from the Crysis games.

  36. Personally, I’m going with a team up, with Batman and Etrigan.

    ……what, no one else saw that episode of Batman: Brave And The Bold? 😉

  37. Come on, only one man could have stopped the Rapture. The only man whose beard can cut a diamond, the one who sleeps with a pillow under his gun, Mr. Chuck Norris himself!

    Or DSK, if the Rapture is female. He just had to appear, and she fled. With good reason.

  39. I thought it did happen, and God only took Sarah Palin leaving the rest of us heaven on Earth.

  40. Nah. Frank “Conundrum” Parker got authorization to do a back-step.

  41. Speaking of Supernatural, though. What did everyone think of the finale?
    .
    At first I had thought that ’10-’11 was going to be the last season– which made the finale incredibly annoying to me. Fortunately, though, I have since heard that it HAS been renewed – which makes the show’s cliffhanger only somewhat annoying.

  42. So, according to Mr. Nutjob, Saturday was only a ‘spiritual’ Judgment Day, and that we should look forward to doing this bûllšhìŧ all over again – FOR REALZ LOLZ – on October 21.
    .
    There’s nothing quite like messing with peoples’ heads in the name of religion.

    1. Apostate Christians like this guy who supposedly deciphered a “code” in the Bible using mathematics to predict the date of the Rapture really do rub me the wrong way. But, I suppose the whole thing has gotten at least a few people actually thinking about the Rapture in a non-mocking way and that is a good thing.

  43. BTW, it looks like Harold Camping is counting on his third guess, er, calculation, for the date of the Rapture to be correct: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/under-god/post/harold-camping-says-may-21-2011-was-invisible-judgment-day-world-will-end-october-21-2011/2011/05/23/AFZmc99G_blog.html

    I have to say, for a man who’s 84 he certainly has a big pair of stones. He spent a lot of time (and money — them billboards ain’t cheap!) saying the Rapture would happen on May 21st, when the Chosen would be brought up to Heaven (and he also said the planet would be ravaged by earthquakes and natural disasters — it wouldn’t be Disneyland with more free stuff for those remaining)… and when it didn’t happen he said it was “an invisible judgment day” that was spiritual rather than physical, and the “real” Rapture will be in October. I won’t give the date because I’ve spent far too much time on this idiot than he deserved, and the best-selling Power Ranger Halloween costume has more significance than his next prediction. I just hope (pray?) no one abandons their job or throws away all their savings to follow this charlatan’s predictions.

    1. Third time lucky?
      .
      I saw a picture of the old guy and it was hard not to feel sorry for him.

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