Add last year's tsunami disaster, the earthquakes in the Middle East, this year's flooding in California, the drought that's been spawning Texas wildfires, the Bird Flu pandemic, and a possible nuclear showdown (Do the words, "World War III" come to mind?) with Iran to the mix and the picture seems even bleaker.
As if that isn't enough, in the past few years sightings of the Virgin Mary have been reported all over the United States and around the world.
Most, if not all religious people who think the Apocalypse is upon us, believe these to be signs that we're truly living in the end times.
Authors Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins have been writing about the judgment day concept since 1995 in their million-dollar franchise of "Left Behind" novels. That is, namely, devout followers of the Lord will one day suddenly disappear without a trace throughout the world while the rest of us sinners are "left behind" to contend with the Apocalypse.
I suppose given the way things are I can understand where some people might be coming from. All you must do is turn on the news or browse the Internet to read and see all is not right in the world now and is getting worse.But it is not just the depressing news events. The list of immoralities this country and the world have engages in is endless. States approve abortion and same-sex marriages while debates are held on whether to take prayer out of schools, take "God" out of the Pledge of Allegiance and take down the Ten Commandments from the walls of city buildings.
"Surely God is mad at America," Mayor Ray Nagin said on Jan. 17, in what would have been Dr. Martin Luther King. Jr's seventy-seventh birthday.
"He sent us hurricane after hurricane, and it's destroyed and put stress on this country," Nagin said. "Surely he doesn't approve of us being in Iraq under false pretenses. But surely, he is upset at Black America also. We are not taking care of ourselves."
Now, being Catholic, I will be the first to admit that although I do go to church on a more regular basis now, I have not exactly lived my life as God would prefer it. But I see nothing positive in seeing today's events as signs that "The Day" is coming. What is so positive about being excited that life is going to end?
When it comes to the Apocalypse, I have always believed ¬ based on science - life as we know it will end when our sun dies and engulfs half, if not all, the planets within our solar system, which isn't supposed to happen for another five billion years.I would like to think that when that time comes, “Star Trek” and “Star Wars” aside, technology will provide us with the 'ark' we need to travel to other planets outside our own galaxy.
Although I am a believer in the supernatural, I find it a little hard to accept that a final battle will one day be waged here during Earth's last days between the forces of good and evil and that Jesus will again rise from the dead to save our souls, if you have read the Book of Revelation.
Then again, if you believe in the writings of The Old Testament, the last time God threw a fit with how people were living their lives, he told Noah to build a boat.
Forget the end of the world.
As far as I'm concerned, it's when our own life ends that matters; and since none of us knows when that is going to happen, maybe we need to start preparing now so we won't have to worry where we're headed when our own personal judgment day comes.
©2/8/06
