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One nice thing about getting older is all the catastrophic end of the world events one survives. For quite a few years I kept a note on my desk that read Mayan Calender Says World will end December 21, 2012 -- Plan Ahead.Didn't happen. Neither did Nostradamus's chilling prophecy (see above.)
Jeanne Dixon's 2/4/62 planetary alignment that would bring about destruction of the world came and went -- but I was in my junior year of college and may not have been paying attention.
Jim Jones (the Peoples' Temple one) predicted nuclear holocaust in 1967. Glad he got that wrong. And Charles Manson predicted an apocalyptic race war in 1969. ( He was basing this on his interpretation of the Beatles White Album -- perhaps the English accents led him astray.)
Herbert Armstrong and the Worldwide Church of kept changing the date for The Rapture -- '36, '43, '72, and '75. The Jehovah's Witnesses liked '75 as well but . . . Pat Robertson said the end of the world was coming in 1982. We're still here and so, alas, is Pat. October 23, 1997 was, according to 17th century Bishop Ussher, exactly 6,000 years since the creation of the world (he did the math -- counting the generations in the Bible) and therefore a nice round number for the end of the world. We were busy celebrating John's birthday and may have missed something. Remember Y2K? Any number of people, including Jerry Falwell and the Christian authors LaHaye and Jenkins, were really, really sure that This Was It -- mass computer malfunctions! the end of society as we know it! dogs on sofas! Nope. Well, except for the bit about the dogs.
April 29, 2007 -- since 1982 hadn't worked out, Pat picked this lovely spring day for Earth's destruction. Came and went. And Jeanne Dixon planetary alignment scare having passed, she predicted Armageddon for 2020. . . something to look forward to. I've only hit the highlights -- there is much, much more HERE. It would be funny if it weren't sad -- the capacity of some people to believe false prophets -- believe so strongly that in some cases they will commit suicide -- while at the same time refusing to believe scientists who warn of verifiable environmental destruction . . . well, the mind boggles.
