My interest in the end of the world.
For warning: this is one of those mopey and morbid posts. Feel free to move along.
So. anyway. I've been sick lately. Got my antibiotics, fighting it out. I've spent most of my life after 15 being nearly perpetually sick. And my parents are in poor health. So we all get upset at each other, all of us expecting the other to be the care giver. But anyway.
So, it's in these moods I tend to get morbid. On other occasions, I've mused on Death, Eternity, and annihilation. (To recap, I don't want annihilation, but I fear eternity, even one spent in heaven.)
Well, lately, my mind has drifted to another old mental hobgoblin: the apocalypse. I've always been interested in it. A major reason being that I was perpetually, deathly afraid of the instantaneous end of the world from 3rd grade, (me being about 9,) to 10th grade (me being about 16.
Some kids probably experience a secular version of this. worrying that you'll see a sudden mushroom cloud or some terrible terrorist attack. But mine came from my religious upbringing.
About now, I should probably quickly recap what current teaching about the end of the world is in evangelical Christianity. This is just one interpretation of the book of Revelations, not the only one. (and not even the most accurate one.) Okay, I was taught that the end of the world would go something like this.
We're all wandering around, doing our thing, when a trumpet from heaven sounds. Jesus shows up. This is NOT the second coming though. this is something called the rapture. Only Christians see jesus, and he whisks all good christians up with Him into the sky and we all go to heaven. Meanwhile, on earth, a supreme asshole known as the antichrist takes over the world by negotiating peaceful co-existence between Israel and Palestine. (If this belief raises your eyebrows, it should.) Anyway, yadda yadda yadda. Antichrist turns out to be Hitler on steroids, in that he launches a Holocaust that makes Hitler's look subdued by comparison.) Meanwhile, up in heaven, this all makes God mad, so he starts unleashing plague after plague onto the earth that makes the old testament seem subdued. This, more or less goes on for 7 years, Then Jesus comes back, This time it IS the second coming, fights the battle of Armageddon, throws the antichrist into the lake of fire. But instead of doing the same thing to Satan, he just gives him a slap on the wrist by way of a 1000 year prison sentence where he's chained up in a cave somewhere. Jesus takes over the world and rules earth for a thousand years. (In case your wondering, there are non-Christians and non-Jews as part of this new world order too. They just defer to the Christians. I don't know if that makes you feel better or not.) So, things are kinda quiet for a thousand years. Then Satan gets let out. instead of learning his lesson, he just starts stirring up shit again. He finds a couple of dudes named Gog and Magog and they all start riling up the people, (those non christians,) to rebel against God one more time, for old time's sake. God just says "meh" and wipes them out with fire and brimstone, which compared to Armageddon is actually not that much effort. God destroys the current earth and the current universe and makes new universe and new Earth. Except Earth is more like the planet Coruscant from Star Wars, no natural features just one large Holy City named "New Jerusalem." And that's where we all live happily ever after, the end.
Can I again stress that while a majority of American Protestants currently believe this model, this is NOT how Catholics or any other part of the Christian world or any other time in Christian History interperets Revelations?
Anyway. I was taught this in 3rd grade. (I'll remind you that I was in private school from K-12. School and Sunday School were one and the same for me.) And not only that, I had to endure the attitude that "this could all happen at any second." That was terrifying. Kids would that there mom's friend's friend had seen an Angel hitchhiker dressed in a tux saying "Gabriel's lips are on the horn." I remember my teacher explaining the school plan to us, telling us when we'd graduate High School, (2003) and when we'd start College. Then she'd dismissively say, "Well, Jesus will almost definitely come back long before you graduate." Followed by an even more direct, "Yes, children, Jesus is coming back soon!" and all the little children in that class besides me whispering excitedly "Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes!"
I decided. I didn't WANT to be a part of the rapture. I didn't want to be alive on that day. I mean, think about it: you're minding your own business, when in the blink of an eye, you're torn away from everything and everyone you know and love, and your very nature as a living being was changed? While the other children prayed to Hasten Christ's Return, I prayed, "Jesus, please let me grow old and die before you come back. You've already waited 2000 years, just give me an extension of one measly life time." Okay, so I'm throwing in that second line as an adult. But honestly, it didn't make sense. Why should I be born and be just a little kid when Jesus comes back, giving me a brief taste of life then denying it to me?
As a child, the unsettled me. I couldn't sleep over this. Any loud sound I would get worried was Gabriel's Horn. I had Nightmares about the second coming. One, a vivid one, had Jesus coming back while I was at a stadium of some sort. To this day, I've refused to go to a sporting event for this reason.
Eventually, I mellowed out on all this. As a teenager, I faced the issue head on after a sorts by intensely studying Revelations and other books about Christian Prophecy. I calmed down when I read books and articles, (not least of which, an excellent one online by our Toonzone friend The Old Maid) that showed me the Rapturist model is way off. And making fun of those awful left behind books help.
Still, in my unquiet moments, a loud noise will spook me and the idea of being instantaneously whisked off to heaven is not too appealing to me. And thus, that's where I've been mentally for a couple of days.
So. anyway. I've been sick lately. Got my antibiotics, fighting it out. I've spent most of my life after 15 being nearly perpetually sick. And my parents are in poor health. So we all get upset at each other, all of us expecting the other to be the care giver. But anyway.
So, it's in these moods I tend to get morbid. On other occasions, I've mused on Death, Eternity, and annihilation. (To recap, I don't want annihilation, but I fear eternity, even one spent in heaven.)
Well, lately, my mind has drifted to another old mental hobgoblin: the apocalypse. I've always been interested in it. A major reason being that I was perpetually, deathly afraid of the instantaneous end of the world from 3rd grade, (me being about 9,) to 10th grade (me being about 16.
Some kids probably experience a secular version of this. worrying that you'll see a sudden mushroom cloud or some terrible terrorist attack. But mine came from my religious upbringing.
About now, I should probably quickly recap what current teaching about the end of the world is in evangelical Christianity. This is just one interpretation of the book of Revelations, not the only one. (and not even the most accurate one.) Okay, I was taught that the end of the world would go something like this.
We're all wandering around, doing our thing, when a trumpet from heaven sounds. Jesus shows up. This is NOT the second coming though. this is something called the rapture. Only Christians see jesus, and he whisks all good christians up with Him into the sky and we all go to heaven. Meanwhile, on earth, a supreme asshole known as the antichrist takes over the world by negotiating peaceful co-existence between Israel and Palestine. (If this belief raises your eyebrows, it should.) Anyway, yadda yadda yadda. Antichrist turns out to be Hitler on steroids, in that he launches a Holocaust that makes Hitler's look subdued by comparison.) Meanwhile, up in heaven, this all makes God mad, so he starts unleashing plague after plague onto the earth that makes the old testament seem subdued. This, more or less goes on for 7 years, Then Jesus comes back, This time it IS the second coming, fights the battle of Armageddon, throws the antichrist into the lake of fire. But instead of doing the same thing to Satan, he just gives him a slap on the wrist by way of a 1000 year prison sentence where he's chained up in a cave somewhere. Jesus takes over the world and rules earth for a thousand years. (In case your wondering, there are non-Christians and non-Jews as part of this new world order too. They just defer to the Christians. I don't know if that makes you feel better or not.) So, things are kinda quiet for a thousand years. Then Satan gets let out. instead of learning his lesson, he just starts stirring up shit again. He finds a couple of dudes named Gog and Magog and they all start riling up the people, (those non christians,) to rebel against God one more time, for old time's sake. God just says "meh" and wipes them out with fire and brimstone, which compared to Armageddon is actually not that much effort. God destroys the current earth and the current universe and makes new universe and new Earth. Except Earth is more like the planet Coruscant from Star Wars, no natural features just one large Holy City named "New Jerusalem." And that's where we all live happily ever after, the end.
Can I again stress that while a majority of American Protestants currently believe this model, this is NOT how Catholics or any other part of the Christian world or any other time in Christian History interperets Revelations?
Anyway. I was taught this in 3rd grade. (I'll remind you that I was in private school from K-12. School and Sunday School were one and the same for me.) And not only that, I had to endure the attitude that "this could all happen at any second." That was terrifying. Kids would that there mom's friend's friend had seen an Angel hitchhiker dressed in a tux saying "Gabriel's lips are on the horn." I remember my teacher explaining the school plan to us, telling us when we'd graduate High School, (2003) and when we'd start College. Then she'd dismissively say, "Well, Jesus will almost definitely come back long before you graduate." Followed by an even more direct, "Yes, children, Jesus is coming back soon!" and all the little children in that class besides me whispering excitedly "Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes!"
I decided. I didn't WANT to be a part of the rapture. I didn't want to be alive on that day. I mean, think about it: you're minding your own business, when in the blink of an eye, you're torn away from everything and everyone you know and love, and your very nature as a living being was changed? While the other children prayed to Hasten Christ's Return, I prayed, "Jesus, please let me grow old and die before you come back. You've already waited 2000 years, just give me an extension of one measly life time." Okay, so I'm throwing in that second line as an adult. But honestly, it didn't make sense. Why should I be born and be just a little kid when Jesus comes back, giving me a brief taste of life then denying it to me?
As a child, the unsettled me. I couldn't sleep over this. Any loud sound I would get worried was Gabriel's Horn. I had Nightmares about the second coming. One, a vivid one, had Jesus coming back while I was at a stadium of some sort. To this day, I've refused to go to a sporting event for this reason.
Eventually, I mellowed out on all this. As a teenager, I faced the issue head on after a sorts by intensely studying Revelations and other books about Christian Prophecy. I calmed down when I read books and articles, (not least of which, an excellent one online by our Toonzone friend The Old Maid) that showed me the Rapturist model is way off. And making fun of those awful left behind books help.
Still, in my unquiet moments, a loud noise will spook me and the idea of being instantaneously whisked off to heaven is not too appealing to me. And thus, that's where I've been mentally for a couple of days.