The Sydney Morning Herald
Rapture deadline passes, world still here
May 22, 2011
Warnings by a Christian doomsday prophet that the world would end on Saturday sent some people into hiding and others into deep depression. But for one Aussie larrikin nothing was going to spoil his "last supper" of fish'n'chips.
American televangelist Harold Camping had predicted the so-called global "Rapture" would begin with powerful earthquakes at 6pm local time in each of the world's regions, after which the good would be taken into heaven.
The not-so-good would suffer hell on earth until October 21, when God would pull the plug on the planet once and for all.
n Australia, an early target of Camping's prediction of Armageddon, Christians greeted news of the end of the world with scepticism and humour as the fateful hour passed without incident.
In Melbourne, Jon Gall was unimpressed by the distinct lack of fire and brimstone.
At the appointed hour, Mr Gall tweeted: "Rapture time here in Melbourne. A rather quiet sort of rapture if you ask me."
Almost an hour later, he went public again: "Well we have had the "Rapture" going for 50 minutes now. So far it hasn't interrupted my fish & chips and glass of stout."
In Brisbane, another tweeter, KillaJeules, was equally unimpressed by the absence of a blockbuster ending.
"So it's 6:37pm here in Brisbane, Australia, said the tweet. "No earthquakes. No beaming up of Christians. No zombie apocalypse. No surprises haha."
Theologian Ian Packer said the May 21 deadline had been greeted with "openly humorous talk" down under.
"It's not being taken seriously at all," Packer, from the Australian Evangelical Alliance told AFP.
"Aside from hearing about Harold Camping in the media, we would not have known about his existence," he added.
Another of the first places to be hit, according to Camping, who wrongly predicted the end of the world in 1994, would be New Zealand, but there, too, 6pm came and went with no earthquakes and little local media attention.
As the appointed time came and went around the world, derision and jokes flowed thick and fast on the micro blogging site.
"Marvellous news! rapture doesn't mean end of world: apparently all the planet's imbeciles disappear in one go" tweeted British actor and writer Stephen Fry.
"People are making jokes like there's no tomorrow," was another top tweet.
For but some, the skeptics had made their point and it was time to move on.
"kinda wish the rapture would come if only to get rid of all the people making unfunny rapture jokes," tweeted Joseph Stannard, writing under the handle of TheOuterChurch.
In the United States, where Camping's evangelising organisation is based, some people had been quitting work and hitting the road to urge others to repent before it's too late.
Gregory LeCorps left his job weeks ago to take his wife and five young children on the road and warn others that the end really was nigh, the Journal News in New York wrote.
"We're in the final days," LeCorps, who said he hoped to be on a beach in South Carolina by Saturday, was quoted by the newspaper as saying.
In Vietnam, thousands of ethnic Hmong converged on northwestern Dien Bien province a few weeks ago after hearing broadcasts on Camping's global religious broadcasting network that Jesus was coming on May 21.
Hundreds were believed to be hiding in forests after security forces dispersed those who were awaiting the supposed return of Jesus Christ on Saturday, a resident told AFP.
The Vietnamese government said extremists used the gathering to advocate a Hmong kingdom but the resident said he was unaware of such talk.
Britain's Guardian newspaper described the looming Rapture as "the fundamentalist Christian equivalent of the last helicopter out of Saigon," referring to the US pull-out after the Vietnam war in 1975.
The fact that Camping's predictions have been wrong before has left even high-profile people willing to make fun of him.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg - who is Jewish and therefore, according to Camping's prophecy, had always been unlikely to be beamed up to sit alongside Jesus and God in heaven - said on his weekly radio show Friday that he would suspend alternate-side parking in New York if the world ends on Saturday.
The much-reviled parking rule requires New Yorkers to move their cars from one side of the street to the other to allow street cleaning to be carried out.
Some cashed in on money-making opportunities.
The Craigslist website ran tens of thousands of ads from non-believers offering to buy the worldly goods of those who believed they were going to heaven, while a group of US atheists sold hundreds of contracts to rescue people's pets.
AAP/AFP
http://www.smh.com.au/world/rapture-deadline-passes-world-still-here-20110521-1eycn.html
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