The end is nigh! (But pay your mortgage just in case)
I'm reading another doom-and-gloom online story about recession, world stock market plunges and the Dow Jones roller-coaster when the "Ads by Google" link in the corner catches my eye.
Instead of the usual targeted pitches for surefire stock tips, MBA degrees and books touting foolproof fortune-building strategies, there is an advertisement for the-end.com -- a Web site predicting 2008 will bring about the end of the world.
(The optimist in me hopes the Rapture won't nab Carlos Zambrano until after the Cubs win the World Series.)
Of all the indicators of the apocalypse, Motorola's free fall (if not this sentence's tortuous metaphor) apparently is the final straw for that camel busting its hump hauling the handbasket we've packed for Armageddon. The Internet boasts hundreds of sites implying current economics are the final sign that "end of the world" should be penciled in somewhere on your 2008 appointment calendar.
"Let me be really frank with you," reads one Rapture survival guide. "If you are reading this manual and the Rapture has already occurred, then you probably are not going to physically survive."
The site suggests you stock up on vitamins C and E, just in case the Four Horsemen don't do you in. Considering I just lost my Internet connection when it got bitter cold, I'm impressed this group is confident it will have the bandwidth to stay afloat while the wrath of God rains down upon the globe.
Signs of approaching doom vary, but most predictors throw in everything from bird flu and global warming to gay marriages and Microsoft.
"There's been a long history, going back to the beginning of the church, of people trying to predict the end," says a dubious Nicholas Perrin, assistant professor of New Testament at Wheaton College. "They are implying they have a leg up on Jesus on this one. Jesus himself says, 'I don't even know.' "
There's probably a "Jesus doesn't know end time" bumper sticker in there somewhere. In the meantime, bacteria are on the rise, Palestinians are fleeing to Egypt, and my 401k account is getting crucified.
"Is that an indication of the End Time? Who knows? I don't think anybody is so bold to say they know the mind of God," says the Rev. Jeffrey Grob, a priest in the Chicago Archdiocese's pastoral center. Grob says people looking for signs, deciphering codes and predicting dates are missing the big picture.
"The most fundamental question to say is: Are you in a good relationship with the Lord? If you are, it doesn't matter whenever he pops up," Grob says.
"We aren't supposed to be looking with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other," Perrin adds. "God seems to be keeping his cards close to his vest on this one."
He probably didn't mean that literally, as I don't see God playing cards or still wearing the three-piece suit necessary to make that vest analogy work. But shouldn't true believers be rooting for the end time?
True believers should "long" for the end of the human world and a heavenly reunion with the Almighty, Perrin and Grob agree.
"But am I cheering and waving a banner, hoping that it is coming soon?" Grob says with a chuckle. "There is nothing wrong with loving life. Life is also a good thing. … If we are so hell-bent in getting out of this world, why are we fighting for life and all life's issues?
"If she shuts down at the end of the day, wonderful," Grob says of the world. "If not, well, that's wonderful, too. It's not 'When?' It's 'Will I be ready?' "
Living a good life today will come in handy even if Judgment Day doesn't arrive before you go.
But if you are certain the end is near, here is my tip:
When you purchase the "Endtime prophecy tour of the Holy Land" from a Web site offering you a chance to see all the religious tourist spots before the Battle of Armageddon begins, you might as well charge it.