• Twitter
  • Facebook
News-Sentinel.com Your Town. Your Voice.
Opening Arguments

Rapture ready

Haven't made any big plans for Saturday, have you?

A New York man spent his entire $140,000 life savings advertising his prediction that the world will end May 21, the New York Post reported Friday.

Robert Fitzpatrick, a 60-year-old Staten Island resident, said he spent at least that sum on 1,000 subway-car placards and ads on bus kiosks and subway cars.

They say, "Global Earthquake: The Greatest Ever! Judgment Day May 21, 2011."
In a self-published book, "The Doomsday Code," Fitzpatrick said the Bible offers "proof that cannot be dismissed."

"Judgment Day will surprise people. We will not be ready for it," Fitzpatrick said in an interview with the newspaper. "A giant earthquake will render the earth uninhabitable."

I hope it isn't actually on Saturday; I don't have a thing to wear. And I usually way overpack even for a few-day trip; you should see how stuffed my suitcases are for a week in Texas. I shudder to think how much I'll need for Judgment Day.

Christians don't seem to be buying this. In a poll conducted by the King James Bible Online website, 98 percent said "No one knows but God" when Judgment Day will occur. Only 2 percent said May 21.  And nobody chose Dec. 21, 201 (that whole Mayan calendar scam). The May 21 prediction comes from Harold Camping of the Family Radio organization, who previously predicted Judgment Day would come in 1994. This guy is like Paul Erhlich, the Matlhusian nut who won't shut up about the Earth being too populous to sustain itself even though not a single one of his predictions has ever come true. He's just going to keep at it until he gets it right.

Or maybe Judment Day was in 1994. That would explain a lot. We've all been Left Behind, and all the crazy stuff that's been happening has been perpetrated by people with nothing left to lose.

Comments

Bob G.
Tue, 05/17/2011 - 10:14am

Leo:
I'm gonna have to go with your LAST paragraph...that kinda nails the coffin shut for ME (no pun intended...well, maybe a little one).

;)

William Larsen
Tue, 05/17/2011 - 1:02pm

I am not sure how numbers and dates are identified in the Mayan calendar, but if it is like roman numerals, I would guess that stone mason got tired and stopped at 12-21-2011

Quantcast