TEACHING DOOMSDAYER DAVID MEADE THE TRUE SATANIC JOY OF THE “RAPTURE”

Once again, fundy weirdo David Meade tells us it’s time for the “Rapture.” And I’m pleased as punchout.

In the past, I’ve always complained about evangelical Christianity’s apocalypse fetish. A religious dedication to human annihilation seems a red flag to a layman like me. Especially given the current state of geopolitics, which is one part “Battleship” to two parts “Hungry, Hungry Hippos.”

But I’ve come to realize that not all apocalypses are created equal. (Outside of the fact that none of them ever happen, that much at least is consistent.)

And although David Meade is a foolish person with hazardous beliefs, his “prophecies” come packed with one (pardon the term) saving grace. Namely: We definitely know when they don’t happen.

 

“Christian numerologist” Meade makes endless End Times guesses. The Bible told him that “planet Nibiru” would collide with the Earth in September 2017. He also anticipated a nuclear war in October that year, and the return of “Nibiru” in March. Our research team is still digging into whether any of that panned out.

Now he’s got a new date: April 23, 2018. Tomorrow. As Meade explains, it’s all in the stars:

“The 12 stars at that date include the nine stars of Leo, and the three planetary alignments of Mercury, Venus and Mars, which combine to make a count of 12 stars on the head of Virgo. Thus the constellations Virgo, Leo and Serpens-Ophiuchus represent a unique once-in-a-century sign. That is our marker.”

FYI, this is why they don’t allow edibles in the planetarium.

Writing for Live Science, Stephanie Pappas points out that not only is this not Meade’s first End Times endzone rush, the April 23 date is old hat too:

“April 23 hearkens back to William Miller, whose followers would form the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Miller predicted multiple doomsday dates, including April 23, 1843. He was most famous for a later prediction that would live on in infamy as ‘The Great Disappointment.'”

Oddly, that was also my nickname in high school. So I can identify a bit with the movement.

Despite calculation skills that are fuzzier than a Tribble, I’ve grown fond of these luckless doomsday hucksters. At least the nature of their “prophecies” comes with the expectation of results

More troublesome fundie cults prefer predictions that can never appear wrong. Anti-Satanist suckers claimed last year that DC Metro Police were “officially investigating” Pizzagate, for example. Nearly six months later the “investigation” appears to have done nothing at all—almost like it doesn’t exist!—but the true believers still believe.

 

And then of course there’s #Qanon, the 8chan conspiracy hallucination that imagines an entire invisible war with devil-worshiping liberals. Hillary Clinton is really in jail, they insist. You might see her on TV every week, but it’s all a ruse.

“80 percent of this battle will never see the light of day. But it is happening,” the believers say. How anybody knows about things that “will never see the light of day” seems a mystery, but I guess questions like that are why I’m on the list.

And as Satanic Temple co-founder Lucien Greaves reminded an audience in Philadelphia last week, conspiracy assholes still insist secret tunnels exist beneath the infamous McMartin Preschool in LA County.

No one has ever seen these tunnels but, Zen-like, they exist without existing. For many people, the truth is invisible, formless, and undetectable, but somehow definitely there.

In Carl Sagan’s 1996 book The Demon-Haunted World, he writes about the “invisible dragon” conundrum. Imagine I tell you a dragon lives in my garage, but it’s invisible, intangible, weighs nothing, and leaves no trace.

“What’s the difference between an invisible, incorporeal dragon and no dragon at all?” Sagan wondered. The answer: only belief.

So I find doomsday prophecies almost comforting by comparison. Doomsdayers must set a date, and when the end doesn’t come they must acknowledge it.

Even if, like David Meade, that acknowledgement is in the form of a new date, that just means having to admit error again down the line.

“Rapture” dates never turn out to be a great supernatural Christian reckoning. Instead they become Satanic events in which reality routes superstition.

So to David Meade and all of his believers: A happy Rapture Day to you. And here’s to many more.