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A Scriptural Reflection on the Readings for Sunday, April 21st, the Fourth Sunday of Easter | Carl E. OlsonReadings:• Acts 13:14, 43-52• Ps 100:1-2, 3, 5• Rev 7:9, 14b-17• Jn 10:27-30Pop quiz: which book of the Bible describes black helicopters, high-tech warfare involving Russia and China, and computer chips embedded in human flesh? Hopefully you answered, “None.” But you may know that some Christians believe the Book of Revelation, or The Apocalypse, describes soon-to-transpire, end of the world events in harrowing detail. And most people—even many Catholics—believe that the final book of the Bible is an unremitting work of doom,...

Rectum? It Darn Near Killed Him! A man in China's southeastern Guangdong province admitted himself to a local hospital after he reportedly got a live eel stuck inside him. Artist Rendition Not gonna say why or how, let's say it wasn't an accident.  The report does not indicate whether it was consensual or if the eel was electric.�� 2 �� Gates of Hell Prevail? So the gates of hell have prevailed all these years. Scientists have discovered the legendary gates of hell in Turkey. When they find the actual gates of Hell, I am left with two questions. Why would...

Oregon school cancels zombie survival classes, ensures students will be eaten Armand Larive Middle School had what is perhaps the greatest junior high social studies class ever: Zombie Survival Skills. But the killjoy parents and administrators put the kibosh on the post-apocalyptic class, feeling that undead studies were not appropriate for growing minds. The East Oregonian reported on Rich Harshberger's zombie survival classes at Armand Larive earlier this week, a class that focused largely on real-world survival skills and also had a reading and writing component. Apparently, parents were a bit surprised to learn the school was teaching a class...

Imagine if suddenly, and completely without warning, the world experienced a total blackout – no electricity, no mobile phones, no banks, no internet, no TV, no emergency services. Nothing. Highways quickly become jammed with cars that have ground to a halt; an aeroplane falls from the sky; a satellite view of the planet shows it rapidly plunging into darkness. As it becomes apparent that the lights are never coming back on, nations are plunged into chaos, mass riots break out in major cities and, without electricity, governments are toppled. Into the vacuum step ad-hoc militias, armed and ready to enforce...

Ahmadinejad: Chavez Will Return With Jesus and 12th Imam A day after his death, Hugo Chavez is already being touted as a martyr and a messiah by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who equated the now deceased Venezuelan leader to Jesus and Shiite Islam’s 12th imam Wednesday, saying, “I have no doubt that he will return, along with the righteous Jesus and the perfect human.” Ahmadinejad also reiterated claims made by Venezuelan Vice President Nicolas Maduro that Chavez died of a “suspect illness” but didn’t go as far as Maduro had in equating Chavez’s death to that of late Palestinian Liberation...

Are you worried about the effects of federal spending cuts on the economy? Yes No

Iran has begun installing advanced centrifuges at its main uranium enrichment plant, the U.N. nuclear watchdog said on Thursday, a defiant step that will worry Western powers ahead of a resumption of talks with Tehran next week. In a confidential report, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said 180 so-called IR-2m centrifuges and empty centrifuge casings had been put in place at the facility near the central town of Natanz. They were not yet operating. If launched successfully, such machines could enable Iran to speed up significantly its accumulation of material that the West fears could be used to devise...

Resigning Pope Brings Doomsday Prophecy Is the world only a Pope away from the End? Yes, if you believe a chilling 12th-century prophecy. Attributed to St. Malachy, an Irish archbishop canonized in 1190, the Prophecy of the Popes would date to 1139. The document predicted that there would be only 112 more popes before the Last Judgment — and Benedict XVI is 111. The list of popes originated from a vision Malachy said he received from God when he was in Rome, reporting on his diocese to Pope Innocent II. The story goes that St. Malachy gave the apocalyptic list...

Superstitious Russians Spent 30 Billion On Preparing For Apocalypse Politics / RussiaDec 27, 2012 - 11:52 AM By: Pravda The Russians, who shared the horror of impending apocalypse with the rest of the world, spent 30 billion rubles on the eve of December 21st. The calculations were made by FBK analysts, who examined the data on the structure of trade turnover and services purchased in December. The end of the world did not come, but many people have to deal with its consequences now - the shortage of money. The hype around the "end of the world" still goes on....

THE problem - as Mayan apocalypse expert Robert Bast puts it - is that if you build it, they will come. And that's why the man who wrote the book on the impending end of the world - due either tomorrow or Saturday Australia time, depending on which time zone you believe it will strike in first - won't show you his doomsday bunker. Asked to take us to the safe house he and his wife and three children will be fleeing to on Friday, he was adamant that its location had to remain secret. ''I've turned down every request...

Ahead of December 21, which marks the conclusion of the 5,125-year "Long Count" Mayan calendar, panic buying of candles and essentials has been reported in China and Russia, along with an explosion in sales of survival shelters in America. In France believers were preparing to converge on a mountain where they believe aliens will rescue them. The precise manner of Armageddon remains vague, ranging from a catastrophic celestial collision between Earth and the mythical planet Nibiru, also known as Planet X, a disastrous crash with a comet, or the annihilation of civilisation by a giant solar storm. In America Ron...

A few days ago, I posted this blog: Doomsday Preppers are Socially Selfish. The role of a blogger is to foment discussion an it certainly appears that’s what I did. I very much appreciated most of the 150+ comments – except perhaps the ones that called me ‘stupid’, ‘nuts, ‘arrogant’, ‘ignorant’ – and a few personal emails that were much more graphic. I wrote this for the emergency management community, who pretty much misunderstood what I was saying. Social media is certainly powerful and I had no idea this would be so controversial. FIRST .. let me offer a heartfelt...

As December 21, 2012 grows near, the hysteria concerning the end of the Maya calendar is coming to a head. Gullible people all over the world are stocking up on non-perishable items and preparing for an apocalyptic disaster. For scientists, though, these latest doomsday prophecies are the same thing as any prophecy – a claim without enough evidence to even be worthy of the label ‘hypothesis.’ Not everyone knows bunk when they hear it, though, so NASA recently devoted the precious time of some of its scientists to debunking the spurious claims. NASA researchers from all over the U.S. gathered...

In case you haven’t heard, the world is supposed to end at midnight on December 21—this year.At least, that’s according to some popularized interpretations of what the Mayans said. But predictions of the end times are hardly a new or unusual thing. For Christians, prophecies of an imminent apocalypse are just about as old as the Church itself. Those predicting the end were an eclectic lot, with wild ideas and strange teachings. They include an antipope, a saint who rode the devil like a donkey, and cultish charismatics who dressed like harlots. Some were inspired by their false interpretations...

STORY When out-of-work techie Duke Evans and his family try to rebuild their lives in a remote mountain town, their own version of the American Dream is cut short as planes begin falling from the sky and all power, communications and transportation suddenly stops working. Caught in an unprecedented cyberattack that signifies the end of the U.S. as we know it, Duke and his family must use all their wits and the unlikely help of an illegal immigrant, to survive this frighteningly realistic scenario where water, food and time are running out.Dragon Day Dragon Day is an independent film that...

If you believe in that sort of thing, humanity can expect a mere two months left of existence before the Mayan apocalypse hits Dec. 21. Sunday starts the two-month countdown toward doomsday, according to an interpretation of the Mayan calendar that has taken hold in some New Age and spiritualist communities online. Two ancient texts confirm the end date of the Mayan Long Count calendar on the winter solstice of this year, which is Dec. 21, 2012. That day is the last day of the 13th bak'tun, or 144,000-day cycle, of the calendar. Ancient Maya would have seen the end...

For those of you who’ve been living under a mainstream media rock the past ten years, then the following sentences are simply the chorus to a song by the famous rock band R.E.M. It’s the end of the world as we know it. It’s the end of the world as we know it. It’s the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine. But to those of us with an apocalyptic bent, the chorus to that song takes the form of an acronym. TEOTWAWKI. And we refer to the acronym on a daily basis, because we...

On Prayer in the 2nd Part of the Book of Revelation [Apocalypse] "There are no superfluous, useless prayers; not one of them is lost" VATICAN CITY, SEPT. 12, 2012 (Zenit.org).- Here is a translation of the address Benedict XVI gave today in Paul VI Hall at the general audience. The Holy Father today continued his reflection on prayer in the book of Revelation [Apocalypse]. * * * Dear brothers and sisters, Last Wednesday I spoke about prayer in the first part of Revelation[Apocalypse]. Today we move on to the second part of the book; and whereas in the first part,...

Pope Benedict XVI says the final book of the Bible, which he referred to as the Book of the Apocalypse, provides Christians with a vision of a Church fully in communion with Jesus Christ in prayer. “The Apocalypse presents us with a community gathered in prayer, because it is in prayer that we gain an increasing awareness of Jesus’s presence with us and within us,” the Pope said during his Sept. 5 general audience at the Vatican. “The more and the better we pray with constancy and intensity, the more we are assimilated to him, and the more he enters...

On Prayer in Part 1 of Revelation [Apocalypse] "The Church at prayer, in welcoming the Lord's Word, is transformed" VATICAN CITY, SEPT. 5, 2012 (Zenit.org).- Here is a translation of the Italian-language catechesis Benedict XVI gave today during the general audience held in Paul VI Hall. The Holy Father reflected on prayer in the first part of the Book of Revelation [Apocalypse]. * * * Dear brothers and sisters, Today, after a summer holiday break, we resume the audiences at the Vatican, and I would like to continue in that "school of prayer" that I am living together with you...

Recipes for the Post-Apocalypse: How and Why to Eat Rat Meat Rat is a readily available street food in some Southeast Asian countries, and earlier editions of The Joy of Cooking contained instructions on the proper butchering of squirrels. But rodents have fallen out of favor in most Western cuisines, relegated to mere vermin. So how would you go about cooking a rat if you'd never tried it before? Laura Ginn did just that recently, breaking her lengthy vegetarianism to how to butcher and prepare rodent meat. Ginn is an artist whose work largely incorporates survival skills such as skinning...

For Only $23,999.00 ... the Ultimate Zombie Apocalypse Survival Kit Your last hope: The $24,000 zombie survival kit Don't expect big firepower from this gear collection, but it does have a few tools that could keep you alive among the undead. My preparations for the coming zombie apocalypse came down to one thing: a baseball bat. But this kit from OpticsPlanet makes me think I'm being terribly naive. The Z.E.R.O. (Zombie Extermination, Research, and Operations) Zombie Kit is the mother of all undead survival kits. For a whopping $24,000 you get oodles of tools, protective gear, cases, and weapons accessories....

Would you want to survive the end of civilization? Let's say the end of the world as we know it is coming — but someone offers you a priceless spot in their guaranteed-to-be-safe bunker, so you can be one of the chosen few who rebuilds the Earth. Would you want to survive, and emerge into the post-apocalyptic wasteland? Would the positives of playing a role in a new society outweigh the loss of creature comforts? Or would you rather just go out with the majority of the human race? I wouldn't last long in a Mad Max-style world — the...

Double-barrel pistol reinvents the meaning of double tapping Don't cry to us when the Mayan Apocalypse comes with a horde of brain-dead zombies because we'll just shake our heads at you for not stocking up on Arsenal Firearms' double barrel handgun that fires two bullets with every trigger pull. More commonly referred to as the AF2011-AF Double Barrel Pistol or "Twenty Eleven" or "Second Century," the gun is special because it's the first semi-automatic pistol that fires two bullets at once. Its body is intrinsically that of a Colt 1911-A1 with twin .45 caliber barrels that can carry eight bullets...

Hyundai's Zombie Survival Machine Hyundai is looking toward the future. Unfortunately it’s a bleak future, where humanity is on the verge of extinction brought upon by the Zombie Apocalypse, but, hey, you’ve got to plan for everything, right? The automaker has teamed up with the creator of the “The Walking Dead” comic book series, Robert Kirkman, to create a Zombie Survival Machine based on its new Elantra Coupe, which will be unveiled at San Diego Comic Con on July 11th. The car was designed by Kirkman who tapped a decade of experience vanquishing zombies to come up with the key...

No, a bunker will not save you from the apocalypse Everybody talks about the apocalypse, but almost nobody actually prepares for it. But let's say you're one of the few visionaries who actually plans for every eventuality. You've been stashing your supplies. You've built a personal bunker, or you've purchased your own spot in a communal "survival suite." When the apocalypse finally comes — possibly later this year — will you really survive if you're locked inside a bunker? (Answer: No.) Protecting against any 2012 scenario A thriving industry exists to offer structures that will defend against a variety of...

What Is A Zombie? History Of A Zombie Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse Girls And Guns Girls With Tattoos The 6 Creepiest Places On Earth When You See IT… The Walking Dead Best Memes You Tube Full Length Movies Zombie Movies Disaster And Doomsday Movies Zombie WallPapers ZombieLand Rules Zombie Proof House Vitamins And Minerals List

Jesus says: "When I put in Zephaniah's mouth that I wll take away everything from the earth, I am having him prophesy what will happen the day before the eve of the last time. I then announced the same thing when I spoke about the destruction of the world, veiled behind the description of the ruin of the Temple and of Jerusalem. Later the Beloved prophesied it again in his Apocalypse (Rev.14:14-20, 19:11-21, 20:1-15). The voices follow each other. In fact, I can say that, as in a sacred building erected to testify the glory of the Lord, the voices...

The oldest-known version of the ancient Maya calendar has been discovered adorning a lavishly painted wall in the ruins of a city deep in the Guatemalan rainforest. The hieroglyphs, painted in black and red, along with a colorful mural of a king and his mysterious attendants, seem to have been a sort of handy reference chart for court scribes in A.D. 800 — the astronomers and mathematicians of their day. Contrary to popular myth, this calendar isn't a countdown to the end of the world in December 2012, the study researchers said.

An ancient Mayan skull stolen from Tibet by Nazis - said to have magical powers to enable humanity to survive the December 2012 apocalypse - has been dropped by a lab assistant in eastern Germany, chipping its chin. The volcanic rock skull, named Quauthemoc, was dropped - or, more eerily, may have fallen of its own accord - during a photo-shoot at a laboratory in the small town of Glauchau, Saxony. "It was probably put down somewhere a bit wobbly," an eye-witness told Bild newspaper. "Suddenly it crashed to the floor. A big piece broke off the chin. It's really...

Nearly 15 percent of people worldwide believe the world will end during their lifetime, and 10 percent think the Mayan calendar could signify that it will happen this year, according to a new poll. The end of the Mayan calendar — which spans about 5,125 years — on Dec. 21 has sparked interpretations and suggestions that it marks the end of the world. "Whether they think it will come to an end through the hands of God or a natural disaster or a political event, whatever the reason, 1 in 7 thinks the end of the world is coming," said...

In 1958, America accidentally dropped a nuclear weapon on two little girls’ playhouse For certain rural residents of the Carolinas during the Cold War, apocalyptic anxiety hit disturbingly close to home. In 1958 and 1961, the American Air Force lost nuclear weapons over the skies of South and North Carolina, respectively, raining potential apocalypse on the folks below. In both incidents, complete catastrophe was avoided thanks to that ever-potent combination of foresight and unmitigated dumb luck. And in the former incident, the bomb fell square on some unsuspecting children's playhouse. The first accident occurred over Florence, South Carolina on March...

Earth Day is a good time to look back and reflect upon the more dire predictions regarding the environment and life on earth. Here are some from 1970, Earth Day’s inaugural year.“…civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind.” -Biologist George Wald, Harvard University, April 19, 1970. By 1995, “…somewhere between 75 and 85 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct.” -Sen. Gaylord Nelson, quoting Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, Look magazine, April 1970. Because of increased dust, cloud cover and water vapor “…the planet will cool, the...

<p>In a creative move meant to draw attention to how to deal with more likely emergencies, last May the Centers for Disease Control posted tips for how to successfully survive a zombie invasion. The timing was perfect: apocalypse discussion was already popular since an End Times pastor had announced the world would end on May 21, and a more realistic danger, hurricane season, was starting on June 1.</p>

Holy cr@p! This zombie attack bike is powered by a chainsaw I'm sorry, did you think I meant a chainsaw motor? I suppose that's understandable (after all, two-stroke chainsaw engines are often used to convert bicycles into rear-wheel-drive motorbikes), but I didn't say chainsaw motor, did I? I said chainsaw. Because whoever pieced together this unholy death machine has clearly left the power source attached to a number of other components. They've even opted for a FWD conversion so that the saw's guide blade and cutting chain could be front-mounted. 100% terrifying, 100% brilliant. Perfect for plowing through hordes of...

Which Science Fictional Scenario Is Most Likely to Happen in Your Lifetime? Science fiction is full of fantastic and horrifying scenarios, many of which seem like they could come true any time. But which of them is really going to materialize — and which is most likely to happen in your lifetime? Vote in our poll for the science fictional scenario that you're most likely to live to witness for yourself: Which Science Fictional Scenario Is Most Likely to Happen in Your Lifetime? Global Pandemic Moonbase World War III/Nuclear Apocalypse Suspended Animation The Singularity Something Else (See Comments) Martian Colony...

How will we get around in the post-apocalypse? One of the irritating things about many post-apocalyptic movies in TV shows is that everyone drives everywhere, with little thought about alternative modes of transportation. But how will we get around after armageddon? We weigh the post-apocalyptic transit options. Hopefully, down the line, we'd see groups of people teaming up to bring back trains, but in terms of personal transit in the immediate post-apocalypse, here are a few options: Cars: Ah, the noble car, transit mode of choice in far too many post-apocalyptic fictions. For some people, cars might be a logical...

Could you really survive the apocalypse by eating freeze-dried food? Is it really a good idea to store freeze dried food for a long-term survival situation? It may be an attractive proposition for the survivalist in you, but you probably didn't bargain on what exactly the process of freeze drying involves — and its price. HOW TO CARRY A TON OF FOOD ON YOUR BACK The process of freeze drying plays with the properties of water within food. When freeze drying, a cooked portion of food is flash frozen under a vacuum. At low pressure, all but 2-5% of the...

R- 404 S- 161 G- 105 P- 61 OMG, this is a nightmare. PLEASE GOD, TELL ME HOW I AM WRONG! Go to the RCP delegate count page. I am using their numbers, they may be off a little but not much. Print it off. Add up the number of total delegates left (bound and unbound, winner take all and proportional.) You will get 1475. It takes 1144 to win. So right now: Romney needs 740 Santorum needs 983 Gingrich needs 1039 Paul needs 1414 That means: Romney needs to win 50% of the delegates left to clinch. Santorum needs...

Wyoming rejects plan to buy aircraft carrier in case U.S. fell apart When the zombie apocalypse is upon us, we'll look back on how legislators from the land-locked state of Wyoming were mocked for wanting to buy an aircraft carrier. The carrier was just one part of a so-called "Doomsday Bill," which explored emergency scenarios in the event of the United States collapsing. In addition to suggesting the purchase of an aircraft carrier, the bill called for $15,000 in funding to investigate how Wyoming might acquire airplanes, enact a draft for all branches of the military, obtain and distribute food...

The U.N. nuclear watchdog ended its latest mission to Iran after talks on Tehran's suspected secret atomic weapons research failed, a setback likely to increase the risk of confrontation with the West. The United States criticized Iran on Wednesday over the failure of the International Atomic Energy Agency's latest mission, saying it again showed Tehran's refusal to abide by its international obligations over its nuclear program. Expressing defiance, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Iran's nuclear policies would not change despite mounting international pressure against what the West says are Iran's plans to obtain nuclear bombs. "With God's help, and...

GM, Ford feud over Super Bowl ad (Reuters) - A simmering feud between General Motors Co and Ford Motor Co heated up on Sunday as Ford objected to GM's Super Bowl advertisement for its Chevy Silverado pickup truck. The ad, which will run on NBC's television broadcast of the Super Bowl on Sunday, depicts an apocalyptic scene in which Chevrolet Silverado pickup trucks and their owners escape death and make it to a pre-arranged meeting point. But, one of their friends, identified as "Dave," who drives a Ford, doesn't make it to the meeting site, in the video that plays...

It seems like everyone has their own vision of the Apocalypse. For Christians, The End is synonymous with the Four Horsemen, the Rapture and the Anti-Christ. Environmentalists, meanwhile, fear climate change, melting polar ice caps and turbulent weather. For paranoid newshounds, if rogue states like Iran or North Korea don't trigger a nuclear war, then debt-wracked banks will soon lead to total societal collapse. Then there's Hollywood: aliens, meteors, earthquakes, malfunctioning uteri and Hitchcock's angry birds. While the Apocalypse-theme has essentially become a pop culture cliché, it remains endlessly fascinating. Case in point: the Christian-focused "Left Behind" books, which have...

How you equip yourself for a zombie apocalypse depends largely on your personal belief systems. Are you going to focus solely on self-preservation? Or is restoring order to your country a transcendent objective? How willing are you to share your resources with strangers? And how discriminating will you be in shooting other human beings? Author Daniel Drezner tackles such moral dilemmas on a global level in his book Theories of International Politics and Zombies. Drezner is the real deal, by the way, a professor of international politics at Tufts University and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Here’s...

There are years that are remembered for changing the course of human history:1492. 1776. 1945. Then there are years that were predicted to change the course of history. 1844, when Judgment Day didn't materialize. 1910, when Halley's Comet didn't wipe out humanity. And remember Y2K? But rarely does a year arrive with such a mixture of anticipation and dread as 2012. We speak not of the presidential campaign but of the Maya calendar, and the projection that it — or, more accurately, a cycle within it — will end on Dec. 21, 2012. That date has kicked up a swirl...

Mayans couldn't even see their own End of Days MY prediction for the year 2012, which I am told begins tomorrow, is that the world will not end. This is despite the belief that the Mayan calendar says that it will. The calendar was devised 5,125 years ago by the Mayans of Central America, a people who never had the wit to invent the wheel, but it runs out on Dec. 21, 2012. The End of Days, so to speak. If, as some seers suggest, thats an accurate prediction, you have less than a year to get your affairs in...

Apocalypse 13:16-18 is based on Ezekiel 8 and 9. The "mark" symbolized the spiritual condition of the inhabitants of Jerusalem. The ones with the "mark" were in allegiance with God. However, in Apocalypse, the mark is reversed. That is to say, the mark was on those who were against God and had allegiance to the "beast." John wrote that the number "is the number of a man's name; and his number is 666." This tells us that those who received the "mark" were actually in allegiance with a "man," an actually person of the first century. So, who was he?...

The long stagnating Red Dawn remake looks set to finally see the light of day, with a designated release date on the horizon. According to Box Office Mojo, the film will hit screens on November 2, 2012 – three years after filming wrapped. A big black cloud has been hanging over Red Dawn in the form of the MGM bankruptcy saga, but, as reported here in September, independent distributor FilmDistrict struck a deal to finally get the film into cinemas, not matter how long it takes. The film is the first foray into directing by former stuntman Dan Bradley, who...

A laser powerful enough to tear apart the fabric of space could be built in Britain. The major scientific project will follow in the footsteps of the Large Hadron Collider and will answer questions about the universe. The laser will be capable of producing a beam of light so intense that it will be similar to the light the earth receives from the sun but focused on a speck smaller than a pin prick. Scientists say it will be so powerful they will be able to boil the very fabric of space and create a vacuum. A vacuum fizzles with...