When Harold Camping recently recalculated his failed End Times prediction to propose that the Apocalypse that didn’t materialize on May 21 is actually, really, certainly, and definitely coming on October 21, I must admit, even I began to lose interest in the prophet from Oakland, California.
But the lessons of Harold Camping, particularly for Christians, just keep coming. There is so much to learn if we are willing to pay attention to the crazy circus that is Harold Camping’s world.
Take Lodro Rinzler’s “An Open Letter to Harold Camping” (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lodro-rinzler/an-open-letter-to-harold-_b_865813.html). Lodro is a Buddhist writer and teacher with Shambala International.
In his letter to Camping, Rinzler puts his finger on one of the most important morals of this story that Christians would do well to heed. Rinzler writes to Mr. Camping,
You’re a fear monger.
You trade in fear. You use it to manipulate good people to believe what you believe and tell them that if they don’t they will die a horrible death. Earthquakes, locusts, you name it. You have claimed that if I don’t get all of my friends and family into your specific branding of God’s plan, then they are screwed. Utilizing the people who would believe that, you attempted to strike fear into the heart of our great nation. For weeks we would hear that millions of lives would be lost if we did not follow what you believe. That is why I believe that you, Harold Camping, have terrorized America.
Here’s the thing: you thought you were doing the right thing. I get that. I really do. You wanted people to seek God’s love and then be saved. It’s the whole “If you don’t do exactly what I believe, you are damned” side of the coin that I think is really aggressive and hateful.
It’s a shame we live in a culture where thousands, if not millions, of people nervously checked their watches at 6 p.m. on May 21. We live in a culture of fear. You’re not helping us move beyond fear. You’re indulging in it.
The kind of fear that is generated by the threat of cataclysm does not work to open and soften peoples’ hearts.
At a recent screening of Velcrow Ripper’s documentary in progress, “Evolve Love,” newly elected Green Party member of Parliament Elizabeth May was invited to address the audience. She spoke briefly, passionately, and eloquently. She said,
Fear, anger, even bitter deep loathing don’t work to bring about positive change. Healthy change only comes by turning our crisis into a love story.
Harold Camping is not the first Christian preacher to have stooped to using fear as a blunt instrument to bludgeon people into making the changes he thinks are necessary for them to merit God’s favour. But we will never get to the right place using the wrong means. Fear, anger, and terror can never produce love. They lead only to more violence.
The often quoted John 3:16 represents the heart of the Gospel. The verse begins with the words, “For God so loved the world.” The God of Christian faith is a God who loves all of creation. Motivated by this love, Jesus says, that God “gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” The Gospel tells us that the centre of the universe is a force of self-giving Love. Our only task is to trust that power of Love.
There is nothing to fear. If we put our faith in the reality of the Love that Christians find revealed in Jesus, our hearts will open to the deep reality Jesus calls “eternal life.” We will experience a dimension within ourselves that is indestructible. We will not fear the Apocalypse. We will not tremble in the face of disaster, chaos, confusion, or doubt. Most of all, we will not be drawn into the foolishness of preachers who peddle in fear and manipulate with terror.
Love will lead us if we open our hearts. Love has the capacity to transform the world in which we live. We do not need to scare each other into the kingdom of Love. We need only to open our hearts and allow Love’s reality to flow out to embrace all of creation. This is the way to a transformed world.
In A Spacious Place 
7 comments
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May 26, 2011 at 5:58 am
jill
Thank you, for this; So wonderfully LIFE GIVING.
May 26, 2011 at 8:25 am
John
It’s true that Harold may be a fear monger, but that does suggest he’s capable of a great deal of conscious calculation around exactly how he communicates with the world. But those who fall for his ideas clearly lack critical thinking skills and much be pretty desperate and alienated themselves.
What I see in Harold is a skilled communicator than simply an individual who is most likely psychotic and extremely neurotic – someone who feels an uncommon need to project or broadcast his personal delusions and fantasies onto the world. Of, one could say this about American culture in general, with a small number of decent exceptions of course. In 2006 Bruce Cockburn released a song called “Tell the Universe,” which concerned the American invasion of Iraq and the use of war as a desperate attempt to stave off imperial collapse. The key lines, as far as Harold is concerned, would be:
You’ve been projecting your shit at the world
Self-hatred tarted up as a payback time
You can self destruct – that’s your right
But keep it to yourself if you don’t mind
As someone who was raised in a less extreme but similar “Christian” milieu as Harold, I know what it feels like to believe the world is soon going to end, that there’s no hope for the Earth, and all the rest that goes with it. But note that I abandoned this view of the world and the church that promoted it as soon as I was old enough to. For me these were the mere speculations of a young adolescent, and that is really what the mentality is behind this kind of Millennial thinking.
Do we have any justification, Harold aside, for believing that the world (or rather the universe) will someday end in an apocalypse set in motion by God? Must we be secular humanists and allow materialistic science the final word, or choose a primarily spiritual perspective where matter is secondary to spirit? Personally I hold to the view that spirit preceded matter and will postdate matter, that matter is a mere stage in our spiritual journey through the evolving universe. But are any major transformations in the nature of the Real just around the corner? Definitely not. Perhaps in the cosmic future. And I really do not believe there will be any easy solutions to the human condition, nor will the Divine provide us an escape hatch when the so-called ship goes down. The most I can say we must all pass through the purifying fire of the spirit, and this could take lifetimes for most of us.
May 26, 2011 at 8:28 am
John
Sorry, a bunch of typing errors – my keyboard is acting up this morning …
The line “It’s true that Harold may be a fear monger, but that does suggest he’s capable of a great deal of conscious calculation around exactly how he communicates with the world” should read “If its true that Harold may be a fear monger …”
Also the line “What I see in Harold is a skilled communicator than simply an individual who is most likely psychotic and extremely neurotic” should read “What I see in Harold is less a skilled communicator than simply an individual who is most likely psychotic and extremely neurotic”
I hope there aren’t too many more typos – sorry if there are.
May 26, 2011 at 8:33 am
John
Okay … so my first sentence is a write-off … argh … my point is that Harold isn’t a great communicator because he’s only been able to persuade other who are like him and and who already think like him.
May 26, 2011 at 8:35 am
Lindsay
Yes, if “our only task is to trust that power of Love”, to trust God and not give in to fear, this makes the most sense to me.
I’ve been trying to figure for a while now what a premonition is and what the point of it is … I’m thinking maybe that is what a premonition is …. you know like when you get a sense of something … a gut instinct … and your head tells you not to listen to it because it doesn’t make logical sense, and emotionally you just don’t want to deal with it because it’s not something you want to happen, and yet you kinda know deep down you have to follow it … like there really is no other option? The last time it happened to me, I was thinking it was more of a curse than a blessing … that I’d rather not have any sense what might happen in the future … just let things happen and not worry about it, not have to do anything about it … even though in the end the way things turned out the reasons to have followed it were clear. Now I’m thinking maybe, that type of premonition does have a purpose … it’s less about telling others what will happen, it’s more like a signpost preparing for something that might happen … to get ready to fulfill a role …. like a calling ….
May 26, 2011 at 8:51 am
Lindsay
… a calling not to be afraid but rather to trust that there is a flow … a Higher Power behind what might be about to happen … that life is unfolding in a way that isn’t entirely arbitrary or disassociated … that my responsibility is to be open to what might happen and to be ready to respond…. even it’s hard to explain the logic behind it or when it’s something I don’t necessarily want to do ….
May 26, 2011 at 10:10 pm
jaqueline
Look, Campings are everywhere. Whether it is religious or whatever, the world is run on fear…keeping people afraid keeps them paralysed .Brings home how revolutionary the words to people when he or angels appear to them: Do not fear.