You know, I've always thought, even before I was a Catholic, that if
you want to find out what Christians believe and why, you ought to ask
Christians before you take too much to heart what is said about their
beliefs by critics or cranks or even professors.
I have come to
apply that same approach to the beliefs of other groups, as well. So,
for instance, if I want to know what Buddhists believe, I favor asking
Buddhists, rather than some expert in comparative religions who studies
Buddhists like insects pinned to a card.
The same courtesy ought
to be extended to the modern descendants of the Maya, who would like to
make it very clear that they – none of them – are lying awake nights
wondering if the world will end in 2012. Not according to this AP article from Yahoo News, anyway.
The
purveyors of this cash-conjuring nonsense, such as the folks at the
History Channel, are doing to the Maya what Dan Brown did for the
Catholic Church in his ham-fisted conspiracy fiction… spinning tales
out of whole cloth and embroidering them with totally unrelated bits of
archeological and historical "evidence" which are only evidence of their
colossal ignorance.
There's nothing wrong with ignorance, per se.
Ignorance with humility is harmless and curable, but ignorance combined
with pride blossoms into arrogance, and is most often incurable, the
patient being highly resistant to the only antidote.
The Maya
would like to invite us all to shut up about the "mysteries" of the
calendar of their ancestors, and take a moment to consider that no contemporary Mayan has ever considered that the calendar predicts anything like the end of the world in 2012.
I
do predict, however, that the loopy 2012 theories will generate a lot
of book and DVD sales. If you could pile all that bull**** into one
place, it might really shift the poles enough to usher in a new ice
age. The real disaster may be the denuding of forests to print all the
books, or the food shortages caused by hoarders who foolishly threw out
their stockpiles of supplies from the Y2K scare. Should have held onto
those powdered eggs…
(Lovingly cross-posted at Tim Jones' blog Old World Swine)
That’s true, Tim.
I have friends in Mexico who are Mayan. They are all Catholic and much more interested in what the Pope has to say and in having a devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe than in all of this end of the world stuff.
They do take rightful pride in their history and ethnicity. For example, they were please when Apocalypto came out, if only for the fact that it was the first major film using the Mayan language, even if the dialect was modern and not from the period.
+J.M.J+
Thank you for that article. It just confirmed what I’ve thought all along; the new 2012 hype is a load of nonsense. Just like the Rapture predictions for 1988, 1989, and 1992, the end-of-the-world predictions for 1994, 1996, 2000… not to mention Y2K.
Just when I thought we were beyond all that millenial hysteria, they’ve found another thing to get scared over. I guess after all the Bible speculation-based dates failed they had to turn to Mayan civilization and exploit that.
In Jesu et Maria,
Rosemarie
It’s easy to appreciate your defense of the Mayans from the easy rip-off of 2012, but I’d like to call your attention to the national–even global–hysteria that the movie plans to tap, and I’d like to suggest to you that this is the end of SOMETHING anyway. We may be about fed up! And I think we’re fed up about the increasing divide between the beliefs of the people, and the government we’ve erected to the false god of freedom. It is failing to serve. Would you entertain the idea that we need a third party that discards the notion of the secular state? I wrote a little piece about it on my own blog, and I wish you’d go read it and comment. I feel like the only person in the world who sees a way clear, although it is a drastic way. But it brings together religion (I mean the Catholic religion, not some mythical amalgamated world religion) and economics. Please go tell me how I’m wrong.
Hail to Christ the King.
I have no doubt that the entire 2012-End-of-the-World hysteria was ginned up by the Colombia Motion Pictures hype machine in advance of the movie.
Colombia is owned by Sony Entertainment, whose influence is felt throughout the entire media spectrum.
Years ago, in my opinion, the media giant began hyping the prophecy through several outlets, creating a sense that this was coming up spontaneously.
Call me a cynic, but I believe that most of what’s out there occurs this way.
+J.M.J+
Speaking of that 2012 movie, has anyone seen the trailer? It has images of the huge Christ the Redeemer statue in Brazil crumbling and Vatican City being destroyed by the global disaster. All these Catholics are praying, I think in St. Peter’s (not sure, don’t quote me!) when the whole building just crumbles down on top of them.
More Hollywood wishful thinking?
In Jesu et Maria,
Rosemarie
Dear Rosemarie
And that’s not the worse (sorry but after much searching I couldn’t find any related news in English.
Here’s the “important” parts translated:
Yet another proof that selective cowardice is a virtue in Hollyweird…
At least Kloser was honest about it. That’s refreshing, if only slightly.
Funny, though, about nature being stronger than religion. What about supernature? And when did our faith become contingent on architecture?
Thank you for your excellent observations here.
To add a brief note, I’m not sure what it is about us in the Western World that we’re so fascinated by the end of things that we rush around looking for the most unlikely sources of information on it. I mean, why would it be the case that an ancient people who were conquered by the surprise turn up of the Spanish would have some special insight to the end of all things? That makes darned near no sense at all.
To add to that, if a calendar like the Mayan calendar is circular, if you wanted to state that they had some special insight, wouldn’t that argue that history works like a clock? That is, start over. I’m not arguing for that position, but that’s what a circular calendar would mean. When we reach 12:00, after all, time does not end.
Finally, Christ stated that he “did not know the day nor the hour” and that when the end came, we were to keep on keeping on as before. It would come like a thief in the night. Given that, there’s no point in any Christian spending a lot of time worrying about the end, and of course our own personal ends are very near in any event, as we’re not really around all that long ourselves. The time we have, we have. Yet plenty of Christians seem to spend a lot of time trying to figure out a date that Christ said he did no know.
As for television, the History Channel seems to have become the 24 Hour Mayan Calendar/Nostradamus/Hitler channel. Time to loose the remote.
So who’s the what’s candidate after this fiasco? I think it’s Isaac Newton’s 2060. Even if there are closer ones, see ExitMundi.nl, he will be popular.
Tangentially, on the subject of calendars and end times. I found this on Catholic Ireland regarding some Protestant objections to the Gregorian Calendar.
I find all this 2012 doom-and-gloom funny.
For more than 30 years now, my friend and I have been planning a party for December 21, 2012. We had heard about the “doomsday prophecy” years ago. We decided that the best response was a big wingding wherever we were. Our “Apocalypse Party.” It gave us something to look forward to and to plan for. A 30-year running joke.
If nothing happens, it’s still a great excuse for a party.
If the world ends, then we will meet it with all the folks we love best.
How can you lose?
The oddest part of the whole thing was that for years now, folks have been laughing at me for having this party noted in my day planner. I mean, who keeps track of a date more than 25 years away? But now, so close to the event, it’s so strange to see everybody jumping. It’s going to be another Y2K — a non-event.
It seems such a shame. I guess we will just have to start planning for our “Welcome Back Halley’s Comet” party now.
Doomsdays are such great excuses to celebrate.
Wow, a curse word on a Catholic blog, the world truly is coming to an end 🙂
I’m more worried about surviving this economic depression rather than figure out if armageddon is happening.
So, you like to sample the Christian cafeteria before moseying on down to the critics café for dessert, coffee and a poetry reading?
And some favor butter pecan while others rocky road.
Though some may favor asking Buddhists, I find I do not favor what Buddhists believe over what the brown bunny believes. For that reason, I do not favor asking Buddhists what they believe over asking the brown bunny what he believes Buddhists believe.
After all, who is a Buddhist, or a Christian or a Mayan anyway? It reminds of Gandhi’s response to the question on whether he was a Hindu. “Yes I am,” he answered. “I am also a Muslim, a Christian, a Buddhist, and a Jew.” And in the movie version, he adds, “And so are all of you.”
Is it not so for the critics, cranks and professors too?
Bad day at work, Terry? Sheesh. You aren’t usually that clod-footed.
I’m just going to do Terry the kindness of ignoring that one.
The brown bunny says, “When painting the Buddha, we not only make use of His thirty-three auspicious characteristics, of a blade of grass, and of innumerable kalpas of training and practice, we also make use of clods of earth and mud, for as clods thrown upward in the air fall surely back upon the earth, what the glorious Buddhas speak is sure and steadfast to the end.”
(sound of one hand clapping)
Terry, this is just rude.
In Mayan mythology, it’s said that the rabbit warned people about a flood and then boarded a boat which, when the flood came, floated into the sky where the rabbit disembarked onto the moon, the image still visible today. Such tales are not unique to the Mayan. Buddhists reportedly have a tale about a rabbit which lept into the fire because the Buddha was hungry, and for the self-sacrifice, was elevated to the lofty spot on the moon.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, St. Peter was telling people, “The end of all things is at hand.”
I’m gonna be making a lot of bets which I intend to collect on 22 Dec 2012!
I don’t buy into the 2012 myth…after all, how many times was Nostradamus wrong?
Besides, it’ll really put a damper on my daughter’s graduation plans….not to mention her senior prom…
2012? I thought that was a GOOD thing. Obama will be out of office.
The makers of the movie 2012 decided to show the CGI destruction of St Peter’s and the statue of Christ in Rio, but not the Kaaba in Mecca, because …