The Freethinker
LAST Friday I became so engrossed poking around the innards of my laptop, trying to bring a dead trackpad back to life, that I completely forgot to remind readers that May 21 marked the 10th anniversary of the most expensive failed doomsday prediction of all time.
Why would I want to remind readers of the $100-million End of the World campaign launched in 2011 by Harold Camping, above?
Because I’d discovered that one of his most ardent supporters, Robert Fitzgerald, is alive and well and living in Hawaii – and has no regrets that he donated his life savings of around $300,000 to support the campaign.
And also because, in 2015, fellow Patheos blogger Bob Seidensticker posted a five-year anniversary report, calling Camping his “favorite doomsday prophet.”
At the age of 92, Camping, founder of Family Radio, was called to meet the CEO of Heaven Inc in 2013, possibly to explain a monumental miscalculation that cost his supporters thousands of dollars.
But Fitzgerald, above, is far from embarrassed or rueful over his support of the old loon, telling the San Francisco Chronicle last Friday that:
I think that’s what the Lord wanted us to do.
Fitzgerald gained some notoriety back in 2011 after being filmed in Times Square, trying to convince sceptical New Yorkers that this was their final day on earth. He nervously glanced at his watch, becoming increasingly perplexed as Camping’s predicted calamity failed to transpire.
We thought that that’s what the Lord wanted us to do. We wanted to let everyone know that Judgment Day was approaching.
But he continued following Camping, who amended his claim and said the world would end five months later on October 21, 2011. When that didn’t happen, Fitzpatrick said he returned to the Bible and pored over the numbers. By early 2012, he said he realised that the May 21 date was still significant as it “marked the end of Salvation.”
In August 2018, Family Radio President Tom Evans, who took over from Camping after the death of the “prophet”, went on a religious podcast and apologised for the non-profit’s role in the Judgment Day debacle.
I do want to humbly apologize to those who are listening here who were affected by Family Radio. I cannot defend Mr. Camping. I will not. It’s time now to let it go. We made a mess of things.
Camping used Family Radio to solicit funds to pay for End of the World billboards, and, according to Wiki:
Many people sold everything they owned and donated it to Family Radio, sometimes even hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Apocalypse enthusiasts are now pinning their hopes on a prediction made by American pastor Kenton Beshore, above, that the world will end this year.
Beshore, who died in 2016, claimed he had “hard-and-fast evidence” that the Rapture will happen in 2021 and Jesus will come sashaying back in 2028.
Beshore’s first stab at predicting Doomsday was a bust when the the world failed to end in 1988.
I’d love a cup of coffee
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