Following my intro post of the End Times series, a reader wrote to me:

I find it interesting, that at a time in history when life has never been better (lowest infant mortality rates, highest life expectancy rates etc), we humans, like all humans before us, still believe the world will end in our lifetime.

He’s right. It is an odd thing that we’re just as focused on the end of the world as we were 2000 years ago, if not more so.

Every culture has had it’s theories on how things are going to end. A good number of those have been fodder for doomsday prophets for a good long time. Thanks to the wonderful world of electronic communications, we now have access to all of those myths and rantings. Or, at least, all the ones that have made their way out of the nooks and crannies of history.

With that much fuel, it’s really no wonder the end of the world is such a popular topic of thought, debate and just plain ranting.

But that’s all the history of it is: fuel.

There’s still some sort of spark that sets it burning. Some sort of catalyst that makes us (or at least groups of us) think “Hey, man, the End is upon us now!” Just like so many generations before thought they were living at the end of history.

I think that we may need that impending doom. It can keep us alert and aware of how fleeting things are. In a generally prosperous world, there isn’t a lot of pressure to do that–it’s easy to fall into patterns and ruts and bland acceptance. But if you shake that up with a good Armageddon scare every now and then, things stay interesting and we pay more attention.

It could also be that we are generally afraid of the concept of forever. Infinity is a big number and eternity is a lot of space to fill. We don’t work well on that scale. If we try, we generally just kind of trail off and…

But if we throw in a distinct end of it all, well then, we know we have X number of years before it all hits the fan. We can work with that. We can say “Hey, in ten years, none of us are even going to be here, so what does it matter?” We can think “If I just make it that much further, everything will get sorted out, one way or another.”

It gives us a boundary.

And if there’s one thing we’re terribly short on these days, it’s clear cut boundaries.

Some End Times scenarios offer a more solid boundary than others. The whole Y2K technological apocalypse was a great wake-up call. The impending 2012 Mayan calendar end is looking like it could be something similar, at least in some circles.

Why do you think the Apocalypse is so popular? What about it keeps bringing it around again and again and again–even after so many “definite” end dates have been missed and so many prophecies passed without incident (and, of course, often revised and reused)?

Why do we keep looking toward the end when it seems we’re just barely at the beginning?

(I’ve been digging to the research for this a bit more than planned… so there may be some delay before it really gets going. I’m even thinking of making this a separate project… we’ll see how that goes. Probably in December.)

As an appropriate follow up to my last post on prophecy, this marks the beginning of a new series here at The Searcher Journal.

The whole End Times, Armageddon, Second Coming, End of the World, Mass Destruction, thing is something I talk about frequently but don’t often write about. As anyone who’s watched one of the specials that often shows up on The Discovery Channel knows, it’s all wild and scary stuff. Conspiracy theories abound, as do prophecies of metaphysical, supernatural doom and gloom. There are, it seems, hundreds of different things that could kill us (some in very creative ways).

I talk about it because I deeply and firmly believe I will see the end of the world as we know it in my lifetime. I have felt that way for a long time–nearly half of my life. I also know, in a way I can’t fully describe or explain, that if the world does end, I will still be around and will have to do what I can to survive and help put the pieces back together. I most certainly won’t be the only one–and I’ll be far from the most important one doing that kind of work–but I’ll be there.

I don’t write about it much (at least in non-fiction) because, quite honestly, it really freaks me out. The simple fact that I can’t not think about it makes me dislike thinking about it. And putting it down in a solid format just makes it that much more real.

When I write, the more logical side of my brain comes into play. When it finds and confirms the same things that my more metaphysical side intuits, I begin to worry that I’m right about my feelings of impending global doom.

I really don’t want to be right.

In fact, I want to be completely and totally wrong.

I don’t want to actually see the piles of bodies and smoldering rubble I’ve seen in my dreams. I don’t want to smell death on the wind and feel the heat of a desert sun in what were once fertile plains. I don’t want to hear the screams of those lucky enough to survive the transition into what comes after, but unlucky enough to not understand what has happened.

Intermittently, from here on out, I will make an effort to discuss some of these things.

All the while I’ll be hoping that, in some small way, that will make the transition less unpleasant.

As always, requests, questions and additional information are more than welcome. If I’m getting something wrong–especially on this topic–I really want to know.

The first bit, by request, will be about 2012 and the Mayan calendar. Look for it here next week, if not sooner.