On Thursday 12 August, a 28-member delegation arrived at the Orion Hotel Devonshire in Braamfontein, Johannesburg. Nothing strange about that, except the fact that the hotel is used to hosting sports and business delegations and they weren’t anything of the sort. They were a Judgment Day delegation. On 13 August, The Daily Maverick was there to meet them.
The Orion Hotel Devonshire on the corner of Melle and Jorissen Streets in Braamfontein, Johannesburg, is aimed at the “discerning business traveler and conference delegate.” It claims to be 25 minutes from OR Tambo International Airport and ten minutes from the “shopping Mecca” of Sandton City. Within walking distance of the hotel are Wits University, Park Station, the Joburg Theatre Complex (formerly the Civic) and the Constitutional Court. Thousands of pedestrians, many of whom work in the high rises and commercial office blocks of central Braamfontein, pass by the entrance of the Devonshire every day. In Johannesburg, it is the perfect place to stay if you wish to announce the imminent arrival of the End of the World.
On Friday 13 August the lobby of the hotel was filled with a delegation of believers who had come to announce just such a thing. There were 28 of them, ten from South Africa and the rest primarily from the United States. They could be identified by their matching t-shirts, which contained bold blue writing against a white background. “May 21, 2011,” read the first line, followed below by the phrase “Judgment Day”. Underneath that were the words “Family Radio,” and then an injunction: “Read the Bible!”
Strangely – or not, depending on where you stand on the fate/coincidence continuum – the first member of the delegation that The Daily Maverick bumped into on Friday morning turned out to be none other than Johannes Cotezee, the Nelspruit resident we’d interviewed telephonically back in January. Coetzee had helped us better understand his organisation after reading our original article, “Only 501 shopping days to Armageddon” (published January 5), and, given that we’d already been warned by his fellow believers (see “Doomsday cultists warn The Daily Maverick”), his candid answers facilitated a more detailed follow-up, “Doomsday cult expands: SA, Africa and beyond” (published January 11).
Coetzee was as helpful in person as he’d been on the phone. He thanked us for the coverage and promptly took it upon himself to introduce us to his compatriots. The first person we met was Phillip Basi from Richmond in KwaZulu-Natal, a man who’d been a pastor in his church before tuning into the message of Family Radio on the AM frequency.
“I heard the truth from the Bible,” Basi told us, “which I never heard in my church. I made a choice for the truth. The Bible has given us proof of what is actually the word of God.”
Asked where he’d be and what he’d be doing come 21 May next year, Basi said: “Carrying on with my preaching. I don’t have any plans beyond that date. This will be the new Earth forever. Satan and his angels will be destroyed. Even Satan knows now.” To underline his point Basi then quoted scripture, specifically Mark 13-32.
As was pointed out in The Daily Maverick’s earlier articles, the precise date for the End of Days was calculated some years ago by Harold Camping, the founder of Family Radio and the spiritual head of the organisation. Camping, a resident of San Francisco, arrived at 21 May 2011 by using a version of numerology that links numbers in the Bible to their specific thematic context, and although he’s been wrong before – 6 September 1994 was his previous End of Days – neither his standing nor the size of his following seems to have been compromised by the mistake.
In fact, the piece The Daily Maverick ran on 21 May 2010, “It’s all over in a year: May 21st 2011 doomsday cult rocks on,” noted that Family Radio broadcasts in 48 languages to every continent on Earth. We reported then that the organisation was looking for people to help them expand their broadcast range into Arabic, Armenian, Creole, Khmer, Sindebele, Northern Sotho, Sesotho, Shona, SiSwati, Tswana, Xhosa and Zulu. At the time of this writing, less than three months later, Family Radio has upped its total to 53 languages, Zulu included.
So while its impossible to give an exact or even an approximate figure for Camping’s follower base – the standard refrain is that Family Radio has “listeners” not “members” – it’s safe to say that there are a lot. And it’s probably also safe to say, taking into account what we observed on Friday, that the majority of them are like Olive Smith from Nelspruit: evenly spoken, friendly to the point of gracious, unshakably certain. “Today is exactly 40 weeks left,” said Smith, smiling broadly.
Nora Rodrigues, who was born in Peru but has lived in the United States since 1981, has been listening to Family Radio for 22 years. A diminutive woman with a smile as wide as Smith’s, she informed us that Family Radio takes no advertising – all its revenues are based on donations, she said. Standing beside her was Zamikhaya Tiwani, a 30-year-old from Nyanga in Cape Town, who told us: “When I discovered Family Radio, it was a breakthrough for me. I had a lot of problems with the churches. As a member of the church, you’re not following the true doctrine.”
This message was echoed by the group leader, Barry Persaud from Georgia in the US, whom we’d been waiting to speak to since arriving at the hotel. “God has revealed to us that the church age is over,” said Persaud. “God doesn’t use the churches anymore. The church cannot save us, only God can. God has removed the life from the churches, Satan rules in them now. The ministers act like ministers of God, but they are ministers of Satan. The ministers are deceived because Satan is a master deceiver.”
Fair enough, but if even men of the cloth are so deceived, what does an ordinary mortal have to do to be saved? “We don’t do anything,” said Persaud, “except beg God for mercy.”
On the surface, then, Family Radio is a benign cult, an organisation that barely warrants the moniker “cult” at all. Harold Camping isn’t Jim Jones or David Koresh, when he was last proved wrong he didn’t demand the mass suicide of his acolytes. Neither has there been evidence of illegal or depraved sexual activity within the organisation; any proof that the act of listening to Family Radio might be harmful in itself has not been forthcoming. Granted, the 28 volunteers that arrived at the Devonshire on Thursday 12 August all came on their own time and at their own expense, but if Camping – an octogenarian – is in it for a cut of the donations, there hasn’t been much to back up that allegation either.
Simply put, these are just a bunch of people who completely believe that the world is going to end next May. The obvious question – what if doesn’t? – is irrelevant to them. On May 22 next year, if they wake up and the world is in the same shape it’s always been in, they will in all likelihood do what they did on 7 September 1994: assume that Camping got his calculations wrong and wait for him to work out the correct date.
Needless to say, however friendly they are, they are also people with a poorly developed sense of irony. As they split up into groups of three or four to spread the word around Joburg, we decided to follow the group that was going to Wits University, the city’s home of such anti-theocratic concepts as logical positivism and dialectical materialism. How would the students there react to pamphlets (they’d printed around 200,000) that explained, amongst other things, why the apocalyptic passages in the Book of Revelations were shortly to come to pass?
Not well, as it happened. On the steps of the Great Hall, students could be heard saying things like, “Judgment Day. What?” It was a warm winter afternoon, and a girl stretched out on the lawns above the swimming pool laughed at her boyfriend, who said he’d like to have a threesome before it was all over. The people in the white t-shirts moved silently onto the next students, careful not to miss anybody.
By Kevin Bloom
Read more: “Only 501 shopping days to Armageddon”, “Doomsday cultists warn The Daily Maverick”, “Doomsday cult expands: SA, Africa and beyond”, “It’s all over in a year: May 21st 2011 doomsday cult rocks on”.
Or get sore knees and cramped fingers trying to pray our way out of it ?
Pedantic shenanigans aside, I'm suddenly in the mood to make these 28 escaped mental patients some shirts with the words "I read the Bible and it rotted my brain!" printed in big friendly letters on the front.
Genesis 8.21 The LORD smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: "Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done."
Damn this is fun. Any more bible quotes? We can play bible tennis, every quote you give I give an opposing one.
Of the dozens of Creoles spoken around the world, can they be more specific? For a fee, I'll help them with Panamanian creole.
They all just assume that if it doesn't happen on 5/21/11, that Mr. Camping got the date wrong thru incorrect calculation. They fail to realize that he has been wrong not once, not just twice or even just three times before, but 10 times. This is not merely Mr. Camping getting the date wrong, but God Himself saying, "No, Mr. Camping, I haven't given you the authority to determine something I have decreed that only I know."
Mr. Camping is very careful to only use the one date that got published in all the papers in California and does not mention the other 9 incorrect dates he came up with over the years. He first predicted the Rapture would happen in 1978.
On this end of the church age thing, if you listen to Mr. Camping, you realize that he is very upset with the churches because he was kicked out of a church for preaching heresy. That is why he came up with this 'end of the church age.'
He says that Satan has been ruling in the churches since 1988. However, where does that put him as he was a member in good standing of a church until 2001? If Satan is indeed ruling the churches and has been since 1988, how do we know that Mr. Camping is not under Satanic influence himself?
Reformed Watchmen is still active but is not the same one. The Campingites have moved to a group called Latter Rain.
This is the type of rancor toward the church and the people of God that this heretical teaching is spawning. This is a long quote but I place it here in its entirety to show the level of understanding these Campingites have of the Bible and how they just take God’s Word and abuse it like it is some kind of a vain novel. The other sad part is how they are always cutting and pasting Strong’s Greek words as if they really know what it means. Tools are dangerous in the hands of a juvenile. This person equates God’s church to a tavern. When I was a drinking person over 21 years ago, I didn’t sing “Amazing Grace” or “Rock of Ages” in the bar. I drank to Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. To date, these bands have never appeared in any church I ever attended. Highlights mine! It is important to know what effects false teaching have on biblically immature people. It shows how false teachings affect the attitudes. This type of attitude reveals the difference between following the Lord Jesus Christ and following a man.
This is what was posted in the yahoo group:
"The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means; and my people love to have it so: and what will ye do in the end thereof?" (Jeremiah 5:31)
Insisting that someone must be in a certain place at a certain time to "worship" is nothing short of a works gospel coupled with blasphemy. Jesus said His words are spirit and life (John 6:63); "spirit" being the quiet, personal relationship with Him as our Lord.
Before Jesus broke fellowship with the "religious leaders" He would ridicule the self-proclaimed "God's anointed"; the parable of the wineskins in Mark 2 points to the fact that their "religion" was passing away. The wine they drank intoxicated them with external rituals and "exhilarating" performance. This is why the people loved it so, God had blinded them.
Exhilaration comes in many ways in the corporate church today. Perhaps it is in mixed sex choirs, Christian rock and rap, and even a paid located pastor who, instead of going into all the world, takes his seat in the "temple" and all but proclaims he is a Christ. Of course, there may be equally if not more qualified teachers in the congregation who could do the job for free, but they are just called "carpenters, engineers or even supermarket workers". Maybe ol preach can't find an honest job. Again, paying a hypocritical "reverend" to preach (not dialogue) is like getting an ethics lesson from the mafia.
In ancient paganism and voodoo people would often use dance, wine and music instruments. I watched a "praise" service on TV the other day and it was quite identical to documentaries I have seen about Voodoo - - except the "chickens" being sacrificed wore white and fluttered around the room repeating the dancing, jerking and barking.
The above statements make it pretty clear that Mr. Camping believes that there is only one way to worship God, i.e., his way. Never mind that the Bible only says, "Make thee a joyful noise unto the Lord thy God." It never says "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God only with Gregorian chants."
The 'maybe ol' preach can't find an honest job' indicates to me that Mr. Camping is very bitter about being kicked out of a church himself.
In order for someone to understand that the May 21 date is correct, he must be willing to do some reading. Mr. Harold Camping of Family Radio was the first to write about the time line of God's salvation plan, which shows how the May 21 date was discovered. The process by which he arrived at the date, however, will not convince anyone that May 21 is the correct date. It is the mathematical proofs that were discovered afterwards that show us that there can be no doubt. These proofs are absolutely amazing. They leave no room for doubt that we are in the final months of a countdown to a tremendous global earthquake that will occur next May 21.
In order to see the complete proof and to understand how it was developed, it is necessary to read Mr. Camping's books Time has An End, We are Almost There, and To God Be The Glory. Family Radio offers the publications for free. Admittedly, this is quite a bit of reading. My book, entitled The Doomsday Code (available at Amazon.com) shows how the date was determined and has the proofs as well. My book was completed after Mr. Camping released his final book. I wrote The Doomsday Code because I felt that there was a need for a single volume explaining the time line and giving the proofs that Judgment Day begins on May 21 and that the world will end on October 21, 2011. May 21, by the way, will be the last minute for God to save anyone. That's why the Bible tells us to "Seek ye the LORD while he may be found..."
Why did God lie? He said that he would never destroy all living creatures again - read Genesis 8.21
I want you (Robert Fitzpatrick) to promise that you will:
a) give away every single asset (including royalties from your books) and all your money before the 21st May 2011. You may give it to a well meaning charity; and
b) you will withdraw totally from society and became a recluse, if the end of the world does not happen as you say it will.
"a" is to see if you will put your money where your mouth is, and "b" is to ensure that the public is never again deceived by false prophets such as you.
Easy!!
Oh, and if you are right? - well then I'll be having supper with the Devil...
God didn't make it easy to understand the Bible. in fact, it seems to me that He wrote it so that there are many verses that can easily mislead a person. It's sort of like a complicated legal document with a lot of fine print, but it's even more difficult than that because only if God opens your eyes can you understand it. That's why the world's Christian churches don't understand what God has now been revealing from His word. Most of the people in those churches - over two billion people - will still be here on May 21 to face Judgment Day.
While we count the number of angels that can fit on a pinhead, allow me to introduce you to the fire breathing dragon in my garage (with thanks to Carl Sagan)
“A fire-breathing dragon lives in my garage.”
Suppose … I seriously make such an assertion to you. Surely you’d want to check it out, see for yourself….
“Show me,” you say. I lead you to my garage. You look inside and see a ladder, empty paint cans, an old tricycle—but no dragon.
“Where’s the dragon?” you ask.
“Oh, she’s right here,” I reply, waving vaguely. “I neglected to mention that she’s an invisible dragon.”
You propose spreading flour on the floor of the garage to capture the dragon’s footprints.
“Good idea,” I say, “but this dragon floats in the air.”
Then you’ll use an infrared sensor to detect the invisible fire.
“Good idea, but the invisible fire is also heatless.”
You’ll spray-paint the dragon and make her visible.
“Good idea, except she’s an incorporeal dragon and the paint won’t stick.”
And so on. I counter every physical test you propose with a special explanation of why it won’t work.
Now, what’s the difference between an invisible, incorporeal, floating dragon who spits heatless fire and no dragon at all? If there’s no way to disprove my contention, no conceivable experiment that would count against it, what does it mean to say that my dragon exists? Your inability to invalidate my hypothesis is not at all the same thing as proving it is true. Claims that cannot be tested, assertions immune to disproof are veridically worthless, whatever value they may have in inspiring us or in exciting our sense of wonder. What I’m asking you do comes down to believing, in the absence of evidence, on my say-so.
The only thing you’ve really learned from my insistence that there’s a dragon in my garage is that something funny is going on inside my head. You’d wonder, if no physical tests apply, what convinced me. The possibility that it was a dream or a hallucination would certainly enter your mind. But then why am I taking it so seriously? Maybe I need help. At the least, maybe I’ve seriously underestimated human fallibility….
Now another scenario: Suppose it’s not just me. Suppose that several people of your acquaintance, including people who you’re pretty sure don’t know each other, all tell you they have dragons in their garages—but in every case the evidence is maddeningly elusive. All of us admit we’re disturbed at being gripped by so odd a conviction so ill-supported by the physical evidence. None of us is a lunatic. We speculate about what it would mean if invisible dragons were really hiding out in garages all over the world, with us humans just catching on. I’d rather it not be true, I tell you. But maybe all those ancient European and Chinese myths about dragons weren’t myths after all…
Gratifyingly, some dragon-size footprints in the flour are now reported. But they’re never made when a skeptic is looking. An alternative explanation presents itself: On close examination it seems clear that the footprints could have been faked. Another dragon enthusiast shows up with a burnt finger and attributes it to a rare physical manifestation of the dragon’s fiery breath. But again, other possibilities exist. We understand that there are other ways to burn fingers besides the breath of invisible dragons. Such “evidence”—no matter how important the dragon advocates consider it—is far from compelling. Once again, the only sensible approach is tentatively to reject the dragon hypothesis, to be open to future data, and to wonder what the cause might be that so many apparently sane and sober people share the same strange delusion.
My dragon likes people and says he will not allow the earth to be destroyed...