Harold Camping has broken his silence. He predicted that the rapture would occur on May 21, when those who God judges worthy would be taken immediately to heaven. The rest of us would endure five months of earthquakes and other disasters until God destroys the universe on October 21.

As you might have noticed, Camping was wrong. Millions of the faithful didn’t suddenly disappear, though the ‘rapture-bomb’ photos are a hoot!

Much like his 1994 prediction of the apocalypse that didn’t happen, Camping says he made a mistake. This time it wasn’t a calculation error, but a misunderstanding of what would happen. May 21 was a day of ‘spiritual judgement.’ God made note of who is naughty and who is nice, and now knows who he’ll be taking to heaven when he destroys the Universe on October 21.

According to the CBC article, “Preacher says end of world actually coming in October,” Camping said,

We’ve always said May 21 was the day, but we didn’t understand altogether the spiritual meaning. The fact is there is only one kind of people who will ascend into heaven … if God has saved them they’re going to be caught up.

Since God has made his decision, there’s no further point in warning people, so his radio network will play music until October 21 rather than trying to save the listeners. This also means that there will be no more ads and billboards. One wonders that since God’s already passed judgement, does our behaviour now make any difference? Can the saved Christians now throw off the shackles of the commandments and beatitudes and do as they please? It seems so.

Lock up your daughters … the randy Christians are coming!