Camping has a prior track record of making failed predictions concerning the catching away of the church (commonly called the "Rapture") based on his numerical calculations. Why belabor the point that this kind of mathematical enterprise is not only futile but flies contrary in the face of scriptures saying that not even the angels in heaven have any inside information on the timing? But what has me very curious is the reaction in the news media. Why are they paying so much attention to some 90 year old crackpot who keeps making the same mistake?
I think the most obvious answer is probably the truest. The mainstream news media will always delight in spreading a narrative that makes the Bible or the Gospel look foolish. And unfortunately, Harold Camping is providing them feedstock for confirming their supposition that "all those Bible believing xtians must be really stupid and ignorant people." But that has been the attitude of much of the news media for a very long time, so much so that when it gets expressed out loud it ends up having a boredom-inducing "dog-bites-man" kind of lede. Always playing H.L. Menchken gets tiresome after a time. But why this hubbub lately? I think one commentator, somebody named Carl, on the Get Religion blog did make a good point:
"Harold Camping isn’t being covered because his Rapture prophesy is intrinsically newsworthy. He is being covered because his failed prophesy can be used as a generic surrogate for all Christian truth claims. People will say “See, now we have proof. They are all like Harold Camping. Everything they say is false.” If the whole of the story was only Camping, there would be no audience. Who is he anyways? How many people at the Rapture parties had even heard of him before this? It is rather the extrapolation from the specific to the general that makes it interesting and appealing to the general reader."However, may I suggest that there might be an additional political angle behind all the news media exuberance regarding Harold Camping: There's an election coming in 2012. I suspect that this story has gotten played up as loud as it has because the tune will get refrained later on along the lines of: "hey, remember those crazy Bible-thumping, gun-toting, bitter-clinger xtians back in May of 2011 who were prediciting the End of the World? Well, they're still around, and for sure they'll vote for the Republican candidate. Republicans are crazy anyhow, and only the crazies vote for Republicans. We can't have the crazies controlling the White House, can we?" And I am willing to bet that at some point a news reporter will ask a Republican presidential candidate, "what are your beliefs regarding the Rapture?" I can imagine a number of possible candidates for whom the question will prove a difficult one to handle well. With all the microphones crowding around you, how do you launch into a lengthy explanation of St. Paul's teaching in 1st Thessalonians, along with other scriptures about the Resurrection and the 2nd Coming, while making careful distinctions between the doctrines themselves and the foolishness of people trying to set dates? For sure, no matter what the candidate says in response, it won't fit neatly into a 15 second sound bite, and the news media reportage will mangle whatever subtle points were made. In any case, the motive behind the question will not be to generate newsworthy information but rather to find some way to embarrass the candidate and make him, or her, look crazy.
[Update] I wanted to see what Camping's website has to say now, but it is not responding at this point in time. My guess is that his web server has been "slashdotted" by an overwhelming number of hits.
[Update] I did manage to get through to his web server, but nothing was said other than zero days left. There was no retraction or "oops, I miscalculated."
[Update] I checked the website again, and now the countdown has been removed. I don't see much point in pursuing this story any further. It bores me already.