Latter-day Saints and latter days

[ by Charles Cameron — nobody knows, tiddley-pom ]

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The Mormon church was first legally established in 1830 under the name, the Church of Christ, since Joseph Smith founded it to restore Christianity to its original form as taught by Christ himself. Joseph clearly viewed the church he founded as gathering together the faithful of the last days: in 1834, within his lifetime, the church took on the name Church of the Latter Day Saints, and since the time of Smith’s successor Brigham Young, it has been known as the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints.

Almost two centuries have passed since Joseph felt the Latter Days were upon him and his flock, just as almost two millennia have passed since Christ said (Matthew 16.28):

Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.

But then again, as Shakespeare observed in The Tempest, his last play: What’s past is prologue.

**

Fast forward, then, towards September 2015, which is conveniently enough the month in which I am writing this post.

According to Nostradamus, there was presumably a 9.8 magnitude quake in California on May 28 this year. Perhaps the God, or the gods, or the four angels standing on the four corners of the earth holding the four winds of the earth (Revelation 7.1), or the purely physical and no way spiritual forces driving great tectonic plates – or some combination of the above — favored my poor self, randomly, or by virtue of my virtue, or because I write for Zenpundit, but I was not no way shaken.

Just this last week, according to a post yesterday on Patch.com -– a site still reeling from the events of May 28 which it apparently survived — “Mother Nature kept Californians humble as she unleashed a wide range of natural disasters across the state”:

It was an intense week in California as residents endured ruthless fires, a surprise summer deluge, several earthquakes and even waited out a tsunami advisory along the coast following an earthquake in Chile.

**

Forget about California, then.

According to the possibly-no-longer-published Los Angeles Times dating way back to September 28, 2003, ie before the California disaster, “A massive temblor could strike Salt Lake City tomorrow or a century from now, scientists say”:

The geologists cannot say with certainty when the next devastating earthquake will hit the Wasatch Front. But they say the threat is real and constant, and that a large quake could occur tomorrow or a century from now a span that represents a mere blip in geologic time.

It’s not surprising, then, that as the Salt Lake Tribune reported about a week ago, there are now Some Mormons stocking up amid fears that doomsday could come this month:

Mixing a brew of biblical prophecies, the Hebrew calendar, a volatile economy, world politics, a reported near-death experience and astronomical occurrences, hordes of Utahns have become convinced that calamitous events are imminent — maybe by month’s end — and are taking every precaution.

They are called “preppers” and are buying up food-storage kits, flashlights, blankets and tents. Some are even bracing to leave their homes — if need be.

At American Fork’s Thrive Life, which sells mostly freeze-dried food, sales have shot up by “500 percent or more in the past couple of months,” says customer- service representative Ricardo Aranda. “There is a sense of urgency, like something is up. A lot of people are mentioning things about September, like a financial collapse.”

Ah yes, a financial collapse. It might be a financial collapse that’s due any time now.

**

And nobody can say they weren’t warned.

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