130 years ago--astrologers actually make a correct prediction

The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork. Psalms 19:1

On August 9, 1896, a solar eclipse occurred; it was the first to attract an expedition from the British Astronomical Association. According to the editorial Darkening of the Sun., published in the Toronto Globe, August 3, 1896:

...This eclipse is important in that it is a total one, not an annular, and it is expected that much will be added to our knowledge of the sun....

Although this eclipse will not at all be visible in Canada, in fact not at all in America except in Alaska, there are many Canadians and Americans who will witness the phenomenon, because the line of totality passes across a region easily accessible to summer tourists. The path of total eclipse begins at sunrise in the North Atlantic Ocean, passes across the northern part of Norway and over the island of Nova Zembia, thence diagonally across Siberia and the Japanese island of Yezo, ending at sunset in the Pacific Ocean.

Most popular of the places of observation are points on the northeast coast of Norway...More favorable stations for observation are in the interior of Siberia, but these are practically inaccessible to observers. Excellent results are expected from the parties stationed in Japan, for the conditions there are good.

During the two minutes of totality the principal stars will become visible to the unassisted vision. The sun will be in the constellation Leo (the Lion), and the planets Jupiter, Venus and Mercury are close together in the same region of the sky...

Should the photographs of the corona turn out as successfully as everyone hopes and desires light will be thrown on various points of solar physics. Especially may the larger pictures give a further knowledge of the solar currents, "lines of force" or whatever they are that determine the peculiar structure of solar appendages. How the distribution of coronal material differs in various latitudes on the sun should also be revealed, and an investigation of the connection between the coronal prominences and sun-spots may be possible. Another point on which the photographs will shed light is the law of decrease in the intensity of the corona is passing outward. If success crowns the efforts being made all along the line then there will be a possibility of determining if the corona changes form in the interval of about 90 minutes which occurs between those observations taken in Norway and those secured in Japan. Previous experience does not favor the idea of such rapid changes.

Weather conditions prevented good results from the BAA expedition, but a smaller expedition to Novaya Zemlya was more successful.

Partial eclipse photographed by Celia Hammer in Kabelvåg, Norway

Photography of the corona during the total eclipse on Novaya Zemlya on 9. August 1896 by Sergei Kostinsky

According to an anonymous article published in the Winnipeg Daily Tribune, August 8, 1896:

...According to astrologers, the eclipse is likely to be followed by disasters in the orient, owing to the fact that it occurs in the conjunction of the evil planet Mars, Herschel and Saturn, and of Jupiter, Venus and Mercury. The line of totality of the eclipse begins in the North Sea, crosses the northern part of Norway and Lapland, the island of Novaya Zemlya, Siberia, and the Japanese island of Yezo, and ends in the midst of the Pacific ocean. Under the general rulings of astrology, these, taking into consideration the square and opposition of the place of the eclipse, to-morrow's event will primarily affect China, Japan, Eastern Siberia, Corea, Egypt, Armenia, Western Russia, the country tributary to the Danube, Scandinavia in its northeastern section, Venezuela, Guiana and Brazil, Newfoundland, Labrador, New England, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Nevada, California and Alaska. Only Japan, China and Russia, however, are, according to the astrologers, to experience disaster, and this is not to be immediate, but some time in the next six months...

It did come as a surprise to this blogger that a major disaster did occur not long after the eclipse. On August 31, 1896, the Rikuu earthquake, of magnitude 7.2, struck on the border between the prefectures of Akita and Iwate (39.5 degrees North latitude, 140.7 degrees East longitude), killing 209 people (209 in Akita), injuring 779, and resulting in 5,792 completely destroyed houses, 3,045 partially destroyed houses, and 9,899 landslides.

Of course, even if astrologers make a prediction that turns out to be accurate, astrology is a pagan practice that should be avoided and rejected:

If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder,
And the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them;
Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams: Deuteronomy 13:1-3a

Thus saith the Lord, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. Jeremiah 10:2

Yet another apocalyptic prediction is about to be proven false

The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth his handiwork. Psalms 19:1

It's the bold and fearless prediction of this blogger that the most recent upcoming date for the apocalypse--September 23, 2017--will come and go, and the false prophets will continue as before.

As reported by Kristine Phillips in the Washington Post, September 17, 2017 (links in original):

A few years ago, NASA senior space scientist David Morrison debunked an apocalyptic claim as a hoax.

No, there’s no such thing as a planet called Nibiru, he said. No, it’s not a brown dwarf surrounded by planets, as iterations of the claim suggest. No, it’s not on a collision course toward Earth. And yes, people should “get over it.”

But the claim has been getting renewed attention recently. Added to it is the precise date of the astronomical event leading to Earth’s destruction. And that, according to David Meade, is in six days — Sept. 23, 2017. Unsealed, an evangelical Christian publication, foretells the Rapture in a viral, four-minute YouTube video, complete with special effects and ominous doomsday soundtrack. It’s called “September 23, 2017: You Need to See This.”

Why Sept. 23, 2017?

Meade’s prediction is based largely on verses and numerical codes in the Bible. He has homed in one number: 33.

“Jesus lived for 33 years. The name Elohim, which is the name of God to the Jews, was mentioned 33 times [in the Bible],” Meade told The Washington Post. “It’s a very biblically significant, numerologically significant number. I’m talking astronomy. I’m talking the Bible … and merging the two.”

And Sept. 23 is 33 days since the Aug. 21 total solar eclipse, which Meade believes is an omen.

He points to the Book of Revelation, which he said describes the image that will appear in the sky on that day, when Nibiru is supposed to rear its ugly head, eventually bringing fire, storms and other types of destruction.

[Will the mysterious shadow planet Nibiru obliterate Earth in October? No.]

The book describes a woman “clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head” who gives birth to a boy who will “rule all the nations with an iron scepter” while she is threatened by a red seven-headed dragon. The woman then grows the wings of an eagle and is swallowed up by the earth.

The belief, as previously described by Gary Ray, a writer for Unsealed, is that the constellation Virgo — representing the woman — will be clothed in sunlight, in a position that is over the moon and under nine stars and three planets. The planet Jupiter, which will have been inside Virgo — in her womb, in Ray’s interpretation — will move out of Virgo, as though she is giving birth.

To make clear, Meade said he’s not saying the world will end Saturday. Instead, he claims, the prophesies in the Book of Revelation will manifest that day, leading to a series of catastrophic events that will happen over the course of weeks.

“The world is not ending, but the world as we know it is ending,” he said, adding later: “A major part of the world will not be the same the beginning of October.”

Meade’s prediction has been dismissed as a hoax not only by NASA scientists, but also by people of faith.

Ed Stetzer, a professor and executive director of Wheaton College’s Billy Graham Center for Evangelism, first took issue with how Meade is described in some media articles.

“There’s no such thing as a Christian numerologist,” he told The Post. “You basically got a made-up expert in a made-up field talking about a made-up event.… It sort of justifies that there’s a special secret number codes in the Bible that nobody believes.”

Meade said he never referred to himself as a Christian numerologist. He’s a researcher, he said, and he studied astronomy at a university in Kentucky, though he declined to say which one, citing safety reasons. His website says he worked in forensic investigations and spent 10 years working for Fortune 1000 companies. He’s also written books. The most recent one is called “Planet X — The 2017 Arrival.”

Stetzer said that while numbers do have significance in the Bible, they shouldn’t be used to make sweeping predictions about planetary motions and the end of Earth.

[For some, eclipse day showcases God’s majesty. For others, it means the Rapture is coming.]

“Whenever someone tells you they have found a secret number code in the Bible, end the conversation,” he wrote in an article published Friday in Christianity Today. “Everything else he or she says can be discounted.”

That is not to say that Christians don’t believe in the Bible’s prophesies, Stetzer said, but baseless theories that are repeated and trivialized embarrass people of faith.

“We do believe some odd things,” he said. “That Jesus is coming back, that he will set things right in the world, and no one knows the day or the hour.”

The doomsday date was initially predicted to be in May 2003, according to NASA. Then it was moved to Dec. 21, 2012, the date that the Mayan calendar, as some believed, marked the apocalypse.

Morrison, the NASA scientist, has given simple explanations debunking the claim that a massive planet is on course to destroy Earth. If Nibiru is, indeed, as close as conspiracy theorists believe to striking Earth, astronomers, and anyone really, would’ve already seen it.

“It would be bright. It would be easily visible to the naked eye. If it were up there, you could see it. All of us could see it. … If Nibiru were real and it were a planet with a substantial mass, then it would already be perturbing the orbits of Mars and Earth. We would see changes in those orbits due to this rogue object coming in to the inner solar system,” Morrison said in a video.

Doomsday believers also say that Nibiru is on a 3,600-year orbit. That means it had already come through the solar system in the past, which means we should be looking at an entirely different solar system today, Morrison said.

“Its gravity would’ve messed up the orbits of the inner planets, the Earth, Venus, Mars, probably would’ve stripped the moon away completely,” he said. “Instead, in the inner solar system, we see planets with stable orbits. We see the moon going around the Earth.”

And if Nibiru is not a planet and is, in fact, a brown dwarf, as some claims suggest — again, we would’ve already seen it.

“Everything I’ve said would be worse with a massive object like a brown dwarf,” Morrison said. “That would’ve been tracked by astronomers for a decade or more, and it would already have really affected planetary objects.”

Some call Nibiru “Planet X,” as Meade did in the title of his book. Morrison said that’s a name astronomers give to planets or possible objects that have not been found. For example, when space scientists were searching for a planet beyond Neptune, it was called Planet X. And once it was found, it became Pluto.

Stetzer encouraged Christians to be critical, especially in an information era marred with fake news stories.

“It’s simply fake news that a lot of Christians believe the world will end on September 23,” Stetzer wrote. “Yet, it is still a reminder that we need to think critically about all the news.”

He took issue with a Fox News story with a headline that appears to give credence to the doomsday claim — and was published in the Science section under the label “Planets.”

“Every time end-of-the-world predictions resurface in the media, it is important that we ask ourselves, ‘Is this helpful?’ ” Stetzer wrote. “Is peddling these falsehoods a good way to contribute to meaningful, helpful discussions about the end of times?”

Mr. Stetzer is correct. The apocalyptic predictions of people such as Mr. Meade and those who made apocalyptic predictions for other dates are using "Christian" methods of numerology and/or astrology, which are forms of divination, and forbidden by God. Although the names of a few constellations are mentioned in the Bible (see, for example, Job 9:9, 38:31-32 and Amos 5:8), those names are used in reference to God's greatness as creator, and are never used for an astrological purpose, i.e., to make predictions.

Those who try to find a code hidden in the Bible are using a gnostic, rather than a Christian, understanding of the Scripture. Gnosticism says that there's a secret, hidden knowledge contained in the Bible, and you can obtain that knowledge if you have the key or have figured out the code. That may remind the reader of "Rabbi" Jonathan Cahn and his views and predictions regarding the Shemitah (his new book The Paradigm has just been released), and I definitely put him in that category (and one of these days I may get around to doing a post on Mr. Cahn).

For further reading, I recommend the books Soothsayers of the Second Advent by William M. Alnor (1989); Astrology: Do the Heavens Rule Our Destiny? by John Ankerberg and John Weldon (1989); and Decoding the Bible Code: Can We Trust the Message? by John Weldon (1998).

April 14, 2018 update: Here he goes again; as reported by Katie Dangerfield of Global News, April 13, 2018 (links in original):

A recycled prediction for the end of the world is making waves on the internet again, with doomsayers warning a planet is hurtling towards a collision with Earth on April 23.

Conspiracy theorist David Meade is predicting Planet X, also known as Nibiru, will show up at the end of April, sparking an Armageddon.

But don’t worry, Meade also predicted Nibiru was going to hit Earth in September 2017 and then in October 2017 and then adjusted his timeline to November 2017.

And we’re still here.

At that time, NASA senior space scientist David Morrison told the Washington Post, “No, there’s no such thing as a planet called Nibiru. No, it’s not a brown dwarf surrounded by planets, as iterations of the claim suggest. No, it’s not on a collision course toward Earth. And yes, people should ‘get over it.’”

The latest doomsday prediction comes after Meade told the Daily Express Nibiru will appear in the sky on April 23 and trigger world-destroying volcanoes, tsunami and earthquakes.

His theory traces back to the Biblical passages of Revelation 12:1-2, which refers to a “great sign appearing in heaven,” and a “woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth.”

“On April 23, the sun and moon will be in Virgo, as will Jupiter, which represents the Messiah,” the Daily Express reported. “Experts at first dismissed this claim when they discovered this alignment happens every 12 years. However, the conspiracy theories claim another planetary alignment, representing ‘the Lion of the tribe of Judah’, will make this time the Rapture.”

The theory of Nibiru colliding with Earth goes back decades — and NASA keeps debunking it.

“The planet in question, Niburu, doesn’t exist so there will be no collision,” NASA states on its website. “The story of Niburu has been around for years (as has the ‘days of darkness’ tale) and is periodically recycled into new apocalyptic fables.”

“If Nibiru or Planet X were real and headed for an encounter with the Earth, astronomers would have been tracking it for at least the past decade, and it would be visible by now to the naked eye.”

Astronomer, Neil deGrasse Tyson also tackled the subject in 2009, when it was predicted that Planet X was going to destroy Earth on Dec. 21, 2012.

In a video, he refers to the prediction as a “marvellous work of fiction.”

“What the site [conspiracy website] doesn’t tell you is that [alignment] happens every year on December 21,” Tyson said. “They left that out of the account.”

See also my posts:

No sympathy here for Camping followers (May 24, 2011)

Mayan idea of time goes beyond 2012 (May 21, 2012)

Members of pseudo-Christian cult in China arrested for spreading December 21, 2012 fear (January 15, 2013)

Some people are still foolish enough to fall for the frauds of psychics and astrologers

How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge? Proverbs 1:22

The simple believeth every word: but the prudent man looketh well to his going. Proverbs 14:15

As reported by Edmonton Police Service, June 14, 2017:

The Edmonton Police Service has received numerous reports of fraudsters posing as astrologers and psychic readers.

It was reported that some persons were lead to believe they were cursed with black magic and/or witchcraft.

In a recent investigation, an Edmontonian was convinced into paying up to $ 100,000 in cash and gold to have black magic removed from their life and to have access more money.

“It is difficult to track these alleged fraudsters,” explains Det. Glen Haneman with Southeast Division. “Often, these individuals quickly disappear when they believe they could be caught.”

These fraudsters typically use fake names and target vulnerable people by promising resolution to their personal problem and leave business cards or pamphlets on parked vehicles.

Examples of astrology and psychic fraud:

Unrealistic promises to solve personal and financial problems.

Request for a small amount of money upfront for performing healing rituals.

Gain your confidence and present a plan requiring thousands of dollars as offerings (for prayers, chain of rituals etc.).

Claim to remove “black magic and/or witchcraft.”

Noted astrologer and psychic fails to foresee his own murder

And he said unto them, Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself: Luke 4:23a

As reported by Liam Quinn of the London Daily Mail, August 31, 2016 (updated September 1, 2016) (link in original):

The body of a famous astrologer and clairvoyant who predicted the death of Michael Jackson has been found rotting in a Mexican alley after he was shot in the back of the head.

Rodrigo Rodriguez, born in Colombia, was found dead near the bathroom at a building he used in Cancun on Saturday morning.

Police found the body after neighbors complained about a strong stench coming from his office, local media reports.

The astrologer, who was known as 'El Brujo de las Estrellas' - the 'Wizard of the Stars', rose to fame by predicting and charting the lives of local celebrities.

He regularly appeared on local television shows, and had events scheduled in the coming months, according to Fox Latino.

The 'wizard' was due to travel to Spain in October, where he would read the futures of the entire royal family.

Rodriguez described his upcoming regal trip as a, 'a big step for (his) career', and said he was thrilled about the opportunity.

In addition to 'predicting' Jackson's death in 2009, Rodriguez also claims to have foreseen the deaths of Whitney Houston and Amy Winehouse.

He also claimed 2014 would be Lady Gaga's last year, however the popstar survived the year and has gone on seemingly unperturbed by the gloomy prediction.

Showing that he doesn't just have an eye for celebrity deaths, the Colombian has also claimed to know the location of crashed plane MH370.

Venus has always appealed to New Agers

According to Scott Van Wynsberghe in the Canadian newspaper National Post, September 4, 2012:

The existence of the planet has been known to humanity, in one way or another, for thousands of years. Yet much of its modern reputation rests on a dubious Russian-born mystic named Helena Blavatsky.

Celebrated as the co-founder (in 1875) of the occult movement Theosophy, but also denounced as a charlatan, Blavatsky issued a sort of planetary manifesto on behalf of Venus in 1887 that helped usher in decades of fascination with our closest planetary neighbour, Earth’s so-called “sister planet.”

Considering how its rival Mars has regularly hogged humanity’s attention, Venus needed the help, and it snagged a big fish with Blavatsky. Although she was already in her twilight years in the late 1880s (she died in 1891), Blavatsky had toured the world in search of arcane knowledge ranging from Western paganism to Eastern metaphysics. She also has exploited a number of men along the way, and otherwise misbehaved so badly that she was accused of both systematic plagiarism (by near-contemporary scholar William Emmette Coleman) and spiritualist fraud (by Britain’s Society for Psychical Research, in 1885).

Prior to 1887, Venus had received only sporadic interest. French novelist Achille Eyraud imagined a trip there in an 1865 book that apparently had little impact. More important was American occultist Thomas Lake Harris, who, around Eyraud’s time, wrote about such topics as his belief in a Venusian master-race that oversaw early human development. L. Sprague de Camp, a historian of such claptrap, regarded Harris as a forerunner to Blavatsky.

Blavatsky issued her Venusian manifesto in the form of a magazine and an essay. The magazine, which she founded, was ominously entitled Lucifer, and its first issue was dated September 1887. Inside, one found her article entitled The History of a Planet, which clarified the publication’s title. Venus, she announced, was an occult casualty of early Christian arrogance — “sacrificed to the ambition of our little globe to show the latter [as] the ‘chosen’ planet of the Lord.”

In ancient Greek times, Blavatsky continued, Venus had been known under a variety of names that came to be translated by the Romans into Latin as Lucifer (“Light-bringer”). Unfortunately, an ambiguous Old Testament passage (Isaiah, 14:12), once rendered into Latin, also used that name and gradually came to be regarded by early Christian theologians as a reference to Satan. So Venus became tainted, along with all pagan beliefs associated with the planet, making Blavatsky’s initiative an effort to reclaim that non-Satanic pre-Christian heritage. (For the record, Blavatsky was rather accurate about that problematic Isaiah passage, judging from Bible scholars Otto Kaiser and Jeffrey Burton Russell.)

Regardless of the state of what might be called Venusian popular culture before Blavatsky, that culture certainly flourished after her — but it was weird.

According to L. Sprague de Camp, one Frederick Spencer Oliver claimed in an 1894 tome that he had encountered a secret society of mystics that had taken him on an out-of-body visit to Venus. Likewise, around the turn of that century, British Theosophist W. Scott-Elliot began reiterating the notion of Venusian supervision for prehistoric humanity.

Not helping matters at this point was astronomer Percival Lowell, now infamous for claiming non-existent canals on Mars. Lowell insisted he saw spoke-like structures spreading from a central hub on the face of Venus, but nobody else did, and it is now thought that glaring light from the planet inadvertently illuminated the blood vessels of Lowell’s eye, as in an ocular examination.

Such novelists as Gustavus W. Pope (1895), John Munro (1897), George Griffith (1901), and Garrett P. Serviss (1911) all described trips to Venus. Going by Den Waldron, who has reviewed some of this material for the ERBzine website, the Serviss book may be particularly important, because it describes a Venus that is partly oceanic. This concept of a “wet” Venus received backing in 1918, when Sweden’s Nobel-laureate chemist (and part-time astronomer) Svante Arrhenius recklessly declared in a book that “everything on Venus is dripping wet.”

Sorry, Svante: As described by British astronomer Bernard Lovell in a 1967 article for the Times of London, a spectroscopic analysis of light from Venus in 1922 showed very little water or even oxygen. This study was repeated a decade later with even more disappointing results, with large amounts of carbon dioxide now turning up. However, the influence of Venusian popular culture was such that denial set in. In a 1932 adventure set on Venus, Edgar Rice Burroughs acknowledged discouraging data but went ahead with his tale anyway. Another science fiction writer, Stanley G. Weinbaum, did the same thing in a 1935 short story.

Occultists were even more oblivious. In 1934, the American couple Guy and Edna Ballard formed the “I AM” sect, which drew heavily on Theosophy, and featured Venusian elements. In 1943, Britain’s C.S. Lewis restaged the Garden of Eden fable on Venus in his Christian-mystical novel Perelandra. In 1945, John Whiteside Parsons ­— a ubiquitous figure who linked the worlds of rocketry, science fiction and the supernatural — reportedly had a vision in the Mojave Desert involving a Venusian. In turn, Parsons knew L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology, who later claimed his own Venusian experience (although this would be downplayed by Scientology officials in the early 1970s). Other religious groups related to Venus included the Aetherius Society (founded in 1956) and Eckankar (1965). By the 1950s, Venus was so influential in popular culture that it sometimes outdid Mars — even, amazingly, in the UFO field.

Of course, Venus always has had the advantage of its brightness, which has caused countless mistaken reports of flying saucers. Although UFO researchers can be touchy about Venus, such prominent figures as J. Allen Hynek, Jacques Vallee and Frank Salisbury all conceded that the planet caused a lot of false sightings. As well, many of the people who surfaced in the 1950s to report not just sightings but actual contact with alien beings were talking about Venusians. In a 1977 survey by J. Gordon Melton, a sampling of 35 of these early “contactees” featured 13 cases of Venusians and only 11 with Martians. Suspecting something other than spacemen, UFO writers Jerome Clark and Loren Coleman have commented: “The Venusian claims usually contain the strongest religious overtones..."

...And then it all came crashing down. In 1962, the U.S. unmanned space vehicle Mariner 2 flew close to Venus and became the first Earth probe to complete an interplanetary mission. A flurry of U.S. and Soviet spacecrafts followed, and the results were nasty. The atmosphere turned out to be mostly carbon dioxide (with a bit of sulfuric acid) and was so thick that surface pressure was 90 times that of Earth, while the surface temperature was not far off 500C...

...So the fun was gone, and Venus really did merit a Satanic image. Interest among authors and filmmakers dwindled, although environmental scientists now had a poster girl for the dangers of greenhouse gases. “Venus,” concluded space historian William Burroughs in 1998, “was a warning.”

25 years ago: The Moronic Harmonic Convergence attempts to accelerate the inauguration of the New Age

On August 16-17 1987, the Harmonic Convergence, the world's first globally synchronized meditation event, took place at approximately 200 sites throughout the United States and about 50 more around the world, with an untold number of participants. The event was organized by José Argüelles, founder of the Whole Earth Festival and one of the originators of Earth Day. It was believed that spiritual energy was particularly strong at "power centres" such as Mount Shasta in California and Mount Fuji in Japan, and that if 144,000 people gathered at these power centres and meditated for peace, it would speed the arrival of the New Age.

The timing of the Harmonic Convergence was allegedly based on the Mayan calendar, and marked an alignment of the sun, moon, and six of the eight other planets. According to one New Age site:

While many saw it as an end in itself, the opening to the New Age, in actuality the event was the fulfillment of an ancient Mexican prophecy, announcing the conclusion of a major cycle of 1,144 years, and the beginning of a final transitional period of 25 years.

This 25-year cycle – the time of prophecy – spans the period between 16 August 1987 and 21 December 2012. This now widely publicized date marks the Closing of the Cycle, the last day of the Mayan Great Cycle of 5,125 years or thirteen baktuns of 144,000 days each – a total of 1,872,000 days. This cycle effectively encompasses the cycle of history; from its beginning at 3113 BC to its conclusion, in 2012 AD.

The basis of the original Harmonic Convergence event and the cause of its success and positive effect on the world were in the principle of synchronized global meditation.

Timed to occur at sunrise, wherever that might occur on the planet, not only were people synchronized in their particular time zones, but as the planet made one rotation on its axis, every point of sunrise was synchronized in a slow motion sweep around the Earth.

The point of the synchronization was two-fold: to establish a common unified field of mind and intention, and secondly to create a type of mental network or field around the planet over a period of two days – a proto-noosphere.

The 1987 Harmonic Convergence also coincided with the 10th anniversary of the death of Elvis Presley. Elvis's movies were being shown on television that weekend, and his songs were widely played on radio, so I associated that anniversary with the Harmonic Convergence. When the King of Rock and Roll failed to come back from the dead and nothing dramatic happened, the Harmonic Convergence was widely ridiculed (see, for example, Moronic Convergence: The moral and spiritual emptiness of New Age by Richard Blow, The New Republic, Vol. 198 No. 4, January 25, 1988, pp. 24-27). However, when the INF Treaty--which abolished an entire category of nuclear weapons--came into effect in 1988, and the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union began to fall apart toward the end of 1989, some New Age proponents claimed that the Harmonic Convergence had helped to bring about a more peaceful world. This spiritual power seems to have largely dissipated since September 11, 2001, but the New Agers still have a few months to go to complete their activities in the Harmonic Convergence of 2012:

Against this backdrop and in the midst of a growing foreboding and anxiety concerning the 2012 date, the call is made for the conclusion to the 25-year time of prophecy, the Harmonic Convergence of 2012. While the first Harmonic Convergence was a two-day event, the Harmonic Convergence of 2012 spans the year, from 1 January to 21 December 2012.

The essence of the concluding Harmonic Convergence will consist of two concurrent cycles of synchronized meditations: a thirteen-day cycle and a seven-day cycle. There are also special synchronized meditations for certain key event points such as the Venus Transit, Crystal 8 (June 6, 2012) and Harmonic Convergence of 2012, Magnetic 22-23 (August 16-17, 2012), etc.

God, of course, is working according to his own schedule, which may not necessarily be in accord with the harmonic Convergence. A sidelight of the 1987 event involved a break-in, resulting in much damage from vandalism, at Gryphon Books, a New Age store on Whyte Avenue in Edmonton. None of the psychics at the store foresaw the attack on their business, although they were aware that it was a location of strange spiritual phenomena. The 2012 Harmonic Convergence has been forced to proceed without any participation from Gryphon Books, which has been out of business for many years.

Roman Catholic splinter group insists that Galileo was wrong about Earth's place in the universe

I suspect that the geocentrists' main complaint is that the Roman Catholic Church is no longer at the centre of things. And the incident recorded in Joshua where the sun stood still for an entire day in no way proves that Earth is the centre of the universe.

As reported by Manya A. Brachear in the Chicago Tribune, July 4, 2011:

Some people believe the world literally revolves around them. It's a belief born not of selfishness but faith.

A small group of conservative Roman Catholics is pointing to a dozen biblical verses and the Church's original teaching as proof that the Earth is the center of the universe, the view that prompted Galileo Galilei's clash with the Church four centuries ago.

The relatively obscure movement has gained a following among a few Chicago-area Catholics who find comfort in knowing there are still staunch defenders of original Church doctrine.

"This subject is, as far as I can see, an embarrassment to the modern church because the world more or less looks upon geocentrism or someone who believes it in the same boat as the flat Earth," said James Phillips, of Cicero.

Phillips attends Our Lady Immaculate Catholic Church in Oak Park, a parish run by the Society of St. Pius X, a group that rejects most of the modernizing reforms the Vatican II council made from 1962 to 1965.

But by challenging modern science, the proponents of a geocentric universe are challenging the very church they seek to serve and protect.

"I have no idea who these people are. Are they sincere, or is this a clever bit of theater?" said Brother Guy Consolmagno, the curator of meteorites and spokesman for the Vatican Observatory.

Indeed, those promoting geocentrism argue that heliocentrism, or the centuries-old consensus among scientists that the Earth revolves around the sun, is nothing more than a conspiracy theory to squelch the church's influence.

"Heliocentrism becomes 'dangerous' if it is being propped up as the true system when, in fact, it is a false system," said Robert Sungenis, leader of a budding movement to get scientists to reconsider. "False information leads to false ideas, and false ideas lead to illicit and immoral actions — thus the state of the world today. … Prior to Galileo, the church was in full command of the world; and governments and academia were subservient to her."

Sungenis is no lone Don Quixote, as illustrated by the hundreds of curiosity seekers, skeptics and supporters at a conference last fall titled "Galileo Was Wrong. The Church Was Right" just off the University of Notre Dame campus in South Bend, Ind.

Astrophysicists at Notre Dame didn't appreciate the group hitching its wagon to the prestige of America's flagship Catholic university and resurrecting a concept that's extinct for a reason.

"It's an idea whose time has come and gone," astrophysics professor Peter Garnavich said. "There are some people who want to move the world back to the 1950s when it seemed like a better time. These are people who want to move the world back to the 1250s. I don't really understand it at all."

Garnavich said the theory of geocentrism violates what he believes should be a strict separation of church and science. One answers why, the other answers how, and never the twain should meet, he said.

But supporters of the theory contend that there is scientific evidence to support geocentrism, just as there is evidence to support the six-day story of creation in Genesis.

There is proof in Scripture that the Earth is the center of the universe, Sungenis said. Among many verses, he cites Joshua 10:12-14 as definitive proof: "And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, while the nation took vengeance on its foe. … The sun halted in the middle of the sky; not for a whole day did it resume its swift course."

But Ken Ham, founder of the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Ky., said the Bible is silent on geocentrism.

"There's a big difference between looking at the origin of the planets, the solar system and the universe and looking at presently how they move and how they are interrelated," Ham said. "The Bible is neither geocentric or heliocentric. It does not give any specific information about the structure of the solar system."

Just as Ham challenges the foundation of natural history museums, Sungenis challenges planetariums, most notably the Vatican Observatory...

...Sungenis said the renewed interest in geocentrism is due, in part, to the efforts of Christians entering the scientific domain previously dominated by secularists. These Christian scientists, he said, showed modern science is without scientific foundation or even good evidence.

Astrological signs won't be changing

And lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldest be driven to worship them, and serve them, which the LORD thy God hath divided unto all nations under the whole heaven. Deuteronomy 4:19

Have ye offered unto me sacrifices and offerings in the wilderness forty years, O house of Israel?
But ye have borne the tabernacle of your Moloch and Chiun your images, the star of your god, which ye made to yourselves.
Therefore will I cause you to go into captivity beyond Damascus, saith the LORD, whose name is The God of hosts. Amos 5:25-27

Then God turned, and gave them up to worship the host of heaven; as it is written in the book of the prophets, O ye house of Israel, have ye offered to me slain beasts and sacrifices by the space of forty years in the wilderness? Acts 7:42

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;
Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.
For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.
Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:
Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen. Romans 1:18-25

Some blondes and other airheads who believe in astrology almost had a collective nervous breakdown when a brief item by Bill Ward of the Minneapolis Star Tribune on January 9, 2011 that gave the impression that the astrological signs have gotten out of line down through the centuries went viral:

A recent Harris Poll found that 31 percent of Americans believe in astrology. They're wrong - although not necessarily in the way their detractors might cite.

The ancient Babylonians based zodiac signs on the constellation the sun was "in" on the day a person was born. During the ensuing millenniums, the moon's gravitational pull has made the Earth "wobble" around its axis, creating about a one-month bump in the stars' alignment.

The result?

"When (astrologers) say that the sun is in Pisces, it's really not in Pisces," said Parke Kunkle, a board member of the Minnesota Planetarium Society.

The article provoked a strong reaction from some believers in astrology, especially when they read that a thirteenth sign may be required for the zodiac:

Sofia Whitcombe began her day with the startling realization that she might not be exactly who she thought she was.

"My whole life, I thought I was a Capricorn," the 25-year-old New York publicist said. "Now I’m a Sagittarius? I don’t feel like a Sagittarius!"

Countless people were astonished by the "news" in Monday’s Star Tribune in which Minneapolis astronomy instructor Parke Kunkle affirmed that the Earth’s "wobble" has shifted the zodiac signs. The buzz has raced across the Web like a shooting star.

Some people seemed angry. "I believe it’s a zodiac scam," said Jose Arce, 38, from Fort Lee, N.J., who runs a body shop. "I’ve known myself to be a Sagittarius, I believe, since I was born. So to come up now with some new sign? It’s unacceptable!"...

...Astrologers across the country reported a wave of calls, e-mails or website hits from concerned clients. "People are more attached and loyal to their signs than they thought," said Eric Francis, editor of PlanetWaves.net, who said he had had 25,000 hits on his site since midnight. "It’s interesting how many people are panicking their sign is wrong."

New news or old, most people had never heard it before. And one of the more fascinating elements was talk of a new sign altogether.

By the reckoning of Kunkle and other astronomers, astrologers are not only a month off in their zodiac signs, but they are neglecting a 13th constellation, Ophiuchus (Ooh-FEE-yew-kus) the Serpent Bearer, for those born from Nov. 30 to Dec. 17.

However, astrologers are reassuring their clients that there's nothing to be alarmed about:

Robin Armstrong, an astrologer and astrology teacher based in Toronto, said the issue comes up every few years.

The mixup stems from the fact that the zodiac signs have the same names as the constellations, he said.

"It's just semantics," Armstrong said Friday. "They (astronomers) are measuring a certain thing, and they...assume astrology must mean this because what they're measuring has the same names."

And:

Linda Zlotnick, an astrologer for 32 years in St. Paul, said she and fellow astrologers have long known of the issue raised by Kunkle, but that the most commonly used zodiac — tropical — isn’t affected by it. Zlotnick, also known as "Moonrabbit," said the sidereal zodiac, which isn’t as widely used, IS based on the constellations.

It seems, then, that believers in astrology can relax and not have to concern themselves with adjusting their personalities to fit their signs.

Instead of looking to the stars for guidance, I suggest looking to the God who made the stars:

Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:
In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins:
Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature:
For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:
And he is before all things, and by him all things consist. Colossians 1:13-17

A useful book on the subject is Astrology: Do the Heavens Rule Our Destiny? by John Ankerberg and John Weldon (1989).

Astrologers don't show up to answer a challenge in British Columbia

According to the Vancouver Province:

A group of self-styled Indian rationalists are challenging astrologers to prove their ability to make predictions for a $100,000 grand prize.

Avtar Gill, a Punjabi resident of Surrey, said he is tired of watching self-proclaimed swamis, gurus and astrologers rip off superstitious South Asian clientele.

"These guys don’t tell the truth. It’s all guesswork and rubbish," Gill, a semi-retired taxi driver, said in Punjabi. "And I feel that in North America, people are even more superstitious than back home, so we want to educate them."

Gill finds it astonishing how popular these astrologers are within his community.
"When they come on the local TV channels, you can’t even get through because the phone lines are so busy," he said. "And they’ll say, give me $1,500 and I will make your court sentence go away, you’ll have a male child or your visa will come through."

His group, the Tarksheel Cultural Society, which promotes rational and scientific thinking, is hosting a challenge competition Monday at noon at the Grand Taj Banquet Hall in Surrey.

Astrologers, ghost busters, black-magic practitioners — whatever their speciality — are all invited to answer 10 questions based on a person’s janam kundli, or astrological birth chart.

If they get all 10 questions right, the Tarksheel Cultural Society will give them $100,000, raised from donations from 40 members.

"And if they get all the questions right, we’ll dissolve our group," he vowed.

The result:

Avtar Gill of the Tarksheel Cultural Society said his group rented a banquet hall in Surrey for the noon hour showdown with the swamis.

"No astrologers showed up," said Gill, who wanted to debunk the ability of the so-called gurus, swamis and astrologers to predict the future.

The catch may have been the $1,000 security deposit required before answering the questions to claim the prize.

Astrologers say they are able to answer questions based on a person's janam kundli or astrological birth chart.

While the swamis failed to show up Monday, there were plenty of people in the Grand Taj Banquet Hall, which can accommodate 300 people.

"The hall is full," said Gill.

The meeting was advertised in local Punjabi newspapers and on radio stations such as Red-FM and Sher-e-Punjab.