Yesterday, Lileks brought back some memories with his reference to Hal Lindsey's The Late, Great Planet Earth. The book postulated that the end times were just around the corner and offered evidence of current events to support the theory.
My mother owned a copy of said book and it was quite compelling reading. At least for a youngster who also liked reading the Book of Revelation for fun. Throw in repeated viewings of the first couple of Omen movies (the pond hockey scene still creeps me out) and I was all but convinced that the Anti-Christ was soon to make an appearance.
It's interesting to look back and realize that although my mother was a rock-ribbed Catholic, she was also running with an Evangelical/Born Again/Pre-Millennialist crowd back in those days. She would attend prayer meetings and lectures and come back with books on the evils of rock-and/or-roll (did you know that KISS stands for Knights In Satan's Service?) and strange theories about how the battle of Armageddon would begin.
One particular scenario that I can still clearly recall her passing on was that the USSR was going to invade Israel. When I expressed my twelve-year-old skepticism--borne of my reading of military history--about how realistic that actually was, she explained that they were going to use horses so as to not be picked up by radar. Okay, then.
A blast from the past. The good ol' days of end times.
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