Newly Catastrophic Apocalypse

Throughout our readings this week, I’ve found broad topic after broad topic that seemed as if they’d be absolutely wonderful to discuss – things I’d like to write about in this blog-space, to discuss with the class… but there was one paragraph in the reading that has forced me to set that aside for in-class discussion – one paragraph that has really caught my eye.  Specifically, it was the paragraph relating a second path that the evolution of the idea of the “apocalypse” has taken – that of “an adjective now understood to be a synonym for the catastrophic or devastating,” with the context being, of course, the events of September 11th, 2001.  Actually, the reference was to a newspaper published the following day in London which depicted said events under a headline tagged “APOCALYPSE.”

I couldn’t honestly say why this fascinated me; there are plenty of reasons.  I suppose the biggest is that that day has remained so prominent in my mind over the past 9 years, and yet I’d never really put it in the light of that headline – I’ve never thought of it as an apocalypse.  Yes, I was scared that day and for a few weeks after, but never tremendously so – I knew things were different (though at my young age I can’t say I understood how, really, or why, other than that the Towers had fallen), but never once did I think the world was coming to an end.

So yes, that’s where my interest in this paragraph must have come in.  And I must admit – for almost my entire life I’d associated the word “apocalypse” with such destruction, only having heard “the four horsemen of the apocalypse” from an old Simpsons episode. (NB – this is essentially a joke, but the point is the same – I had not been schooled, as it were, in the imagery in Revelation.)

I don’t really have much to say on this – just to disagree with the author’s point that this image was a great change, as in my personal experience, that’s all I’d known.  I’ll admit, however, that this could be due to the aforementioned lack of schooling in Revelation, and the fact that I grew up in a decade (mostly) absent of the large, looming Soviet threat at the forefront of everyone’s mind.

There are, however, certain questions I can ask.  Or rather, one larger question.  That is, can the situation as described by the author refer to something like a “godless apocalypse?”  Does it indicate the growth of such an idea in the Western mindset?  Alternatively, could it simply be that the editors of the paper meant that this was the beginning of the apocalypse, that perhaps there was some sort of redemption to be had, that some sort of savior would appear after a long battle?  I feel like reading the newspaper article and not just mentioning the headline would give us a much better idea.  I would tend to agree with those who say that this was seen as the beginning of an “apocalypse,” as it were: first, the tragic event, then a long war against forces (or “axes,” if you will) of evil, at the end of which there would be world peace for those who have been deemed worthy?  It seems like a fairly strong metaphor to the events going on then and now, and I’m fairly certain that that is what the newspaper editors meant to highlight.