Posted on 10/17/2006 9:42:47 PM PDT by B-Chan
All things must end. Life, matter, the universe itself — it seems that nothing is permanent. While discussing this topic on another FR thread tonight, I happened to wonder if it might not be fun to find out how the rest of you think it's all going to end up. To that end, I hereby announce the Apocalypse Contest.
To play, simply write out your best guess at how the End of All Things will come about, especially with regard to the human race; then post it on this thread. A week from now I'll read all the entries (if any), pick the most interesting/striking/creative Apocalypse, and announce the winner here. The winner gets either a free drawing (any subject) by Yours Truly, or a selection of humorous lapel buttons from our company's famous line of, well, buttons.
Articles should be under 2000 words; but there is no minimum length, and you can write in any way you choose, from silly to serious. And later, after the Apocalypse actually occurs, we'll have lots of laughs re-reading the entries and seeing how far off they were.
Thanks, all!
100,000 years from now — if the Lord tarries — all of Mankind will be united in a single Christian empire. Man will have spread across the galaxy via wormholes, traveling in great self-steered Ships that no one will understand or even think much about. Earth will have long since been emptied of its billions, set aside by order of the Emperor as his personal desmesne; left to return to seed, the great cities and highways will lie beneath seas of grass and glaciers of soil, abandoned and forgotten save by the animals and the few men and women of the Imperial Court. Mankind will remain mankind; the genetic supermen will have been killed off, the materialists will have uploaded themselves into their own virtual Hells, surviving only as ghosts. All schisms, sects, and heresies will be dead, or will have long since given up their rebellion and come back to Mother Church of their own free will. Those of faiths inimical to the true Faith will have their own worlds upon which to follow their images and shadows under the tolerance of the Emperor, but “the Earth is the Lord's”. War will not be permitted; industry will be banished; the wheel will no longer scar the land. The meek shall inherit the Earth.
The wild men — the criminals, the capitalists, the artists, the prophets — all will be scattered to the skies. Those who cannot live meekly will be banished to the million worlds of the Empire, the great planets ruled by the Peers, the Nobility, the Aristocracy, and the Gentry: the Star Worlds. The Emperor will not interfere in the running of the Star Worlds, limiting his authority to enforcing the few, simple Laws that all men know, and guaranteeing to each citizen the right to leave any planet at any time, so that no man may be held against his will or make war upon Authority based upon mistreatment. Other than the Emperor's few edicts, the Lords of the Stars will be free to rule their worlds as they wish — some kindly, some cruelly. In this manner, every man will be assured that somewhere exists a world run to his liking, and guaranteed the freedom to live there.
The dark arts — genetic engineering chief among them — will have long since been forbidden. Men and women will still marry and bear children; though their lives may be longer, these children will grow up, age, grow old, and die. The basic cell of society will remain the extended natural family, gathered together in small villages surrounded by farms. But farming will not be necessary; those who till the soil will do so only for the sake of their own pride or pleasure. Cornucopia Machines in each village — magical technologies, each the personal property of the Emperor and sacrosanct upon pain of death — will provide each person his due of basic food, shelter, clean water, and clothing, making these from atoms obtained from human and animal wastes and powered by sunlight. Wage slavery will have been abolished; if a man wishes, he may sleep all day, or paint, or carve, or read, or build, or compose, or drink, or dream.
Of course, most people will choose to work — but only at what they wish, and on their own schedule. Capitalism will be a dim memory. With every human being guaranteed the basics of life, human existence will no longer be subject to the vagaries of commerce. Human creativity will be the only commodity of value. Those who choose to do so will buy, sell and trade craft objects, works of art, and services; those who choose not to labor will be free to do whatever they wish, eating the basic food, drinking the water, and wearing the simple garments the Cornucopia provides. So long as the Law of the Empire is not violated, Mankind will be as free as he shall ever be outside of heaven.
Yet within each human heart the same great questions will burn: why does anything exist? How did I come to exist? for what purpose do I exist? is this all there is?
Some will seek to fill this hole in their hearts by going to the stars, joining the crews of scouts and seekers who blaze trails through the emptinesses between the galaxies in their great city-ships, bidding farewell to their homes and families left behind as the great slower-than-light exploration vessels crawl from star to star. Some men will make a life surveying new worlds, building wormhole gates, planting new colonies. Others will remain at home, filling the emptiness inside with the pleasures of family and friends, or hobbies; and still others will turn to the vices of the flesh, or gluttony, or drunkenness, or to preying upon their fellow men. (The sheriffs, soldiers, and Knights of the Empire will deal with such as these.) The human race will live the simple lives of children — as God meant for them to do.
But the Questions will remain. And in Rome, far from the starships and the million worlds of Man, the Pope will still sit enthroned, ruling the Church, teaching the Truth, and sending out men and women to spread the Good News to those who would hear it. For as long as the Lord tarries, and Man exists, the hands of the Pope and his Bishops and Priests will hold aloft the Bread, brandish the Chalice, and say the words of hope that bring us into the Presence of God Himself. "Heaven and Earth shall pass away, but these words shall never pass away."
And Heaven and Earth will pass away. In the end, the Empire will be corrupted from within. Satan will enter into some willing soul, and under him the final rebellion will begin. The war will be long and hard-fought, and heroes will rise and fall along the way back to Earth, but eventually the Empire will be overthrown in the name of Freedom and the Will of the People. The Man of Sin will topple the Emperor himself from his throne, cast the Pope into prison or kill him, institute as the new church the worship of himself, and call upon man to revive the forbidden knowledge and become a race of gods in order to make war upon God Himself. In the name of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity the supermen will rise once more to lend their brawn; the ghosts of the savants will be called forth from their digital tombs to render their cold quantum reason. Under the benevolent eye of the new Prometheus, man will grasp the Fruit of the Tree of Life and rise to the level of godhood. For a moment, it will seem as if all hope is lost. As the Great Leader of the Republic of Man cackles in glee and assumes the Title of the Most High, those who remain in Christ will find their faith tested to the breaking point, forcing them at last to forsake their own strength and place themselves entirely in the Hands of the God of Creation.
And then, with a single Word, it will all end. The universe Men call real will evaporate like smoke; the masks and disguises will all be stripped away; and all creation will stand naked and bare in the pure Light of God. Those who have been restored to the Image of God by the sacrifice of Christ will cry in torment as the Light burns away the filthy scraps of sin that cling to them — then shout with joy as they emerge into the Presence. Those who have deliberately chosen to reject their own restoration will find their desires fulfilled as the Presence is withdrawn beyond their ken; shrieking in anger and horror, they will begin an eternity of self-torture. A New Universe will appear, and in it a New Earth. At its center the Garden will be revealed once more, and in the midst of the Garden will stand the New Jerusalem, centered on the Throne. Man will join hands with his Maker; all tears will be wiped away; and the Questions will at last be answered.
And then it will all begin again — as it was in the beginning.
For me it ends some time in 2007. If I'm lucky.
Now, Aliska, you have really gone out on a limb here. You know that, don't you?
Cf: The Book of the Revelation
The big bang is a big circle. The universe will stop expanding, then begin contracting until it coalesces into another big bang. I know this is true. I witnessed it at The Restaurant at the End of the Universe last January.
Lighten up, Francis.
That cult would never die till the stars came right again, and the secret priests would take great Cthulhu from His tomb to revive His subjects and resume His rule of earth.The time would be easy to know, for then mankind would have become as the Great Old Ones; free and wild and beyond good and evil, with laws and morals thrown aside and all men shouting and killing and revelling in joy.
Then the liberated Old Ones would teach them new ways to shout and kill and revel and enjoy themselves, and all the earth would flame with a holocaust of ecstasy and freedom.
From The Call of Cthulhu, by Howard Phillips Lovecraft, 1926
AD 5,000,002,006: The Sun expands as it evolves into a red giant and engulfs Earth.
The MSM will blame President Bush.
The honor of asking the last question at the last Presidential news conference will go to Helen Thomas.
We'll reach the Singularity and all be gobbled up by nanobots.
Barney Frank will hijack the space shuttle and attempt to penetrate Uranus, but instead settles for a worm hole, and finally katie Couric's colon, and it ends up polluting the air and causing the resurrection of the "coming global super-Strom", (Thurmond, that is) which wreaks havoc on the environment, making it impossible for the invasion of Taiwan, which means the Chinese will raunch long dongs into the sky, causing pre-mature evacuation of mooselimbs from our cities, preventing them from blowing them up, which means they all try to settle in Israel, which cuases the "Anti-C.Rice", Hil-liar-y "the dragon lady" Clinton, to wipe out the Temple Mount, which makes Temple university Graduate Bill Cosby fly Richard Branson's Virgin Spaceship to Jerusalem along with Jackie Mason who slays the dragon lady using a sling made from madonna's used, streched out diagphram, and discarded Jews For Jesus direct mail fundraisers crumpled up into projectiles shaped and spray-painted using the boogers ofPalestinian children to look like little green footballs.
bump
ROTFLMBOAPMP! That will be a tough one to beat.
This year I hope it ends on April 14th, but unfortunately I doubt it.
Meteorite 2002 NT7 on Feb 1, 2019. Mass extinction event, I'm having a big party for the NFC/AFC championships or semi-finals in January 2019, just to be safe and go out with a bang.
After reading your rant, I'd rather be destroyed by the Vogons who would be making way for a hyperspace bypass...just to avoid the embarrassment of having been destroyed the way you describe it!
I agree. Yuk...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.