Is the world as we know it coming to an end?

[Tom A. Saiyan]

According ot the Mayans... magsisi na kayo ng mga kasalanan ninyo...

[artfulabortions]

Complete BS

[patmunar]

Maybe... maybe not... Depende kung paano natin aalagaan si mother earth.

[blueberrikeyk]

nasusulat, walang nakakaalam ng eksaktong oras kung kelan darating si hesus or ang paggunaw ng mundo, tanging ang dyos ama lamang ang nakakaalam. kaya be ready all the time

[Tom A. Saiyan]

Hindi sa nananakot ako pero hindi ninyo ba napapansin ang sunod-sunod na malalakas na lindol? Una sa New Zealand, Japan, Indonesia, sa may Central America pati na rin sa Pilipinas... alam ko araw-araw ay lumilindol pero hindi ganito kalalakas... nagiging active yata ang ring of fire...

[USteg]

Coz naman naubusan na nang araw yun Mayan calendar, anyway 'ala na atang gumagamit nuon, even the descendants of Mayan culture or whatever is left of them had ceased to follow it a long time ago........... buti na lang yun gamit natin kalendaryo and dami pang araw, linggo, taon na natitira and, as I remember and recall it, batang musmos pa lang ako, laging naririnig ko na ang "end of the world"....... teka di pa puwede mag-hintay yan sa susunod na araw na lang............ he.......he........he........ mauubos lang ang oras natin kahihintay niyan, dasal na lang tayo lagi....God Bless!

[Tom A. Saiyan]

[USteg]

TAS, thanks for that interview of my cousin Jimmy Licauco, wasn't able to catch it 'live' and was even surprised that we view and apprise the Mayan calendar in the same way and manner...., my main concern, the Mayan calendar was only recently deciphered and thus, its accuracy is still being tested for accurateness? And this hold true of ancient hieroglyphics, cyrillic and arabic alphabets which modern scholars, religious, archealogists, genealogists are still debating about, so, with our own baybayin!

He...he....... about a year or so ago, a US-based christian sect announced the exact date of the 'end of the world', when it did not happen, mali lang daw ang calculations, ay, sus, musmos pa lang ako, ganyan na, eh?

Curious, a picture of Arnold Clavio is prominently displayed at OAR?

[Tom A. Saiyan]

Pope quits, shocks world
Agence France-Presse, Associated Press
12:05 am | Tuesday, February 12th, 2013


VATICAN CITY— Pope Benedict XVI on Monday announced he would resign, citing old age, in a stunning announcement that marked a first in the modern history of the Catholic Church.

The German-born pope said he would step down on February 28, which will make him the first pontiff in 600 years to resign.

“I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry,” the 85-year-old pope said in a speech delivered in Latin at a meeting of cardinals in the Vatican.

Dressed in red vestments and his voice barely audible as he read from a written text, the pope made the announcement in a hall in his residence— the Apostolic Palace next to St Peter’s Square.

Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said he expected a conclave of cardinals to be held in March within 15 or 20 days of the resignation and a new pope elected before Easter Sunday on March 31.

It will also allow Benedict to hold great sway over the choice of his successor. He has already hand-picked the bulk of the College of Cardinals — the princes of the church who will elect the next pope—to guarantee his conservative legacy and ensure an orthodox future for the church.

Several papal contenders

There are several papal contenders in the wings, but no obvious front-runner—the same situation when Benedict was elected pontiff in 2005 after the death of Pope John Paul II.

Benedict, an academic theologian who has written numerous books including a trilogy on the life of Jesus Christ that he completed last Christmas, will retire to a monastery within the Vatican walls.

“In order to govern the ship of Saint Peter and proclaim the Gospel, both strength of mind and body are necessary, strength which in the last few months, has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfil the ministry entrusted to me,” the pope said.

“For this reason, and well aware of the seriousness of this act, with full freedom I declare that I renounce the ministry of Bishop of Rome, Successor of Saint Peter, entrusted to me by the Cardinals on 19 April 2005, in such a way, that as from 28 February 2013, at 20:00 hours (1900 GMT), the See of Rome, the See of Saint Peter, will be vacant and a Conclave to elect the new Supreme Pontiff will have to be convoked,” he said.

Tributes

Tributes poured in for Benedict from around the world including his native Germany where Chancellor Angela Merkel said she had the “greatest respect” for his decision, and hailed him as “one of the most significant religious thinkers of our time.”

French President Francois Hollande said the pope’s decision was “eminently respectable.”

British Prime Minister David Cameron said the pope had worked “tirelessly” to boost ties with Britain.

Benedict, formerly Joseph Ratzinger, was the Catholic Church’s doctrinal enforcer for many years and earned the nickname “God’s Rottweiler.”

He was elected in 2005 at a time when the Vatican was being rocked by multiple scandals over child abuse committed by priests.

The guiding principle of his papacy has been to reinvigorate the Catholic faith, particularly among young people and in countries with rising levels of secularism like Europe and North America.

Benedict has championed Christianity’s European roots and showed his conservatism by repeatedly stressing family values and fiercely opposing abortion, euthanasia and gay marriage.

Pope Benedict, who has looked increasingly weary in recent months and often has to use a mobile platform to move around St Peter’s basilica during Church services, had hinted in a book of interviews in 2010 that he might resign if he felt he was no longer able to carry out his duties.

The scandal over confidential memos leaked from the Vatican by the pope’s once loyal butler last year was a particularly hard blow for the pope.

‘Caught by surprise’

“The pope caught us a bit by surprise,” Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said at a hastily arranged press conference.

Lombardi stressed that the pope’s decision was his own and was “well thought out” and that “there is no illness that has contributed to it.”

In recent years, however, the pope has slowed down significantly, cutting back his foreign travel and limiting his audiences. He now goes to and from the altar in St. Peter’s Basilica on a moving platform, to spare him the long walk down the aisle. Occasionally he uses a cane.

His 89-year-old brother, Georg Ratzinger, said doctors had recently advised the pope not to take any more trans-Atlantic trips.

“His age is weighing on him,” Ratzinger told the DPA news agency. “At this age my brother wants more rest.”

Benedict emphasized that carrying out the duties of being pope—the leader of more than a billion Roman Catholics worldwide—requires “both strength of mind and body.”

“After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths due to an advanced age are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry,” he told the cardinals.

“In order to govern the bark of St. Peter and proclaim the Gospel, both strength of mind and body are necessary—strengths which in the last few months, have deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me,” he said.

Allowed to resign

Popes are allowed to resign; Church law specifies only that the resignation be “freely made and properly manifested.” But only a handful have done it.

The only other pope to resign because he felt unable to fulfil his duties was Celestine V in 1294, a hermit who stepped down after just a few months in office saying he yearned for a simpler life and was not physically capable for the office.

In 1415, Gregory XII resigned in a bid to end the “Western Schism,” when two rival claimants declared themselves pope in Pisa and Avignon and threatened to tear apart Roman Catholicism.

Other popes have stepped down for a variety of reasons in the papacy’s mediaeval history.

When Benedict was elected at age 78, he was the oldest pope chosen in nearly 300 years. At the time, he has already been planning to retire as the Vatican’s chief orthodoxy watchdog to spend his final years writing in the “peace and quiet” of his native Bavaria.

On Monday, Benedict said he would serve the church for the remainder of his days “through a life dedicated to prayer.” The Vatican said immediately after his resignation, Benedict would go to Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer retreat south of Rome, and then would live in a cloistered monastery.

Contenders to be his successor include Cardinal Angelo Scola, archbishop of Milan, Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn, the archbishop of Vienna, and Cardinal Marc Ouellet, the Canadian head of the Vatican’s office for bishops.

Longshots include Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York. Although Dolan is popular and backs the pope’s conservative line, the general thinking is that the Catholic Church doesn’t need a pope from a “superpower.”

Given half of the world’s Catholics live in the global south, there will once again be arguments for a pope to come from the developing world.

Cardinal Antonio Tagle, the archbishop of Manila, has impressed many Vatican watchers, but at 56 and having only been named a cardinal last year, he is considered too young.

Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson of Ghana is one of the highest-ranking African cardinals at the Vatican, currently heading the Vatican’s office for justice and peace, but he’s something of a wild card.

All cardinals under age 80 are allowed to vote in the conclave, the secret meeting held in the Sistine Chapel where cardinals cast ballots to elect a new pope. As per tradition, the ballots are burned after each voting round; black smoke that snakes out of the chimney means no pope has been chosen, while white smoke means a pope has been elected.

The pontiff had been due to attend World Youth Day in July in Rio de Janeiro; by then his successor will have been named and will presumably make the trip.

newsinfo.inquirer.net/356575/pope-to-resign-saysvatican-spokesman


and according to St. Malachy the next Pope will be the last before judgment days...

[USteg]

Teka, bago mag end ang lahat, sana mag MBT champion uli ang Growling Tigers~

[Tom A. Saiyan]

Deadliest earthquakes in Asia since 2010
Agence France-Presse
8:00 pm | Tuesday, October 15th, 2013

CEBU CITY, Philippines — Below is a list of the deadliest earthquakes to hit the Asian continent since 2010, after a major quake rocked the Philippines on Tuesday, killing at least 85 people.

2013
October 15: PHILIPPINES — At least 85 people die when a 7.1-magnitude quake triggers landslides across Cebu, Bohol and Siquijor, three tourist islands in the central Philippines.
September 24: PAKISTAN — A quake of 7.7 magnitude kills 376 people when it strikes Baluchistan province.
July 22: CHINA — 95 people are killed and more than 1,400 injured in twin earthquakes in Gansu province in northwestern China. Magnitudes 5.9 and 5.6.
April 20: CHINA — A 6.6-magnitude quake leaves 196 people dead, 21 missing and more than 13,000 injured when it hits Sichuan province, on the edge of the Tibetan plateau.
April 16: IRAN/PAKISTAN — A 7.8-magnitude quake centered in Iran leaves one dead there and 40 more across the border in Pakistan’s Baluchistan.

2012
November 11: MYANMAR — A 6.8-magnitude earthquake strikes Myanmar, leaving 38 dead and missing.
September 7: CHINA — At least 81 people are killed in a series of earthquakes that hit a remote, mountainous area of southwest China on the border of Yunnan and Guizhou provinces.
August 11: IRAN — Twin earthquakes with a magnitude 6.3 and 6.4 leave 306 dead and more than 3,000 injured near to the city of Tabriz.
February 6: PHILIPPINES — A 6.7-magnitude quake triggers landslides, destroys homes and kills at least 52 on the heavily populated islands of Negros and Cebu.

2011
October 23: TURKEY — An earthquake of 7.2 magnitude rocks eastern Turkey, leaving more than 600 dead and at least 4,150 injured.
September 18: INDIA-NEPAL — A 6.9-magnitude earthquake hits northeastern India, rocking neighboring Nepal; 110 die.
March 24: MYANMAR — At least 74 are killed when a 6.8-magnitude earthquake strikes near the border between Thailand and Laos.
March 11: JAPAN — Nearly 18,900 are killed when a tsunami triggered by an undersea quake slams into the northeast coast, triggering a nuclear crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi atomic plant. Magnitude 9.0.

2010
October 25: INDONESIA — At least 400 people die after a tsunami triggered by an earthquake of 7.7 magnitude smashes into a remote island chain off western Sumatra.
April 14: CHINA — 3,000 people are left dead and missing after a 6.9-magnitude quake hits Yushu county in Qinghai province.
March 8: TURKEY — A magnitude 6.0 quake kills 42 in Elazig province.


Read more: globalnation.inquirer.net/87937/deadliest-earthquakes-in-asia-since-2010#ixzz2hrCnYIRe
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