Thirty years later, notions of apocalypse and Armageddon don’t seem like the paranoid ramblings of Christian fundamentalists. Everything from the Middle East to the polar ice caps seems on the verge of exploding or melting away. While war, famine, pestilence, and death have always been around, the four horsemen have rarely ridden in more resplendent fury than these days.

If the world doesn’t end in fire, it will end in ice. One is a bang, the other a whimper; both herald a holocaust of our own making.

Worse, we live in a nation where our Commander-in-Chief, if not completely convinced he’s a force of Biblical prophecy, is dangerously myopic in his worldview. And we have who knows how many fundamentalist Christians who see signs of the apocalypse in every geological fart and countless other non-religious types convinced that the world is ending. These are tense, anxious times; even if it isn’t the apocalypse, there are enough whackos of all kinds out there eager to play some part in whatever ridiculous obsession they’re cultivating.

Many devout believers in conspiracy theories are, on some level, trying to explain their own sense of powerlessness in the face of existential anguish. They yearn for a purpose, a place, a mission. They’re the fuel that a well-place spark could readily ignite.

I know that sounds paranoid in its own right, but every race, culture, ideology, religion and creed have frightened extremists ready to fight, die, and kill for their cause. It’s all quite disconcerting. In a time when great personal changes must take place if we’re to save the planet from environmental destruction (maybe that’s the true Antichrist), we’d rather obsess over some fairy tale battle between great supernatural forces that treat us like cattle and pawns. It’s a collective sense of personal abdication. It’s pointless, selfish and suicidal. Unless…

Stay tuned. And check the foreheads of any spooky-looking kids while you’re it.