End is nigh, maybe June

By LOUISA CLEAVE

It's back to the drawing board for the doomsayers after the apocalypse failed to materialise at the beginning of the new millennium.

When the clocked ticked over to the 21st century there were no disasters - triggered by either a higher power or an invisible computer bug.

Bob Seales, a New Zealand farmer-turned-preacher, was among those who gathered in Jerusalem for the Second Coming. But he told journalists on New Year's Eve that the end was "not right now."

"Soon. But not right now. People who think it's going to be at midnight, in just a few minutes, well, they haven't read all the signs correctly," said Mr Seales, who camped beneath the Golden Gate of the Old City, where many believe the Messiah will appear.

How long they will have to wait is open to interpretation, says the Rev Dr Derek Tovey, of St John's Theological College, Auckland.

"Nobody knows the time, not even Jesus," he said. "The only person who knows is God the Father."

He said that although the book of Revelation appeared to set timetables for the Second Coming of Jesus, it was highly symbolic.

"Many people today - Christians, including conservative Christians - read things literally when they should be taken a little more symbolically."

California apocalypse watcher Marilyn Agee says the end of the world will be in June - a date arrived at by adding Christ's age at the time of the crucifixion (33) to the moment of maximum territorial expansion of the revived state of Israel (June 1967, during the Six Day War).