From the earliest days of the Church there where those who predicted the return of Jesus in their own lifetimes. There is nothing new with people predicting the end.

What the Catholic Church has taught from the earliest days is that you must seek to keep your soul in a state of preperation for the end. None of us know when our lives will end on this earth, but we do know they will. Be it at the end of the world, or our own individual end, it will come.

St. Paul warned of the danger of these predictions as in the early Church there where those who stopped working, and became a burden on the Christian community, as they lazed away the days waiting for Jesus, rather than working to support the poor, and contribute to the common good.

I remember in my childhood a local Protestant Minister who preached what the date would be, his congregation sold or mortgaged their property, gave all the money to spreading the word, and the Minister ran off with the funds. This was some 35 years ago, and it was nothing new then….