![](https://blog.emergingscholars.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/eclipse_1712630697-420x280.jpeg)
The past week brought a total solar eclipse and a magnitude 4.7 earthquake to the northeastern United States (among other places for the eclipse). For the folks who will seize any opportunity to invoke the rapture and possibly God’s judgment on specific subpopulations, it was a convergence too delicious to pass up. This in turn could not be overlooked by the folks who love to trot out a science fact. Don’t you know that eclipses and earthquakes have natural causes, and that the eclipse has been predictable for decades? Now, while I’m inclined to agree that ascribing guilt for natural events is dicey, and I am well aware that many predictions of the rapture have come and gone unfilled (including any associated with this eclipse), I also think invoking plate tectonics and celestial mechanics rather misses the point.
[Read more…] about Science Corner: So When is an Eclipse not Just an Eclipse?