Eschatology

Eschatology refers to religious end of the world scenarios, or more broadly the concept is secularized and used to refer to potential environmental catastrophes, wars, terrorism and other events that could literally or metaphorically could be said to bring about the end of the world or a similarly nighmarish scenario. Eschatology as an academic field is a subdiscipline of Biblical theology concerned with the study of beliefs and doctrines about religious end of the world scenarios.

In certain strains of evangelical Christianity, the end of the world is preceded by the Rapture, an event during which "the dead in Christ shall rise... [then] we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air" (1 Thes. 4:15-17).