José Luis de Jésus Miranda, leader of Miami-Dade-based congregation Creciendo en Gracia and the self-proclaimed "Man Christ," has announced the world will go all apocalyptic July 1, 2012. That's when Miranda claims his physical body will be "transformed, dressed in immortality and incorruptibility." It also happens to be Miranda's 66th birthday. New Times profiled Miranda in 2006, when the former heroin addict was splitting his time between Miami and Missouri City and persuading his followers to shower him with money so he could enjoy the finer things in life, like a diamond-encrusted Pasha watch. How else do you expect the Lamb to tell us lowly humans the exact time the world will blow up in a calamity of earthquakes, hurricanes, plagues, nuclear war, and locusts?











Miranda claims to have hundreds of thousands of followers spread over 103 countries, and they all tune in to his weekly Internet broadcasts. And they don't seem to mind that Miranda uses their charitable donations for personal expenses such as alimony payments to his first wife and buying property in his and his relatives' names. Anyway, Miranda's flock sent over a statement explaining the coming rapture:



