If you’ve been curious about whether the world comes to an end in 2012, or wondering if now is the time to seriously get closer to God …  please be assured that as far as any expert I’ve talked with …  the world will still be around pretty much as it is today in 2013. (That doesn’t mean, you shouldn’t cozy up to the big guy!)

Here’s the lowdown.

Fact: the ancient Mayans were great mathematicians and astronomers, obsessed with time. They created these long-count calendars of five cycles, totaling around 26,000 years. At the end of every cycle they predicted that some sort of major event would happen. What that event would be they didn’t know. The last cycle ends on December 21, 2012.

Director Roland Emmerich took that fact and created the worse-case scenario, for a big budget, $260 million, Hollywood disaster flick. It’s the disaster flick to end all disaster flicks.

Fact: Most Religions have End-Times prophecies. Most are preceded by some sort of series of cataclysmic events. None of the prophecies gives a time frame.

But that hasn’t stopped anyone from guessing.

People throughout history have looked on all our wars, natural disasters and general mayhem, as signs that the world is coming to an end. But yet, here we are.

There’s one prediction we can be assured of: With hundreds of books written about 2012 and the Mayan calendar, “2012″ the movie will likely bring good fortune to many a folk.