However, before the moment of disproof, they can achieve great intensity, and have intense power precisely because they are so short-lived. There are about 40 different calendars in use worldwide. Some evidence exists of an increase in mass pilgrimages, executions of heretics and sporadic acts of violence, though it is not clear how widespread they were. The Second Coming did not happen, but the legacy of counting time in increments of a thousand years remains with us. Aside from a handful of fringe groups, few people believe the current thousand-year period will end in the return of Jesus.
Millennium is still the norm, but a secular one.
The Year A.D. 2000 will certainly be celebrated, as is natural for a year with such a round number, but, accurately speaking, we will be celebrating the 2,000th year or the last year of the millennium, not the start of the new millennium. The discrepancy goes back to a 6th century monk named Dionysius Exiguus, or Denis the Little. The fact Denis did not start his calendar with 0 has been a source of consternation for centuries. It was, however, not his fault. The concept of zero, as defined by Hindu and Arab mathematicians, would not be introduced to Europe for another 250 years or so.