The world has continued in violence, suffering, injustice and oppression. The real issue, then, lies in how any given individual or group has dealt with dashed hopes, how they have handled the headlong dive from the heights of inspired and infinite potential of apocalyptic time back into the limited and tragic confines of normal time. Or to change it more slowly. Here again, song at once preserves that uncanny sense of coming so close, and inspires us with hope that, the next time, even if we cannot, ever, break through to the other side, we can bring enough back to quietly, gently, transform this world. There is no necessary connection between a millennial dream and a chronological millennium such as we are now greeting.
Millennial movements can flourish in any year.
In the year 1000, such hopes brought with them the first great peace movement in the history of civilization, the Peace of God. What it will bring in our own day, only time will tell. But as long as we can sing, and learn to sing, there is hope.