Carlos Barrios
Carlos Barrios is a Guatemalan of Spanish origin living at Huehuetenango who, along with his brother Geraldo, has studied with the local Mam tribe of the Maya for twenty-five years. He has been accepted by them as an Ajq'ij or day keeper of the Eagle Clan of the Mam and speaks and writes on their behalf.
According to Barrios, as we transition between the fourth and fifth worlds, the old economic order will break down and the world banking system will collapse. He also foretells the melting of the polar ice caps and a general rise in sea level, though this has been a mainstay of climate-change prediction for some time.
His principal message has been to speak out about the fact that the Mayan elders wish it to be known they do not believe the world will end on December 21, 2012. Rather, they believe the world will be transformed. This date will herald the beginning of the fifth world of creation, which will be marked by a return of a fifth element: ether. This immaterial, spiritual element will allow for a fusion of polarities that has not been possible within a world that only acknowledges the existence of the four material elements of earth, air, fire, and water. This new element will presage a new way of being for humanity and will be accompanied by significant changes in the material world.
Unlike Cirillo, Barrios accepts the end date of December 21, 2012, and also places great significance on the date of harmonic convergence, August 16, 1987. He considers the twenty-five-year period between these dates to be a period of unprecedented planetary transformation.
In the next chapter we will look more closely at the harmonic convergence, the event that marked the beginning of what could be called the Neo-Mayan movement. This is when western authors began to make their own interpretations of the meaning behind the calendar. These sources have been largely responsible for popularizing the Mayan calendar and inspiring many of the ideas about 2012 in circulation today. However, they are sometimes in disagreement and at variance with both the indigenous Maya and academic Mayanists.
