The Choir

This story was first reported in Life Magazine, 1950, and we recently ran across it in Robert H. Hopcke's There Are No Accidents. It's a stunning example of...well, you'll see.
***
A church choir in Beatrice, Nebraska was due to practice at 7:20 PM on March 1. There were 15 people in the choir and all of them, for perfectly legitimate reasons, were late for practice. The minister and his family, for instance, were late because they were finishing up the laundry, another person had car trouble, someone else was finishing homework.

Due to a flaw in the church's heating system, the church exploded at 7:25 PM.

The odds of all 15 choir members missing the opening of practice was later calculated at one in a million.
***
Group karma? Plain ole synchronicity? Apparently the members of the choir believed a divine intervention was key. Given the earlier discussion in final destination about death calling, you have to wonder about this one. What happened to these people after this experience? Were their lives and belief systems radically changed? Did any of them die shortly afterward? What kind of spiritual lessons are learned from an experience like this? It reminds me of the Bridge of San Luis Rey - Thorton Wilder's second novel - except that all the people in the book died. All the people in the choir survived.

It's certainly one of the strangest synchronicities we've come across.