Natural Disasters and Global Warming

Just a few weeks ago I was having a conversation with my mom and her friend about the horrible weather our planet has suffered; the tsunami, the earthquake in Japan, and the tornado in Alabama, just to name a few. It's scary because every single disaster has been hailed as "the worst of all time" and they never seem to stop coming. I don't remember how the conversation started up, but near the middle of the talk, my mom's friend went into some bizarre rant how the Mayan's predicted the whole thing and she wouldn't be surprised if the world ended in 2012. My mom and I both dismiss the theory but we agree something is happening to the world, nothing serious though like the apocalypse. My hairdresser thinks that God is furious with the human race so he is punishing us with all these disasters. I see the world being out of sorts because of global warming, not because of an ancient theory or religious belief. Back when I was a sophomore in high school but my environmental science teacher showed the class a video about our carbon footprint. The video talked about how global warming is happening because of poor recycling habits and too much energy and water use. I was very environmentally conscious for a period of time and though i'm not as eager to live a very green life now, I still feel the need to help our planet. The natural disasters are proof that Earth's environment is unstable and I feel we can change that because I don't believe it's an old prophecy. What do you all think about the recent amount of disasters?