Genesis 6:11-13 reveals, “The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. And God said unto Noah, the end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.”

Will God “pull the trigger” again because of our sexual and political corruption and excessive violence?

Even famous historians tell us we are about to enter the Third Dark Age with a total societal collapse! Of course, none credit God, but fault economics, climate change, crime, broken treaties, failed diplomacy, etc. But global destruction is ahead.

We are at the strangest period of world history where we have experienced one crisis after another—wars in many parts of the world; famines in odd places; numerous earthquakes; volcanic eruptions; locusts infestations destroying national farmland; a massive plague of bats severely terrorizing parts of Australia; African Swine Fever wiping out millions of pigs worldwide; rampant violence and crime in major cities; run-away inflation; volatile stock markets; irrational behavior accepted as normal or acceptable; heatwaves; forest fires; food and water shortages; numerous healthy young adults falling dead; and a pandemic changing the world, killing over a million Americans and over 6 million worldwide according to NBC News.

Some will declare that the world has experienced most of the above for thousands of years, which is true; however, we have not seen as many upheavals as today, and many of these events are happening simultaneously. The massive increase of healthy, young people dropping dead has never been seen before—surprising, shocking, even startling life insurance actuaries.

Everyone should take notice when something happens that has never happened before.

Thoughtful people fear that these threats will collectively create a “perfect storm” and a dreadful nightmare that will soon continue to intensify to a disastrous climax.

The Guardian reported our world is “facing a series of interlinked emergencies that are threatening the existence of humans, because the sum of the effects of the crises is much greater than their individual impacts.” Experts tell us some nations could handle some of these threats, but as they accelerate from one to another and even happen simultaneously, they will overwhelmingly produce a “perfect storm.”

The Guardian reported on a survey of 222 leading scientists from 52 countries that found the responses to these emergencies by governments, civil society, businesses, and institutions “failed to recognise their interlinked nature.” The report reveals that the nations trying to solve their problems individually failed to consider “cascading” impacts, causing a failed response. More than a third of the scientists surveyed said these crises would exacerbate each other “in ways that might cascade to create global systemic collapse.” The suggestion is that it is a catastrophic mistake to attack each crisis in isolation rather than as a massive threat. All concerned emphasized a global collapse was in our future.

The report declared the world “is facing a series of interlinked emergencies that are threatening the existence of humans, because the sum of the effects of the crises is much greater than their individual impacts, according to a new global study.”

That means the world is in trouble, not simply here in River City.

It is reasonable to seek an understanding of ancient times to better comprehend the present and future. Biblical scholars are aware of events that brought down our world in the early days of man’s history. About 2348 B.C., or 1650 years after God’s astounding act of creation, man became so violent and sexually vile that God decided to change directions. He destroyed the world’s population with a global Flood, as seen in many landscapes unless one is wearing very dark glasses. He gave everyone a chance to escape the coming global Flood in the Ark, but only eight righteous people believed Him, and everyone else missed the boat.

In April of 2000, the Smithsonian magazine announced that scientists “have started to uncover evidence that Noah’s flood may have a basis in some rather astonishing events that took place around the Black Sea some 7,500 years ago.” Their date is off by a few years, but it’s close.

A recent Nature article asked, “Did a mega drought topple empires 4,200 years ago?” If so, what connection is there, if any, to biblical events? Their spurious modern dating does not align with the biblical timeline because of major problems with radiometric dating methods that I dealt with in Evolution: Fact, Fraud, or Faith?.

About a hundred years after the Flood, Noah’s posterity had gravitated south to Babel from modern eastern Turkey forming an unholy amalgamation of everyone. Josephus declared in his Antiquities that this was the first place the multiplying group of people lived after leaving the mountains of Ararat. At that time, there were no other civilizations on the planet. Mankind’s desire, as always, was to live without God’s approval, so they built a tower to “make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.”

Mankind has from the beginning tried to form a united nation in disobedience to God’s plan.

Evidently, God did not want a united race, speaking one language, living under one civil authority since that’s why He confused the tongues at Babel.  God confused their speech and scattered mankind to hinder their uniting and fostering rebellion against Him. Noah’s sons and grandsons scattered around the Mediterranean area. Javan, Noah’s grandson, founded Greece and Mizraim founded Egypt. These facts always cause Bible critics to squirm uneasily and sweat profusely.

I like to see Bible critics squirm, and especially sweat.

The Tower of Babel incident occurred around 4,200 years ago—about 100 years after the Flood but before Abraham was born. This was before ancient Egypt, Greece, Sumer and other early civilizations. These places couldn’t have begun until after people left Babel to establish the various cultures. So, what of China and others who (based on oral traditions) claim pre-Babel civilizations? No one has found a coin, written instrument, book, or pottery with such early dates. Archeologists and paleontologists hypothesize ancient dates after looking at evidence of bones, pottery, and tools—that are never stamped with a manufacturing date!

Furthermore, they always arrive at ancient dates. They have to if man has been evolving for “millions and millions or years.” An ancient Earth is the glue that holds their myth together.

Without millions of years, unbelievers are left with, yep, creation about 8,000 years ago.

The citizens of Babel scattered across the Fertile Crescent (Iraq) into the Greek islands, North Africa, and back into modern Turkey. Over the centuries, various civilizations rose and fell. Still, about 4,200 years ago, the Akkadian Empire located in modern Iraq and Syria experienced a massive drought about 2200 B.C., and by 2150, the Empire had disappeared!

In the 1990s, Harvey Weiss from Yale University found evidence of global drought, writing, “We’ve got Mesopotamia, the Nile, the Aegean, and the Mediterranean all the way to Spain.”

Additionally, he says there is evidence from around 4,200 years ago of a drying climate, central authorities’ collapse, and people moving to escape the newly parched zones.

Most historians, archeologists, paleontologists, etc., are humanists who interpret everything through a distorted lens. Above all, they must twist, distort, confuse, and defend their evolutionary timeline. Historians write about prehistoric times before writing was invented in Sumer and Egypt about 4,000 years ago. They divided history into the Stone, Bronze, and Iron Ages. Of course, they admit that there is much overlapping and the starting and ending of each age varied in different locations.

The groups that settled near the sea or large lake became adept at fishing, boating, and navigation. Another group that settled inland excelled at farming, canning, etc. While another group deciding to live in wild areas with much game, became hunters and developed the bow, slings, etc. In other words, each group adapted to their environment as men always have.

In those early days, men worshipped one God, believed in the family unit, and had knowledge of decency since they used animal skins to cover their nakedness and to keep warm. That does not fit the evolutionary scenario but perfectly fits the biblical timeline.

Remember, Adam was a husbandman keeping orchards and farming at the beginning of civilization, while his son Cain was also a farmer, and brother Abel was a keeper of flocks. With those two occupations, the needs of the developing civilization could be met: meat, eggs, milk, wool, shoes, etc., and various vegetables and fruits.  Cain had administrative and organizing talents since he built the first city. The sons of Cain knew musical instruments and forged bronze and iron; therefore, mankind did not have to discover that knowledge.  Genesis two reveals that gold and bdellium, and onyx were known to Earth’s first people.

Christians, not tied to evolutionary myth, believe when the world population was scattered at Babel into language groups, they possessed various talents, abilities, and inclinations. One group knew smelting metals, another was adept at farming, etc. So, there were not different ages but different groups with specific knowledge not possessed by other groups. The Stone, Bronze, and Iron ages did not exist in succession but simultaneously. Millions of years are not necessary.

Unusual and deadly events began in the various empires, and no one seems to have seen the big picture. A 300-year drought started, and an earthquake storm continued for fifty years. The drought resulted in famine followed by social unrest, crime, and invasion by nomadic tribes of people seeking livable conditions.

In 1177 B.C., the obscure Sea Peoples (thought to be fleeing disaster at home) invaded Syria by boats, wagons, oxcarts, and chariots. They raided their way south through parts of Lebanon, Israel, and finally into the Nile delta of Egypt. The Egyptians defeated them but were a second-rate power thereafter. Although weakened, Egypt was the only major power to survive the collapse of 1172!

People soon struggled to stay alive as starving peasants scrabbled for roots, bark, and animal droppings (containing seeds and nuts) in the shadow of abandoned homes and elaborate estates. Even public buildings were abandoned, and officials and ordinary people fled the disasters looking for livable conditions elsewhere. Hence, the Hittite Empire and others disappeared only to arise again hundreds of years later.

Nations died in an area stretching from what is now Italy to Afghanistan and from Turkey down into Egypt. Egypt managed to escape a final collapse, unlike other civilizations.  Troy and Gaza and other ancient cities were destroyed or abandoned, trade routes were lost, and literacy declined throughout the region.

Each civilization was independent of others; however, they traded, fought, intermarried, and had other activities with each other and soon became dependent on each other. Cline writes that the kings requested the ser­vices of physicians, artisans, weavers, musicians, and singers from one another. Ancient fragments revealed one nation sent grain to starving nations only to arrive too late. When trading slowed then stopped, bronze-making halted, resulting in fewer weapons. Bronze was made from tin imported from Afghanistan and copper from Cyprus. Importing silver from Greece and gold from Egypt also stopped, affecting those economies as well. The dominoes were falling all over the Mediterranean area.

As conditions worsened, ­people started deserting the more significant cities since there was safety in less populated areas. Hopefully, they would find more fertile soil and start life anew. Another reason to leave was to escape roving gangs of bandits and invaders who always use the disaster of others for personal advantage.

This globe was shaking like a leaf in a violent storm. Historians believe the evidence suggests a “black swan” event (an unexpected and low-­probability event with catastrophic results) occurred with a domino effect as culture after culture fell, some never to rise again. The extent of the catastrophe was enormous; it was a loss that the world would not see again until the Roman Empire collapsed more than fifteen hundred years ­later.

Thinkers are asking if our planet is standing on a similar precipice at this time approaching a “Third Dark Age.” It seems the world is taking a new direction not seen in 3000 years!

Panic must be avoided while planning and preparation must be pursued with passion.

(Dr. Don Boys is a former member of the Indiana House of Representatives who ran a large Christian school in Indianapolis and wrote columns for USA Today for 8 years. Boys authored 20 books, the most recent, Reflections of a Lifetime Fundamentalist: No Reserves, No Retreats, No Regrets! The eBook is available at Amazon.com for $4.99. Other titles at www.cstnews.com. Follow him on Facebook at Don  Boys, Ph.D., and visit his blog. Send a request to DBoysphd@aol.com for a free subscription to his articles and click here to support  his work with a donation.)

“You have not lived today until you have done something for someone who can never repay you.”  John Bunyan, Baptist Preacher

The Expose on July 22, 2022, revealed that since the beginning of 2022, “the vaccinated population have accounted for over 9 in every 10 Covid-19 deaths in England, and a shocking 91% of those deaths have been among the triple/quadruple vaccinated.” That is super serious, even shocking, and scandalous. No honest person can assert that the vaccines are “safe and effective.”

This was a worldwide blunder (or as some say, plan as in plandemic) that has killed millions and disabled millions more. And when world citizens finally realize what was foisted off on them, resulting in so many personal health disasters, it may become the worst “black swan” event in history. Some say it might end history!

Most people have not heard of a “black swan” event, but it is an unlikely, unforeseen, and unstoppable event that causes outrageous consequences that are catastrophic. An example would be the results of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife on June 28, 1914, by a Bosnian Serb student while they were being driven through Sarajevo, the provincial capital of Bosnia. The obscure event triggered World War I.

Few people except some Europeans knew much about the couple or their empire. No one thought their deaths would result in an international conflict involving most major European nations, Russia, the United States, and the Middle East. The war led to the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia and set the stage for World War II. Additionally, the transfer of millions of soldiers and military equipment facilitated the spread of the Spanish Flu worldwide, killing 50 million people.

Influential people are concerned about a far worse “black swan” crisis simmering slowly and silently of economic, environmental, and political events that could result in the total collapse of world cultures—triggered by the consequences of the heavy-handed federal approach to the COVID pandemic.

The Covid-19 epidemic prompted U.S. (and most other nations) Government officials to demand free people be forced to permit their bodies to be injected with an unwanted, untrusted, and unneeded substance. As always, “the good of everyone” was justification for a massive overreach and heavy-handed attack on Americans.

Furthermore, the federal health agencies told us “the science” demanded their unprecedented requirements. Incredibly, Americans complied with the unsafe and ineffective vaccinations and the resultant lockdowns, mask-wearing, etc.

Now, even woke leftists know that many federal health officials are running around Washington with their pants on fire, and everyone knows what causes that. Major federal officials are congenital liars.

President Biden assured us, “You’re not going to get COVID if you have these vaccinations.” Then he got the shots and the boosters and announced, “I have COVID.” And he got it a second time! Of course, Biden’s pants have been in flames since he arrived in Washington. Jill tested positive on August 16.

Dr. Anthony Fauci promised, “When people are vaccinated, they can feel safe they are not going to get infected.” Then he tested positive for COVID two times.

Dr. Deborah Brix of the CDC and the White House influencer told Fox News, “I knew these vaccines were not going to protect against infection. And I think we overplayed the vaccines.” Furthermore, she and Fauci made up information on the fly. There was no scientific evidence for “15 days to stop the spread,” six feet of social distancing and limiting oneself to groups of ten people. She also admitted to altering COVID weekly reports upon which the states made vital health decisions! Her pants are flaming.

While federal health officials, many state officials, and consequently many thousands of uninformed medical doctors stretched the truth, altered the facts, and lied about COVID, some independent, competent, and truthful physicians told the unpleasant truth: stay away from these vaccines like poison.

Drs. Mike Yeadon, Luc Montagnier, and Vladimir Zelenko believe the COVID-19 shots could reduce life expectancy by several decades. Furthermore, “There is an absolute effect on fertility,” Zelenko (recently deceased) says, “We just don’t know to what degree yet.” Drs. Stephanie Seneff and Judy Mikovits agree with that claim.

Dr. Joseph Mercola reported that Byram Bridle, Ph.D., a Canadian immunologist and vaccine researcher got access to Pfizer’s biodistribution study from the Japanese regulatory agency. He discovered previously unknown facts of a “huge problem with all COVID-19 vaccines.”  Bridle found that Pfizer’s vaccine’s mRNA and subsequent spike protein are “widely distributed in the body within hours” rather than remaining near the vaccination site. Since the spike protein is a poison, it can “cause cardiovascular and neurological damage.” This can result in the toxin accumulating in the ovaries of females who received the injection, causing blood clots, abnormal bleeding, infertility, pain at the injection site, heart inflammation, heart attacks, severe allergies, diarrhea, etc. Additionally, 30,000 women reported their periods being altered after getting the COVID-19 vaccine.

“We made a big mistake,” Bridle said in an interview with Alex Pierson. “We thought the spike protein was a great target antigen; we never knew the spike protein itself was a toxin and was a pathogenic protein. So, by vaccinating people we are inadvertently inoculating them with a toxin.” To a non-medical person, it is strange to purposefully instruct the body to create the thing (spike protein) that will destroy their body.

Dr. David Martin asserted, “Let’s make sure we are clear… This is not a vaccine. They are using the term ‘vaccine’ to sneak this thing under public health exemptions…It’s not a vaccine. It is made to make you sick… You are getting injected with a chemical substance to induce illness, not to induce an immuno-transmissive response…This is about getting you sick and having your own cells be the thing that get you sick…Our leadership who are actively participating in this malfeasance must be made aware that this participation will have consequences. This kind of complicity is no different than what the German doctors and scientists were accused of and went to trial for at Nuremberg.”

When citizens understand what health officials and politicians have done to them, they will do far more than demand a return to Nuremberg. I’m afraid every tree may become a lynching tree, but honorable people will leave punishment to the legal process. Many COVID victims may go from apathy to anger to anarchy with careless and callous health officials and complicit politicians being victimized. If this happens and in large numbers, we may have a black swan event in the works.

Many innocent people forced into unsafe and unproven vaccinations have reported serious reactions such as Bell’s palsy, herpes, massive blood clots, bleeding, heart attacks, paralysis, shingles, etc., following COVID-19 vaccination.

Each person must be awake, aware, alert, alarmed, and active in protecting their health.  If not, they will not be alive if a cadre of independent physicians is correct.

A coalition of 18 independent physicians makes up Americas Frontlinedoctors.com who sued the state of Alabama, alleging “that they have proof that there never was a COVID public health emergency.” They further allege that the CDC rigged the PCR tests to inflate the number of COVID-19 deaths. Those physicians had far more experience treating COVID patients than the political physicians in Washington health agencies.

It is a significant factor that the above doctors are not anti-vaccine, which removes the most damaging weapon from their critics. Unlike federal political physicians, private physicians risked everything to present what they consider life and death medical facts, while national health officials are charged with spinning myths, mistakes, and malice.

I’m not a physician, but if the highly qualified, independent physicians are correct, it sounds like some elite city slickers sold a pandemic to some country bumkins. And if found guilty, the elites will end up in the pokey for a few years. But I’m afraid it will be far worse for them and others.

People are slowly taking notice of the numerous young, healthy people dropping dead, which is happening globally. While people have dropped dead occasionally, it has never happened so often, especially with so many younger people. Indiana has seen an unprecedented rise in death for ages 18-64, up 40%. In Canada, six doctors from one hospital mysteriously died in two weeks.

An Alberta-based doctor said 13 Canadian physicians have died “suddenly” and “unexpectedly” after receiving the Covid vaccination.  Their ages ranged from 27 to 62. Dr. William Makis said on August 3, “I’ve now tracked 13 Canadian doctor ‘sudden deaths’… This is the most complete data set I’ve seen anywhere by far.” Makis added that he expects “many more deaths to come” due to the Covid shots.

Three doctors who worked at the same Ontario hospital died after receiving their fourth Covid shot on July 24, 2022. What village idiot wants even to suggest that those deaths were all coincidental?

Dr. Makis declared, “Three doctors died while exercising (two swimming, one running), two of them were very high-level athletes. Three doctors died ‘in their sleep’ unexpectedly. Two doctors also had aggressive cancer that had arisen within the past year. All of them were at least triple vaccinated.

“Remember, these are YOUNG, healthy individuals who are always first in line to get jabbed. The vast majority of doctors will get their fourth and fifth jabs this summer and fall. Sadly, I expect many more deaths to come,” Makis added.

Doctors in the U.S., Canada, the UK, and around the world are warning the public about a strange and mysterious rise in “Sudden Adult Death Syndrome.”  SADS is a condition where apparently healthy adults suddenly drop dead of heart failure. Sometimes two or three die in the same week. Well, this has happened before, but no, it hasn’t. “Before 2020, there were never more than 10, and typically fewer than five, sudden on-the-field deaths among high-level athletes. Suddenly, in 2021, there were more than three hundred such cases, and more of them are pouring in this year.”

I think I see a black swan waddling down the street.

The National Vaccine Information Center recently published shocking numbers of COVID deaths and dangerous and deadly reactions to the vaccines. In the United States, the Vaccine Adverse Events Recording System (VAERS)  reported 30,162 deaths and 1,379,438 injuries following COVID-19 vaccinations. Do you think maybe they should have stopped the vaccination push after a few recipients had died?

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) database of adverse drug reactions reports 46,999 deaths and 4,731,833 injuries following COVID-19 vaccines. Evidently, the vaccines are causing death, disability, and disease instead of preventing the same.

Some cynics think money and ego might have something to do with the massive vaccine push.

Wayne Root, a conservative talk show host, was married a few months ago and revealed an incredible COVID connection. Eight months after his wedding, some of his friends and attendees started dropping dead. “People we know and love have been dying and suffering deadly non-Covid illness in huge numbers,” declared Mr. Root. He added, “33 dead, or injured, crippled or disabled in only eight months. That’s a lot of friends and relatives.” But the kicker is, all 33 were vaccinated! And among his family and friends who were not vaccinated, “not one of them has died or been sick since my wedding eight months ago.”

I can see hundreds of thousands of angry, fearful, and resentful citizens rushing through the streets and parks looking for someone to collect a “pound of flesh” for their damaged physical condition or a relative forced into an unwanted vaccination. Don’t be one of them. There might be a black swan in their midst. If so, Katie Bar the Door.

However, on with the crusade to convince and require everyone to accept a booster every few months in the most significant power grab since Attila the Hun saddled up for his ride across Europe in the fifth century. Attila killed 100 million people, but if peoples’ reaction to forced COVID vaccinations results in the collapse of many cultures, it will be far worse.

Always be aware of black swans.

(Dr. Don Boys is a former member of the Indiana House of Representatives who ran a large Christian school in Indianapolis and wrote columns for USA Today for 8 years. Boys authored 20 books, the most recent, Reflections of a Lifetime Fundamentalist: No Reserves, No Retreats, No Regrets! The eBook is available at Amazon.com for $4.99. Other titles at www.cstnews.com. Follow him on Facebook at Don  Boys, Ph.D., and visit his blog. Send a request to DBoysphd@aol.com for a free subscription to his articles and click here to support  his work with a donation.)

“You have not lived today until you have done something for someone who can never repay you.”  John Bunyan, Baptist Preacher

And the food supply is being devastated by the ever-increasing population.

In 1906, Alfred Henry Lewis stated, “There are only nine meals between mankind and anarchy.”  Three days without food will often turn friend against friend, neighbor against neighbor, and in some cases, relative against relative. It will also turn decent people into criminals and, in some cases, turn well-bred people into cannibals.

No stable person will go berserk after not eating for three days, but when the fear of starvation is added, panic will soon follow.

In 1798, Thomas Malthus wrote that the population expands in times of plenty until there is not enough food (and other resources) to feed the people. A relentless struggle for food causes tremendous pressure and distress in a region. Even in difficult times, the drive for “a virtuous attachment” (marriage) is so strong that the problem will worsen with additional children making any permanent improvement of the poor impossible. His basic premise was when times are good, the population increases, and the increase tends to consume resources, making it difficult for the less fortunate.

Malthusianism is in our world today, often with missionary zeal, to cut the population by prohibiting marriage, limiting family size, and even using the radical schemes of forced abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia. Even aborting handicapped babies after their birth and killing off those born without the possibility of a “quality life.”

Malthus posited that since population growth will always outrun the food supply, any improvement of humankind is impossible unless harsh limits on reproduction are imposed. He suggested late marriages and “moral restraint” (abstinence), wars, and disease would help keep a balance between the population and the food supply. Others added birth control; however, Malthus was an English preacher and did not recommend birth control.

When favorable weather produces abundant crops, the population is generally healthy and happy. They tend to keep having children in abundance. We are told the tendency toward marriage is a constant struggle and hinders any improvement in the condition of the poor. Therefore, the population increases, causing distress and pressure for additional food and other resources. Malthus considered society doomed to famine, disease, poverty, misery, and death; however, later marriages, sexual abstinence, and celibacy would help mitigate the suffering of the poor.

He lived in the mid-1700s and did not see the Industrial Revolution galloping his way from 1760 to about 1840. He did not anticipate machines run by steam, water, air, or electricity doing the work of scores of men. He also failed to see the rise of contraceptives that permitted families to have two or three children instead of five or six—or more.

Hunger, disease, and war decrease the population requiring less food; and birth control, postponement of marriage, and celibacy further help to keep the world in balance.

He thought natural causes such as accidents, old age, famine, and “vice,” including infanticide, murder, contraception, and homosexuality, could stop excessive population growth. But he didn’t have any hope of escaping massive famine.

When good times continue and the population increases, it threatens everyone; consequently, since more people live longer, the elderly, handicapped, and unproductive are “useless eaters.”

The famines in India (which happened about every ten years for decades) were necessary to keep the “excess” population in check. Officials even prohibited private charities from taking food into famine-stricken areas! The Malthusian theory also “influenced British policies in Ireland during the 1840s, in which relief measures during the Irish Potato Famine (1845-1849) were neglected, and mass starvation was seen as a natural and inevitable consequence of the island’s supposed over-population.”

Enter the Germans. In 1920, a world-shaking book was published by Germans Karl Binding and Dr. Alfred Hoche with the English title, Permission to Destroy Life Devoid of Value or Permitting the Destruction of Life Unworthy of Life. It addressed the legal relationship between suicide and euthanasia and then extended it to killing the mentally ill. The book suggested that killing a patient was justifiable when it led to other lives being saved, mainly when the patient in question was of no value to themselves or society. The book advocates killing the mentally ill or the intellectually dead, especially since such people were a drain on society.

The expression “life unworthy of life,” which appeared first in this book, was essential to Nazi ideology. The two authors, a lawyer, and a physician, were not political and were not National Socialists. They were academics dealing with a very delicate subject. Does the state have the right to kill some people for the good of many? Does the state have a right to decide when a life is not productive?

That question has not been answered, in my opinion.

Food or the lack of it is a significant issue in our time because if not enough food is available, then everything comes down. I have never seen such an emphasis on food and its potential unavailability. It is no longer only an issue for the preppies, but for everyone since everyone eats.

People are becoming more aware of their total dependence on others for that which is indispensable—food. Past generations would have been horrified of such reliance.

With the absence of food, anarchy prevails, followed by famine. Shortage of food is one thing, but the lack of food is a disaster. Paul Lee Tan gave a peasant’s description of the Russian Famine from 1932 to 1933. “We’ve eaten everything we could lay our hands on—cats, dogs, field-mice, birds. When it’s light tomorrow you will see the trees stripped of bark…And the horse manure has been eaten. Sometimes there are whole grains in it.”

Americans have little experience with food shortage on a national scale and no examples of massive starvation in our country.

No longer is a food shortage, food interruption, and food unavailability discussed only by the fringe groups, but highly placed officials and politicians are concerned. President Biden said of the food shortage, “Yes, it’s gonna be real.” Food prices are at their highest since records began 60 years ago.

That’s one time Biden got it right.

The concern is already here, and it will worsen as grocery stores run out of major items early in the day, then they will no longer have those items at all. Then, many people will go from anxious to apprehension to anarchy—the nine meals have been missed. It is one thing to be fearful of food shortages but another to have a fear of starvation, then the fact starvation.

It will get super serious as some borderline people become irresponsible. Some parents will take what they want to feed their children. The cities would become unlivable as food riots occur as otherwise decent people use force to take what they feel they need—if not deserve. Understand this is not speculation. It has always happened in all societies. As seen before, truckers would refuse to enter the rioting cities, further exacerbating the problem.

Henry Kissinger declared in The Final Days, “Control oil and you control nations; control food and you control the people.”  In a 1974 National Security Memo, he also declared, “Depopulation should be the highest priority of foreign policy towards the third world, because the US economy will require large and increasing amounts of minerals from abroad, especially from less developed countries.”

If you don’t think many public officials will promote plans to diminish, deplete, and destroy elements of a population to keep order (and their jobs), you live in an alternate universe. And you don’t know history.

Our Great Food Disaster has already started.

 The Great Famine was one of the great disasters of human history. The world-class disaster started when a physical chill settled on Europeans of the 14th century. The Baltic Sea froze twice, followed by unseasonably cold years of gradually shorter growing seasons that meant disaster. Rain started in 1315 and continued for 7 years, especially in the summers. Crop failures lasted through 1316 until the summer harvest in 1317.

In 1315, it rained so much, people talked of Noah’s flood. Crops failed, and people all over Europe died of starvation. People began to harvest wild edible roots, grasses, nuts, and bark in the forests. They ate their own children, and people in Poland took down hanged men from the scaffold and ate them. Food scarcity prompted prison inmates to kill new inmates and “devoured them half alive.” The time was conspicuous for severe crime levels, rampage, disease, mass death, cannibalism , and infanticide.

Almost everyone was hungry since 95% of the population consisted of peasants who had no reserve food supplies and no money to purchase if any were available for sale. During this time, people did not think or act rationally. They butchered their draft animals and ate their seed grain, guaranteeing continued famine. Many abandoned their children, yet some elderly people chose not to eat to ensure food for the young.

During this period, life expectancy was shockingly low. During the Great Famine and the Plague, it was a little under 30 years, and between 1348 and 1375, life expectancy was only 17 years! Lack of food and a deadly plague will do that to a population.

All that was area-wide, including a few nations; however, some experts tell us we are facing a world famine, first in Africa, Bangladesh, South American nations, Middle East nations, and China, then Europe and the United States.

And those populations are all headed in your direction!

Governments and do-good organizations will do something even if it is wrong. The World Economic Forum (WEF) just finished its annual conference in Davos, Switzerland, expressing concern about the world’s future because of the reliance on meat in our diets. They recommend everyone swear an oath to veganism and eat seaweed, algae, cacti, and avocado seeds. Gamblers can safely bet the farm that the billionaires in Davos did not eat algae.

God warns us in I Timothy 4:3 in the last days men would forbid the eating of meat and abstaining from marriage!

Suppose you’re stranded on a leaking lifeboat in the middle of the ocean with 5 other people. The problem is the boat will only hold 4, so two passengers must jump overboard or be thrown overboard.  One passenger is CEO of a major corporation; another is a surgeon skilled in saving helpless children; another is Stacey Abrams, pretender to the Georgia Governor’s office; another is a glib college student, and an unemployed person recently fired and now waiting for the results of a recent job application.  The boat is leaking badly. Two of you have to go. Whom do you throw overboard? I don’t think the unemployed man has to worry about his job application, nor will the college student have to worry about his student loans. Both are expendable.

The obvious point is people have different values in today’s world, but no person or board or any political entity has the authority to decide on a person’s worth.

But then, if Stacey would choose to do the manly thing and jump overboard, that would solve the theoretical problem. However, the food problem is not theoretical. And Stacey’s decision, like all her decisions, is totally irrelevant.

Today, leaders who allegedly are levelheaded, honest, informed, and concerned say starvation is ahead, first in third world nations then here.

Have you planted your garden yet?

(Dr. Don Boys is a former member of the Indiana House of Representatives who ran a large Christian school in Indianapolis and wrote columns for USA Today for 8 years. Boys authored 20 books, the most recent, Reflections of a Lifetime Fundamentalist: No Reserves, No Retreats, No Regrets! The eBook is available at Amazon.com for $4.99. Other titles at www.cstnews.com. Follow him on Facebook at Don Boys, Ph.D., and visit his blog. Send a request to DBoysphd@aol.com for a free subscription to his articles and click here to support  his work with a donation.)

“You have not lived today until you have done something for someone who can never repay you.” – John Bunyan

The Black Death (bubonic plague) is not simply a fearful fact in history but is still with us today. The CDC reported that in recent decades there are about seven cases annually in the western U.S. Colorado reported 22 cases of the bubonic plague between 2005 to 2020, and the Daily Mail reported a ten-year-old girl died in early July 2021of the plague. In 2015, four people died of the plague nationwide.

Bubonic plague is called Black Death because body parts such as fingers and toes turn black with gangrene. Death occurs within 2 to 7 days, often sooner. Its deadlier form, known as pneumonic plague, can prove deadly within 24 hours of onset and can be transmitted through the air.

CCN reported on July 6, 2020, “The infamous Bubonic Plague, also known as the ‘Black Death,’ has claimed two lives in Western Mongolia and infected a few in the Chinese region of inner Mongolia….China has become a Petri dish of deadly diseases lately….Judging by the craziness 2020 has brought us so far, one might think nothing could surprise us anymore. Well, think again. Bubonic plague, the one that killed half of Europe back in the 13th century, has just made a comeback in China and Mongolia.” One hundred and forty-six people were put in quarantine.

On February 20, 2021, The Independent reported bubonic plague  killed at least 31 people and sickened over 500 in the Biringi area of Ituri Province in the northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo between November 15 and December 13 of 2020. The health minister said, ‘We have more than 520 cases … of which more than 31 have been fatal.’”

New evidence supports the contention that bubonic plague started much earlier in China than thought. According to dental samples, the October 22, 2015, issue of Cell published a study revealing that Black Death was present in China almost 3,300 years ago. “They found the DNA of Yersinia pestis bacteria in seven individuals, the oldest of which walked the earth around 2794 B.C.”

What was thought to be the first recorded case of the bubonic plague was in China in 224 B.C., and it struck again in the first worldwide bubonic plague in A.D. 540 at Pelusium, Egypt. This was during the reign of Emperor Justinian, known as “the emperor that never sleeps.” The plague spread to all parts of the known world in sixty years. The dead lay unburied in the streets, and “at length, ten thousand persons died each day at Constantinople.” The people of Constantinople became desperate with all the bodies, so they placed them anywhere they could. It got worse as the black horse of famine galloped through the city streets because mills, where corn was ground, stopped operating.

Historian William Rosen wrote in his book Justinian’s Flea: Plague, Empire, and the Birth of Europe, the plague “would mark the end of one world and the beginning of another. Along the way, it would consume at least 25 million human lives.” Some say half of Europe’s people (100 million) were killed before the plague left in the 700s.

The contemporary historian John of Ephesus described the scene of destruction at Constantinople in the following words — “noble and chaste women, dignified with honour, who sat in bed chambers, now with their mouths swollen, wide open and gaping, who were piled up in horrible heaps, all ages lying prostrate, all staturers bowed down and overthrown, all ranks pressed on upon another, in a single wine-press of God’s wrath, like beasts, not like human beings.”

Bubonic plague even attacked Emperor Justinian, but he survived; however, his Empire did not. The invisible bug brought an end to the Byzantine Empire and began the Middle Ages. The question is: how will bubonic plague and other deadly pestilences impact America?

The plague returned in 1339 and became known as the Black Death, Great Mortality, and Great Pestilence, killing millions. Others died during a seven-year famine called “the famine before the plague.” In August of 1347, the plague haughtily marched into England, killing millions more. One Italian wrote, “Its victims ate lunch with their friends and [ate] dinner with their ancestors in paradise.”  This epidemic claimed an astonishing 20 million lives in just four years.

The bubonic plague cut its way through the Far East to Italy and then to Europe. It is thought that Genoa merchants transported plague in their cargoes of spices, nutmeg, jewels, and silks. In Siena, Italy, 75% of the people were cut down like grain before the scythe. As described in the Cronica Senese by Agnolo di Tura in 1348, “The victims died almost immediately. They would swell beneath the armpits and in the groin and fall over while talking. Father abandoned child, wife husband, one brother another; for this illness seemed to strike through breath and sight. And so they died. None could be found to bury the dead for money or friendship.”

Pestilences have a horrific record in mankind’s history and have produced massive problems of civil disorder, disruption of labor, economic disaster, rebellion, and the demise of whole populations. Government officials, bishops, and the Roman Emperor accused Jews, lepers, beggars, and gypsies of spreading the plague by poisoning water wells resulting in the massacre of entire communities of men, women, and children for those alleged crimes.

In Germany, France, Switzerland, and Austria, Jews were massacred as the cause of the plague since rumors were rife that they had poisoned city water systems. In Strasbourg, 2,000 Jews were burned alive, and 3,000 Jews were slaughtered in Mainz. Rulers in Poland and Lithuania offered a haven to Jews starting a mass Jewish migration to those nations.

The King of Sweden believed fasting on a Friday and not wearing shoes on Sunday would appease God and stop the plague. However, lice on rats were the cause, not God, and the plague continued killing two of the king’s brothers and moved capriciously to Russia and Greenland.

The deadly plague lashed the face of Russia in 1351, and in 1353. It retreated but never disappeared, coming back sporadically but not killing millions again until another outbreak in the 1600s that also greatly reduced the population of Europe.

The face of London was smashed by the plague in 1348 and about every ten years thereafter until the plague of 1665. In 300 years, the city experienced 40 epidemics. During those times, about 20 percent of the living in London died of plague.

The Great Plague of 1665 was one of the worst of the numerous outbreaks, killing 100,000 Londoners in just seven months.

The most significant change that came with the pandemic was the end of serfdom in Western Europe as the lord of the manor no longer had a stranglehold on his serfs. The serfs were in great demand, so they could not be forced to stay with their lifetime lord. Homes were empty, businesses closed, and the land lay idle. A laborer became worth far more since workers were few. The survivors had better opportunities for work and increased wages.

The fifteenth century brought prosperity since numerous houses were empty after infected people fled their farms and businesses for hopeless healing and protection elsewhere. Moreover, the plague broke down the common divisions between the upper and lower classes, which led to the rise of a new middle class.

The Black Death outbreaks in the sixth, fourteenth, and seventeenth centuries claimed the lives of up to 200 million people, about 30 to 60 percent of Europe’s population! And all eruptions started in China!

Bubonic Plague lashed the face of Europe in the Middle Ages, killing half the population in some cities, more in others. The presence of plague, unknown to most people, is still with us today, even in America.

Now the World Health Organization (WHO) has reported that bubonic plague is spreading in parts of Madagascar (island nation just east of southern Africa), and a “weak health care system means it may spread farther.” The WHO reported that as of August 1, 2017, Madagascar was experiencing “a large outbreak of plague.” These cases were “unusually severe.” After November 2017, a total of 2119 confirmed, probable, and suspected cases of plague, including 187 deaths, were reported by the Ministry of Health of Madagascar to WHO.

Today, most plague deaths are in Africa, particularly the Congo. Other areas with regular outbreaks are Tanzania, Madagascar, Vietnam, Peru, China, Mongolia, and, occasionally, the U.S.

What does that portend for America?

It seems many people think (and knowledgeable Christians know) that earthquakes, famines, wars, and rumors of wars are an indication of the end of the world as we know it. No, I’m not a pessimist; that teaching comes from the Bible—and an old Time magazine cover screamed, “The End of the World.” Yes, we have seen disasters before but not with such frequency and intensity. Nations could be destroyed as they have in the past.

Muslim religious scholars taught that the plague was a “martyrdom and mercy” from God, assuring the believer’s place in paradise. For non-believers, it was a punishment from Allah. Some Muslim doctors cautioned against preventing or curing a disease sent by Allah.

Pope Francis even promised forgiveness of sins to all Chinese coronavirus victims and their caregivers. Francis is a usurper of authority spewing false hope to superstitious, susceptible, and suffering people.

Historically, the Black Death visited many major cities, but necessary border controls at some city gates, harbors, and mountain passes kept the disease at bay and some cities did not have many deaths. However, when the plague arrived in an area, it often killed 70% of the population!

National Geographic revealed the bacterium has even been researched as a biological weapon by some countries! Known nations experimenting with biological weapons are Iraq, Iran, Libya, China, Russia, and North Korea.

It is not demagoguery to suggest that the world could become a massive graveyard since the Black Death is still very much with us, as is the Chinese coronavirus.

I will sleep well tonight because I trust the sovereign God who is in control; however, while mankind cannot thwart the future, he can make preparation for the knowns and try to mitigate the unknowns.

I hope you also sleep well tonight, pilgrim.  

(Dr. Don Boys is a former member of the Indiana House of Representatives who ran a large Christian school in Indianapolis and wrote columns for USA Today for 8 years. Boys authored 20 books, the most recent, Reflections of a Lifetime Fundamentalist: No Reserves, No Retreats, No Regrets! The eBook is available at Amazon.com for $4.99. Other titles at www.cstnews.com. Follow him on Facebook at Don Boys, Ph.D., and visit his blog. Send a request to DBoysphd@aol.com for a free subscription to his articles and click here to support  his work with a donation.)

When uneducated, unthinking, and unconcerned people sense danger, they look to the government—when often the government is the problem.

With the Chinese coronavirus, the world has experienced the first world lockdown, and it was done based on dubious evidence. Not only businesses (which I may add, are in business to do business) shut down and stopped doing business, but all schools, parks, and most churches closed their doors. Attending church or continuing your business one-on-one was illegal, but you could legally protest in huge crowds!

The funeral for former congressman John Lewis in Atlanta was said by the media to have abided by facemasks and social distancing guidelines; however, that was an obvious lie. The audience was seated close together and the singing team and soloist were not masked or separated. So, it’s legal to protest and go to state-approved funerals but not go to church or run your business!

Since when did any official have the authority, power yes, authority, no, to tell churches they must close? Or, if they could open, they could not sing or have more than ten congregants? Never has a nation or the world made such a sea change so quickly.

But that could never happen to us. But it did. “But, it can’t last forever.” Are you sure? “Well, government officials will never let it get so bad that we run out of food and water.” Are you sure about that?

When God warned Noah that bad weather was coming and the earth would be inundated, he followed God’s instructions that involved long term planning. And many years of hard work. He was ready when the rain began. While a global flood had never happened before, Noah thought it best to prepare for it.

The normalcy bias could have killed everyone.

Five years ago, I wrote the following that is more relevant now than it was then.

The normalcy bias is a mental condition individuals experience when facing a disaster. It causes people to become vulnerable to approaching danger as they underestimate both the possibility of a disaster and its potentially dangerous impact. This often results in situations where people fail to prepare for a disaster, and that failure can be catastrophic on a state or national scale.

It is a mental condition that convinces a person that since it has never happened before, it can’t happen. Or “it won’t happen to me.” After all, this is America. We are special; however, we are not immune from natural or manmade disasters.

The town of Pompeii, located on the Bay of Naples, was a flourishing resort for wealthy, powerful, and élite citizens of Rome in the first century A.D. The city of about 20,000 citizens was located about five miles from Mount Vesuvius and citizens, slaves, tourists, and artisans jostled through the well-paved city streets. They passed elegant villas, taverns, cafes, bathhouses, and brothels to attend the arena that could seat 20,000 people.

Everyone knew about the volcano at Mount Vesuvius nearby, but it had been silent for over 1700 years. Nothing to worry about, but in August of 79 A.D., the mountain blew its top sending ashes, rocks, and hot gases 21 miles into the sky that could be seen for hundreds of miles.

Pliny the Younger was living with his uncle Pliny the Elder, an admiral of the Roman fleet who died in the eruption that had 100,000 times the thermal energy of the Hiroshima-Nagasaki bombings. The younger Pliny watched the eruption from across the bay and then wrote, “I believed I was perishing with the world.” However, there was plenty of time to flee the eruption, yet about 2,000 people watched in wonder as death fell around them! The hot, heavy ash made it difficult to breathe, and then a 100-mile-per-hour surge of poisonous gas rushed down the mountain, killing every living thing in its path. When the mountain stopped shaking, spitting, and sputtering the next day, the silent city of the dead was covered with up to 20 feet of ashes, rocks, and lava.

Highly intelligent people watched the eruption until death devoured them, an ancient example of the normalcy bias.

When Hurricane Katrina slammed New Orleans Aug. 29, 2005, thousands of citizens refused to leave the city, and city officials didn’t even attempt to evacuate them. There were scores of parked buses that could have saved hundreds of people, but the mayor refused to give the order, and 1,461 people died. The National Hurricane Center warned on August 28 that the area would be “uninhabitable for weeks” after “devastating damage” caused by the storm. Finally, the day before the disaster, Mayor Ray Nagin ordered a mandatory evacuation, yet thousands of people refused to seek safety!

The media have defended those who decided not to evacuate the area “because they were mostly poor.” Wait a minute. Are we to believe that all those people did not have automobiles, did not have friends or family with cars, or could not afford a $50.00 bus ticket out of town? However, they could have walked away from danger! They didn’t leave because “I’m different,” or “It can’t happen here,” or “It can’t be that bad,” or “God (or government) won’t let it happen to me.” Normalcy bias killed again.

The mind seems to make an attempt to protect us from traumatic events that come our way. When some things are too troublesome, traumatic, or tragic, the mind often shuts down. One survivor from the Muslim terrorist attack on September 11 in New York City reports of going blind when she saw some of the 200 humans hitting the ground after falling 100 stories outside the Twin Towers. The human mind is an incredible organ, but obviously, there are some things too terrible to comprehend.

When faced with major danger, the mind goes into one of three modes: it will “suggest” flight, fight, or freeze. Many people freeze–and die.

Americans have had it too good, nice, easy, cushy, soft, and pleasant all their lives. Disaster does lie ahead; so each one, especially heads of households, must prioritize, plan, and prepare. You cannot plan for every contingency, but you can for some. And remember that “hope” is not a plan. And “thinking about it” is not a plan. Nor is “worrying about it” a plan. A plan requires a plan. If you don’t have one, then get one.

Trusting God is very important; yes, God feeds the sparrows, but He doesn’t put worms in their nests.

What’s in our future? It could be a total financial collapse of our economy far worse than the Great Depression. Such suggestions are no longer coming from just me and other “prophets of doom.” Highly respected economists tell us that it is only a matter of time. Not if, but when the big bubble bursts.

Jim Rogers is a famed billionaire investor co-founder of the Quantum Fund with George Soros. Jim said that we are in for a major financial meltdown that will be the most shaking financial event “we have ever seen in recorded history.” But surely not. “It just can’t happen to us.”

A study done in Britain revealed that Britain is only “nine meals from anarchy.” The Daily Mail said that it would take only “nine meals–three full days without food on supermarket shelves–before law and order started to break down, and British streets descended into chaos.” Furthermore, the food you eat for dinner tonight had to be brought an average of 1500 miles. What if the food or the trucks or the fuel or the drivers or the highways were not available to deliver that food?

“But that could never happen here,” says the average American as he snaps open another can of beer.

A financial collapse would bankrupt state and federal governments, and the feds would renege on their financial obligations. Tax payments to the IRS would plummet, and our national debt would really go into the stratosphere. Already billions of dollars in the hole, the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation, an agency that guarantees pensions of major corporations, would go belly up. So would Social Security. Everyone would be on his own. “But our government would not permit that to happen.”

The disaster that does you in may be an epidemic that shuts down every school, church, theater, or even all public transportation. Hospitals and clinics will be overwhelmed, taking only the most diseased and dying. “But that couldn’t happen here.”

It may be an attack by one of the rogue nations such as China, North Korea, or Iran dropping an EMP device over a major heartland city knocking out all electronic devices including all electrical power, all automobiles, all cell and land phones, all elevators, televisions, radio, traffic lights, air traffic control, air travel, etc. In other words, we would be back in the 18th century. A major solar bombardment would have the same effect! “But that just couldn’t happen, could it?”

Naïve, confused, closed-minded Americans say, “The President would never declare martial law and incarcerate mass numbers of people who refuse to be vaccinated.” No, it hasn’t happened here, but something similar has sure happened elsewhere. Why can’t it happen here?

Tomorrow morning a dirty bomb may explode in the heart of Dallas or Washington revealing the fact that some suitcase bombs are circulating in Muslim circles. A mushroom cloud does not portend a normal life for anyone in America. But then, “It’s never happened here.” Yet!

It may only be a natural disaster that destroys your city, rendering you without utilities, food, employment, etc. But that disaster might ignite your normalcy bias that ends up killing you or your family. It is better to prepare and not need it than to not prepare and need it.

Hope is not a plan. Wishful thinking is stupid thinking.

Remember, it wasn’t raining when Noah entered the Ark!

(Dr. Don Boys is a former member of the Indiana House of Representatives who ran a large Christian school in Indianapolis and wrote columns for USA Today for 8 years. Boys authored 18 books, the most recent Muslim Invasion: The Fuse is Burning! eBook is available here with the printed edition (and other titles) at www.cstnews.com. Follow him on Facebook at Don Boys, Ph.D.; and visit his blog. Send a request to DBoysphd@aol.com for a free subscription to his articles, and click here to support his work with a donation.)

What is not known by most people is that China is the source of the three most deadly plagues that smacked the face of our planet in the last 2,000 years. Now, over vociferous denials and charges of xenophobia and racism must be added the Chinese coronavirus.

Running smack dab into the solid wall of facts, China is vehemently trying to distance itself from the Chinese coronavirus that is now smacking down people in over 200 nations and territories with about 600,000 deaths and counting.

China lied about the coronavirus originating in China; they have been lying about the number dead; now, China is charging that it did not start in China. USA Today reported that Chinese officials circulated a false claim that the coronavirus “originated in the United States and was passed along to China.”

The truth is if there were an Olympics for Deadly Pestilences, China dictator Xi would have gold medals draped all over him.

Correcting many historical reports, Galina Eroshenko and associates reveal in their scientific study that the Y. pestis triggered three world pandemics. Y. pestis, (the Black Death) lashed mankind starting with the sixth century Plague of Justinian (killed up to 100 million) to the Black Death in the fourteenth century to the third wave in the nineteenth century.

The study reveals, “Y. pestis has originated in China, and that the strains, which caused three historical plague pandemics also had their origin in China, from where they were regularly brought into Europe by Chinese merchants and military commands.”

The Plague of Justinian raised its ugly head in 541 and 542 A.D. and lasted until 750! It was named for the Byzantine emperor Justinian I, who ruled from 527 to 565 A.D. It affected about half the population of Europe, and was responsible for the highest number of deaths during any epidemic in history. Estimates believe “100 million people died during this time, which was half the world population.”

This plague spread so quickly because it was carried by lice-infected rats. Those rats “traveled all over the world on trading ships and helped spread the infection from China to Northern Africa and all over the Mediterranean.”

Even the emperor was infected but survived, although his empire disintegrated.

That was the first pandemic from China.

The Black Death that decimated Europe in the Middle Ages was used as a weapon by China, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica. The Chinese were fighting the Genoese trading port of Kafa, now Feodosiya in Crimea. It was 1347. The Chinese catapulted plague-infested bodies into the town as a weapon against their enemies. It worked as Genoese ships returning home spread the plague to Sicily, North Africa, Italy, Spain, and France. From there, it raced into England, Scotland, and the Baltic countries. Four or five years after arriving in Europe in 1347, the pandemic surged through the continent in waves that killed millions.

That “second pandemic” raced across the globe, taking down millions of helpless people and was stamped, “Made in China.” It was an effective killer that caused the depopulation or total disappearance of about 1,000 European villages in the early 1400s.

Even the wealthy and royalty did not escape the pestilence by running and hiding. They ran but couldn’t hide.

The “third pandemic” of Black Death erupted in 1855 in the Chinese province of Yunnan. Over the next few decades, this plague prowled the planet taking it to all inhabited continents. Most of the devastation took place in China and India, but there were also scattered cases from South Africa to San Francisco. The worldwide outbreak eventually killed about 15 million people, and the World Health Organization considered it active until 1960.

By this time, the world was far more interconnected than it had ever been. People traveled more frequently; the world’s military was “on the go,” and trade had exploded with the invention of the steamship. The ships carried grain and other foodstuffs to all occupied continents, and grain means the presence of rats and rats mean fleas. Ships sitting at anchorage with vessels from other nations had a constant exchange of rats, thereby quickly spreading the rats and plague worldwide.

Media propaganda suggests that we may see a similar killing with the Chinese coronavirus. It is raging in over 200 nations of the earth with unknown prospects of slowing.

Wait until it really hits the 55 nations of Africa! A few days ago, after I wrote this, the virus jumped 47% that week!

(Dr. Don Boys is a former member of the Indiana House of Representatives who ran a large Christian school in Indianapolis and wrote columns for USA Today for 8 years. Boys authored 18 books, the most recent Muslim Invasion: The Fuse is Burning! eBook is available here with the printed edition (and other titles) at www.cstnews.com. Follow him on Facebook at Don Boys, Ph.D.; and visit his blog. Send a request to DBoysphd@aol.com for a free subscription to his articles, and click here to support his work with a donation.)

Fanatics in India “actually believe and are taking cow dung baths to prevent or cure themselves from sustaining the deadly virus.” And the Evening Standard reported, “a Hindu group in India was hosting a cow urine drinking party as a means to immunize themselves from the coronavirus.”

Of course, Americans have their fools as well. One famous televangelist (worth $760 million) “would like people to believe that coronavirus can be cured through their TV sets, so long as those televisions are tuned into his show.” The Evangelical preacher Kenneth Copeland urged viewers to “put their hands on their screens and be cured of the coronavirus.” Copeland, who occasionally stumbles on the truth destroys any credibility with the “name it and claim it” teaching and his emphasis on money. While people have a right to give to whomever, it is usually the poor who keep the likes of Copeland in expensive suits, living in mansions, and flying around the world in plush private jets.

The above reactions are old news for old plagues. Men have not changed and they react the same way under similar circumstances during all ages.

When bubonic plague reached Paris in 1348, Philip VI called in his top medical people from the University of Paris to give him some answers relating to the origin of the pestilence that was ravaging the city. His learned academicians decided that the answer was astrology! Their explanation was so reasonable that anyone would accept it–anyone, that is, whose I.Q. equaled, but did not exceed his hat size.

The esteemed professors informed his Majesty that there had been a conjunction of Saturn, Mars, and Jupiter in the house of Aquarius on March 20, 1345–at 1:00 P.M. However, they did not indicate if that was Eastern Standard Time or Central Time. They told the king that the conjunction of Saturn and Mars meant death and destruction, and the conjunction of Mars and Jupiter released pestilence into the air. This was a Royal Con Job, and the king should have had a―You‘ve got to be pulling my royal leg look—but they assured him that the warm and humid Jupiter sucked up the water and nefarious vapors from the earth. Then, naturally, Mars, known to be hot and dry, ignited a fire.

Of course.

Those professionals were certified experts! The big surprise is that the king and his court did not fall down to the floor holding their sides with hysterical laughter; however, we must remember that it was an age of superstition and ignorance. At least the king got the message that Paris was not the place to spend that spring and summer. The Paris Medical Association had decided on the origins of the plague, so they could now give expert advice about how to escape being cut down like grass before the scythe.

The experts told the king, not to eat fat meats, poultry, and olive oil. The learned doctors told their patients not to sleep past dawn, don‘t bathe, and forego sexual intercourse since it could be fatal! During those days, quackery was part and parcel of most of the disciplines. The quacks wore academic gowns and were a part of the intellectual brotherhood—just like today. Moreover, as today, no one dared say, “But that‘s quackery.” After all, one might be accused of being an independent thinker! Horrors!

The people spent their hard-earned money for pills, potions, and preservatives, and in a later plague, infected folk sought a cure by bathing in urine collected from people who had eaten cabbage!

When it was decided that the Black Death was airborne, they were told to visit, even live in foul-smelling sewers among the rats that carried the disease! Victims would often bathe in urine several times a day and drank a glass of urine. Others cut open their sores and applied a paste made from tree resins, flower roots, and human feces. I don’t think their medical plans covered such an alternative treatment.

Dr. Thomas Vicary, the surgeon to Henry VIII, invented the very popular treatment called the Vicary Method. With a live chicken, he would shave its butt and strap it to their swollen lymph nodes. Then, when the chicken got sick, they would wash it and repeat the process until only the chicken or victim was dead or alive.

During most plagues, it was commonly believed that a lucky charm would keep the plague away. Dr. George Thomson, a famous physician, wore a dead toad around his neck.

I assume Dr. Thomson was board certified.

Pope Clement VI declared that all people who died of the plague were forgiven of all their sins so they could enter Heaven. Since no man on the face of the earth has such ability, the Pope gave the plague victims false hope. Admittance to Heaven comes only through faith in Christ.

Recently, the Catholic Church granted forgiveness of sins to the faithful who died of the Chinese coronavirus. The decree also covers healthcare workers and relatives who care for their sick family members. To qualify for forgiveness, one must read the Bible “for at least half an hour.” Pope Francis, like Pope Clement VI, assumed authority he does not have and gave dying people and relatives a false hope.

I don’t know if Clement and Francis were fools, frauds, or fanatics, but I do know their statements were false, and the coronavirus races on.

(Dr. Don Boys is a former member of the Indiana House of Representatives who ran a large Christian school in Indianapolis and wrote columns for USA Today for 8 years. Boys authored 18 books, the most recent Muslim Invasion: The Fuse is Burning! eBook is available here with the printed edition (and other titles) at www.cstnews.com. Follow him on Facebook at Don Boys, Ph.D.; and visit his blog. Send a request to DBoysphd@aol.com for a free subscription to his articles, and click here to support his work with a donation.)

It appears we not only have a temporary shortage of toilet paper but a permanent shortage of common sense.

You can exist without toilet paper since mankind did until 1920. It didn’t come to West Virginia until about 1940 based on my personal experience. But we couldn’t afford it. Food has been around a little longer and is considered indispensable while toilet paper is only important.

The Daily Mail reported on a British study that revealed any city or nation is only “nine meals from anarchy.” The report said that it would take only “nine meals–three full days without food on supermarket shelves–before law and order started to break down, and British streets descended into chaos.”

The reason for empty shelves and empty stomachs isn’t important since it could be a national lockdown resulting in disruptions in the food chain or political unrest, or a natural disaster. People will react as they have in all nations, in all ages, and under all circumstances—panic, fighting, looting, thievery, even killing to get food.

I remind you that all of mankind’s trouble started with food when Adam and Eve refused to obey God about food. And it has been a constant struggle for mankind since that day. Man’s chief drive through the ages is to find enough food and water to sustain himself. In the Garden of Eden, the human race received a mandate that man would have to fight the bugs and beetles, weeds and weevils in order to produce enough food to sustain himself and his family. God didn’t promise us a rose garden but He gave us the ability to grow one for ourselves that includes beans, potatoes, corn, onions, and tomatoes—even okra and beets if you are really hungry.

However, it would require work, a dirty four-letter word.

If we don’t work, we don’t eat; therefore, we starve. Some people are too lazy to work and some simply think it is foolish to work if they can convince others to provide them a place to stay and food to eat.

Animals instinctively know that food is required to survive as the daily struggle is evidenced with the life and death battle in the wild kingdom. Recently, we saw hundreds of hungry monkeys fighting over one single banana in Thailand after the coronavirus pandemic caused a massive drop in the number of tourists who normally feed them. Days later, they (the monkeys) fought over a cup of yogurt.

It may be the tourists tomorrow.

Moreover, there is no record of monkeys ever fighting over toilet paper.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, people looted “in order to feed themselves and their families.” However, much of the looting in all disasters is greed, not groceries—and stealing is never justified.

The major cities and nations of the world are locked down; streets are empty; schools are closed; stores, restaurants, and markets are vacant; airplanes are parked; the world has stopped because of an invisible bug—the Chinese coronavirus.

What if there is a sudden shutdown of oil supplies—no fuel for trucks that move food to our cities; no diesel to run farmers’ tractors; production methods are now such that 95% of all the food we eat in the world today is oil-dependent. So what happens when wells are not pumping, trucks are not running, and grocery shelves are empty?

Tim Lang, Professor of Food Policy at City University, London declared, “We are sleep-walking into a crisis.” London imports 80% of its food, so London is close to a major crisis.

We are in big trouble if farmers can’t produce food, truckers can’t deliver to grocery stores, and farmers quit the farm and move to the city.

Zerohedge.com reported the average farm income has fallen to near 15-year lows in the U.S. resulting in bankruptcies, suicide, and farmers giving up and leaving the farm. Farmers are not sleeping well because major commodity prices have plunged “by about half since 2012, farm debt jumped by about a third since 2007, bad weather prevented farmers from planting nearly 20 million acres in 2019 alone, and U.S. soybean exports to China dropped 75 percent from 2017 to 2018 amid festering trade tensions.”

Obviously, there are major problems down on the farm so that means problems at the dining room table. Farmers are fleeing the farms and if they don’t farm, we don’t feast.

USA Today reported that more than 450 farmers killed themselves in nine Midwestern states from 2014 to 2018 all related to failure to successfully produce food.

Americans spend more money on food than on almost anything else in their budget. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, nationally “we spend more than $7,700 per year on groceries and going out to eat. For rural and suburban consumers it’s their third highest expense after housing and transportation.” City residents spend more on housing followed by food than anything else.

This coronavirus may change us in many ways including the way we eat as happened with other plagues. During the Middle Ages, a person’s status determined what he ate and how he dressed. Consider, for example, the average diet of an English peasant before the 1300s when their diet consisted of bread and oatmeal pottage; very little bacon; and thin ale. Following the plague, their diet consisted of beef and mutton instead of bacon; wheat bread instead of barley; fresh fish instead of salted herring. The peasants ate better after the plague than before!

However, the peasants were held back in their attempt to get better food by lecturers, literature, and legislation criticizing the “greed” of the workers and tried to restrict their ability to earn better wages and eat better food. In other words, the poor needed to stay poor.

William Langland’s Piers Plowman in 1360 reminds us that beggars even ate better following the pestilence and they refused the cheap ale and wanted the “brownest that brewers sell.” Moreover, they demanded fresh fish instead of bacon.

Poet John Gower in the 1400s declared if a person was hired to serve in a household, he scorned “all ordinary food… he grumbles… and he will not return tomorrow unless you provide something better.” The peasants, while earlier were pleased to eat “course food,” now felt empowered and became demanding.

It was obvious that the peasant class knew they had far more power since workers were few, so they demanded the right to dress up and to eat up. The upper class did not like their uppity ways; however, it was inevitable that the world had changed and was going to change even more.

Sumptuary legislation (an attempt to regulate personal habits on moral or religious grounds to preserve class distinctions) prevented people from eating food that was not appropriate to their status and was intended to control conspicuous consumption. Such arrogant laws restricted the kind of food available to people based on income and social position. For example, the English sumptuary legislation of 1363 declared that lads “shall have meat or fish to eat once a day,” and at other times “food appropriate to their estate, such as milk, butter, and cheese.” Likewise, live-in servants were to receive “appropriate, not excessive, food and drink.”

It seems the English had come through the plague but their common sense had not improved.

I suggest people stop, take a deep breath, be thankful you’re not living in the England of the Middle Ages, go home and read the books you have boasted of reading, including the Bible, and get to know your kids better and thank God for life, liberty, and health—then plant a garden to be sure of having food this summer.

It seems we not only have a temporary shortage of toilet paper but a permanent shortage of common sense.

(Dr. Don Boys is a former member of the Indiana House of Representatives who ran a large Christian school in Indianapolis and wrote columns for USA Today for 8 years. Boys authored 18 books, the most recent Muslim Invasion: The Fuse is Burning! eBook is available here with the printed edition (and other titles) at www.cstnews.com. Follow him on Facebook at Don Boys, Ph.D.; and visit his blog. Send request to DBoysphd@aol.com for a free subscription to his articles, and click here to support his work with a donation.)

It has happened in all ages, in all societies, in all circumstances.

During the London plague in 1665, it was no different, although no doubt the city officials were fearful of panic. Politicians usually think they are far more responsible than are ordinary citizens.

London officials deceived the populace by underreporting the number of deaths in the city. Daniel Defoe wrote in A Journal of the Plague Year, “The burials in St. Giles’s were fifty-three, a frightful number, of whom they set down but nine of the plague. But on an examination more strictly by the justices of the peace, and at the lord mayor’s request, it was found there were twenty more who were really dead of the plague in that parish, but had been set down of the spotted fever, or other distempers, besides others concealed.”

The city officials concealed the number of deaths of plague and identified other plague deaths as having other causes. Astute residents of the part of London where the deaths were happening noticed that there were far more funerals than deaths reported.

Evidently, politicians don’t think ordinary citizens can count.

During the influenza epidemic of 1918, so much of the poor handling of the official response stemmed from the fact that newspapers were encouraged not to write anything that would damage “morale” during World War I. Government censors played down the epidemic using the war as a reason.

Few Americans will believe it but our government, in fact, the United States Public Health Service permitted 399 black men to die without giving them the medicine that could have totally cured them! It started in 1932 and was called the “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male.” Health officials wanted to know the natural history of untreated syphilis so they went to Alabama and found 600 poor black sharecroppers from Macon County.

In late 1932, Macon County was flooded with fliers promising “colored people” special medical treatment for “bad blood.” Blacks in the “colored” part of town read the government pitch: “Free Blood Test; Free Treatment, By County Health Department and Government Doctors,” the black and white signs said. “YOU MAY FEEL WELL AND STILL HAVE BAD BLOOD. COME AND BRING ALL YOUR FAMILY.”

There were 600 Guinea pigs divided into two groups: 200 without syphilis and 399 with syphilis. Over 40 years, the men were watched by health officials as they died. At their death, their ravaged bodies were examined to discover what the vicious disease had done to them.

The victims were told that they would get free medical care from the government plus meals and free burial insurance and the study would last six months. It lasted 40 years. The victims were told they had “bad blood” a euphemism for syphilis, anemia, and other illnesses. None were told it was a syphilis study or that they would never be treated. The treatment at the time had 50% success. Penicillin had been discovered in 1941 and every life could have been saved with a shot of penicillin. But the researchers wanted to know what advanced syphilis would do to the human body.

The 399 Blacks were not even told they had a deadly disease, one that could now be cured easily; however, they were permitted to die an agonizing death—by their government!

In 1997, President Bill Clinton formally apologized and held a ceremony at the White House for surviving Tuskegee study participants. It did not help the dead victims or the 40 wives that were infected by their husbands or additionally, alleviate the pain, sorrow, and the horror of the surviving children, nineteen of whom were born with syphilis.

We must remember that even health officials, at best, are human with all the human frailties: they make mistakes, lie, exaggerate, and can be incompetent. The Wall Street Journal revealed that the official figures reported by Chinese officials for this pestilence are vastly underreported by simply falsifying death certificates. Coronavirus deaths are listed as pneumonia.

There have been many reports of stacks of body bags at hospitals in Wuhan that were taken to crematoriums and burned without being added to the official record. At one hospital, a woman said, “I have been working all day long. Now I am off duty. I took off around 4 p.m. I have been crying my eyes out. The infection is much more horrible than it’s reported on TV.”

Continuing their path of deception, China is now accusing America of being the source of the coronavirus! But then, Communists have a record of lying as the World Health Organization (WHO) got the Chinese officials to admit that the SARs problem in 2003 was “nearly 10 times worse than had been admitted.” But then, you can always trust Communists to lie. It’s part of their DNA.

Furthermore, from television news, it would not be surprising if this virus were started by the toilet paper industry.

(Dr. Don Boys is a former member of the Indiana House of Representatives who ran a large Christian school in Indianapolis and wrote columns for USA Today for 8 years. Boys authored 18 books, the most recent Muslim Invasion: The Fuse is Burning! eBook is available here with the printed edition (and other titles) at www.cstnews.com. Follow him on Facebook at Don Boys, Ph.D.; and visit his blog. Send a request to DBoysphd@aol.com for a free subscription to his articles, and click here to support his work with a donation.)

In the pestilence of 302 A.D., the plague had a companion–-famine. The people resorted to eating grass, and deaths from famine almost matched those dying from disease. Hungry dogs fought over the bodies of the human dead. Likewise, during the bubonic plague (Black Death) in the early 1300s, the population of Europe had outrun the food supply, and in a few years, the poor were eating cats, dogs, and other animals. Some say they even ate their own children!

Some historians suggest that up to 70% died of plague in affected areas. During this time, it took 200 years for the population of Europe to recover to the level prior to the epidemic.

This loss of population impacted the workforce, but at first, only the more skilled positions. However, when the second and third waves of pestilence swept across Europe, every job was affected. Farmers, servants, tinkers, and others were in short supply. J.L. Cloudsley-Thompson wrote, “some 50,000 persons died in London alone so that all public business was interrupted for two years and the war with France had to be discontinued.”

During this time, inflation skyrocketed. Goods became difficult to obtain and very expensive because so many people had died. Serfs no longer were tied to one master; it became easy to leave one lord and be hired at high wages by another master. It took between 100 and 133 years for Europe to overcome the shock and consequences of such a disastrous loss of workers!

There was a scarcity of all kinds of workers, so those who were still alive were worth more. They tried to unite and strike for higher wages, but the result was the Statute of Labourers of 1351 that kept wages at the 1346 level. It also prohibited workers from leaving their masters. Other laws followed that were just as bad, but the medieval economy experienced a major overhaul after a series of peasant revolts in 1381 and 1449. The plague helped force many economic changes.

The loss of workers caused wages and prices to soar; however, rents plummeted. Historian Gary North wrote, “There was now a labor shortage (at the old terms of labor). Wages shot upward. All over Europe governments passed wage controls. They made it illegal for people to move to new parishes. And all over Europe, this legislation failed.”

As the plague impacted a city, the healthy workers demanded higher wages and as the workers now had more leverage, even the dullest leaders knew serfdom (feudalism) was in its death throes. The serfs were no longer tied to a master for life with no hope of advancement. Of course, the aristocrats resisted, resulting in rebellion concluding with riots in Paris, Florence, and London in the mid and late 1300s.

If the coronavirus becomes more threatening, we can expect people to react in a similar fashion. The airlines, hotels, car rentals, and similar businesses are being decimated as you read this. Others will follow if the virus intensifies. If laws were passed forbidding workers to change or quit jobs or move, would you obey those laws? If you are quarantined, will you resist? If vaccination is required, will you comply? If church attendance is forbidden, will you meet secretly?

No one—politician, physician, preacher, or pundit—can give any guarantee that this threat is temporary or that it will kill millions, but everyone should consider all possibilities. It is only wise to pray, plan, then prepare for the worst. If it is a minor threat to a few thousand people and it fizzles in a month or two, then no big deal. If people keep dying worldwide, you will have been wise to prepare.

When the number of dead reached the breaking point in Europe which was different in various societies and ages, responsible people became irresponsible, calm people became terrified, and the borderline paranoid became dangerous. As fearful people ran from their homes, social and political organizations disappeared, crops were left to rot in the fields, populations were displaced, civil war was fomented, and major shifts in religious thinking occurred.

Religions were changed to a certain degree during and following all major plagues, and one of the most flamboyant results of pestilence was also one of the most appalling—religious excess. With a constant threat of death, it became time to look at one’s self, and as is often true, some people became mentally or emotionally unbalanced. Such were the Flagellants or the Brotherhood of the Cross. Those confused, but sincere people tore off their clothes and beat each other on their naked bodies with scourges, consisting of three lengths of leather with knots. In each knot were iron spikes, sharp as needles. The movement spread throughout Poland, Hungary, Bohemia, Germany, etc.

The extremists went from town to town spreading their fanaticism, and no doubt, the pestilence. Cloudsley-Thompson wrote of the Flagellants: “the gloomy fanaticism which gave rise to them infused a near poison into the despairing minds of the people. Thus, during the fourteenth century, the idea was spread that Jews had been responsible for spreading the pestilence by poisoning wells and infecting the air.” He was saying that a poisoned mind produced poisoned thinking and twisted actions, resulting in hatred of Jews and others. Any sane person could see that Jews were dying at the same rate as others.

Religious society was massively impacted not only by the plague but also by the printing press. When the printing press was invented in 1440, the Bible was printed for the common man and for the first time in a thousand years, people began to be informed and think for themselves. The influence of printing accelerated with the production of books, pamphlets, tracts, and flyers resulting in the Protestant Reformation.

The plague in the 14th century made a lasting impression on the Roman Catholic Church and its critics. Some of Rome’s monasteries were wiped out. Charles Gregg reports that all 150 monks died at the monastery near the French seaport of Marseilles and the same thing happened in Avignon.

A small group of intellectuals ruled the educational world, and most of them, being older, were most vul¬nerable to the plague and were mowed down when the pestilence visited Europe. In fact, four of Europe’s thirty universities disappeared in 1350 as a result of plague which was a major concern in academia during those desperate days of death.

Another consequence of plague was the disappearance of Latin as the medium for writers, and the acceptance of the common language for literature. The reason is simple: there was no choice since the teachers and clerics who taught Latin in the schools, seminaries, and universi¬ties were buried!

Today’s education has already been impacted by all schools closed in Japan, Italy, and twenty other nations. Homeschooling prevalence is exploding because of the epidemic.

An indication of the extent of national trouble during times of disease, destruction, and death can be seen in desperate laws passed all over Europe to alleviate their misery. During Diocletian’s reign (ruled 285-305) farmers were forbidden to leave the farms to take up other jobs and some occupations were made hereditary. That simply meant that a son had to follow his father’s trade or profession. Yes, such laws were tyrannical but politicians don’t think correctly in difficult times, or any time!

Obviously, the bug has caused more damage to nations than battles. Hans Zinsser wrote that the Plague of Justinian in the sixth century was responsible for the demise of the mighty Roman Empire. He suggested that it was “perhaps the most potent single influence—which gave the coup de grâce to the ancient empire.”

The mightiest empire of all time fell because of a bug! So, what are the possibilities for us today with the coronavirus in China, Italy, South Korea—even America?

It’s something to think about—then pray, plan, and prepare.

(Dr. Don Boys is a former member of the Indiana House of Representatives who ran a large Christian school in Indianapolis and wrote columns for USA Today for 8 years. Boys authored 18 books, the most recent Muslim Invasion: The Fuse is Burning! eBook is available here with the printed edition (and other titles) at www.cstnews.com. Follow him on Facebook at Don Boys, Ph.D.; and visit his blog. Send a request to DBoysphd@aol.com for a free subscription to his articles, and click here to support his work with a donation.)