Armageddon, apart from its end-of-world battle and religious significance as the confrontation of good and evil, is most popularly known as a critical moment of reckoning. The application is as narrow as that of an aging person or as broad as that of a declining empire.

Reckoning at any level is bracing.  Primarily the thrust of  such a moment is an uncomfortable reality; and an admission that in spite of all that might have unfolded in the past, no matter how well-intended, hopeful or clever, the past is suddenly irrelevant to the blunt prospect and awakening of the future. In short things change, the world changes. And while it may feed one’s melancholy to imagine we get what we pay for or deserve, the true hardship is that no one escapes the final or changing reality.  In that respect we are all doomed no matter how much we may attempt to forgo the privilege.

My point is not to embellish the misery; rather to acknowledge the predictable evolution of existence. Paradoxically the more bountiful the life, the more perilous the disease. Nutrition like starvation is equally harmful in the end. Nor does it matter by which model you describe the peril; either way it is a ruinous end. It is no doubt the ambivalent appeal of religion which affords its elemental attraction in this sobering matter. But if you’re not aligned with religious persuasion or hybrid mythological themes such as Zeus (“God of the sky, lightning, thunder, law, and order”), even Rome will fall. It is axiomatic; it is a natural evolution.

Whether individual or global, the issues at hand in the metaphoric battle between good and evil/beginning and end are practical topics such as alcohol and drugs (on the personal level) or education, health care and infrastructure (on the public platform).  Yet in either case there is no way for whatever reason to escape the impending transition. It is a pragmatic and historic truth, whether applied to you, me, Rome or the British Empire, that capitulation awaits.  Nor was it ever a forged end. Dinosaurs have come and gone; the ice age changed the world’s geography; empires have lived and died; and, by all current estimates, the face of the world is once again changing.

This, dear Reader, is a moment of reckoning. We are witnessing the threatened dissolution of ancient democracy and public favour; we are being encouraged to submit to the natural terms of existence unfettered by government and design; we now hear the open appetite for invasion and entrapment. At the same time, the world is experiencing unprecedented wealth in a small group while citizens of the identical sphere are suffering daily loss.

It disturbs one’s focus to imagine such impending alteration. Yet one must keep in mind the concurrent alterations of the world view not just those within one’s immediate scope. Events of a global nature happen in confluence with one another, not independently. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed; rather, it can only be transformed or transferred from one form to another. The unvarnished truth is that global alliances are undergoing remarkable change. The once convenient political fictions of disparity between people of different nations is dissolving to permit blending of unprecedented record. While it is just as impossible today to predict the future of tomorrow, there are evident marks of evolution in the process. On the personal level I find that people are collectively turning away from many of the historic biases and prejudices – including the circus of religions – which have poisoned our earthly community. This immediate awakening – no doubt spirited by the improvement of education and learning – has also adduced a sometimes frightening clarity of political ambition and representation.

Most of us are familiar only with what has transpired on the planet in the past 200 years, from 1800 to 1900 to 2000.  You will, dear Reader, likely easily recall the highlights of that limited era in human history – though I suspect only with a “Western” perspective (namely, Europe and North America). Meanwhile the truth of the Egyptian pharaonic period, the Byzantine Empire, Babylon, Greece, Rome, the Persian Empire (550–330 BCE), Han dynasty (206 BCE-220 CE), Umayyad Caliphate (661-750 CE) and the Mongol Empire (1206-1368 CE) are largely beyond one’s ken. Though one may excuse the lack of acquaintance as purely geographic or not proximate or relevant, I wager that most of us are equally unfamiliar with what has transpired within our lifetime in China and Africa.

By every consideration the advances being made in those vast continents is inexpressible. And what has happened is a product of summary human elevation – education, health and infrastructure (the same topics which, when ignored, are predicted to cause the evaporation of a population). This development has mostly been made quietly and assiduously. It is the same characteristics which attach to the current dialogue among nations with regard to the fundamental need for trade. Alliances are shifting; preferences and attachments are dwindling on one hand and thriving on another. The reinvigoration of international cooperation is assured to revive as well a devotion to public well-being.