The Abomination of Desolation - St. Marys Coptic Orthodox Church

26
SIGNS OF HIS COMING
A foretaste of hell is given to mankind before the great day of reckoning. 1
Having spent 19 years as a physician before being ordained, I cannot get
rid of the part in my gray matter that still thinks like a physician! So,
when I meditate on the phrases, “spiritual torment,” “foretaste of hell,”
and “men shall seek death and shall not find it,” one word keeps
flashing in my mind, DEPRESSION!
Depression is the closest thing to being in hell. It is a state of utter
hopelessness, where the present is worse than the past, and the future
is even worse than the present. The torment and mental agony are so
overpowering that the only deliverance often seems to be death. And,
indeed, in spite of the major advances in medical treatment, some
depressed people commit suicide to escape the torment.
A patient once told me, “I know that if I kill myself I’ll go to hell,
but, I am already in hell!” It is for this that I personally believe that the
fifth trumpet will usher an epidemic of depression, the like of which the
world has not seen.
But, can this really happen? Some people think it is already
happening. A recent article in Air Canada’s in-flight magazine “En
Route” tells us that we live in a period in which depression seems
rampant. One in five Canadians experiences some form of mental
illness. Last year, pharmacists filled more than five million
prescriptions in Canada for Prozac or other antidepressants. This
represents a fivefold increase in the prescriptions written in 1996 over
those written in 1991, according to IMS Canada, a supplier of
information and analysis to the health care sector, and, there is nothing
to suggest a slowdown. Four percent of those prescriptions are
dispensed to those between the ages of 10 and 19. Prozac now even
comes in a liquid form, and between 10 and 15 percent attending a
children’s clinic at the Clarke Institute of Toronto receive it, including
one patient who is six. We are also told in the same article that even
veterinarians dish them out to snarling dogs!
About a year ago, Time Magazine reported that in one small town
in NY, the whole population is on Prozac. They claim it increases their
productivity and competitiveness!
1 Culleton R. : The Reign of Antichrist