The taunt, however, was particularly painful on this day, for that very morning I had received an official “Euth” notice from the local Citizens’ Wellbeing Office. My friend Charlie called it a Euth-warrant or a Euth ticket. Charlie tried to hold out as long as he could, but the state caregivers came for him not long after he received his final “invitation” to report for mandatory counseling and life quality assessment.
The caregivers said they had received a number of reports that Charlie had become a danger to himself and others in the community, living as he was in his own apartment. His apartment was suddenly condemned and deemed an “unsafe and unsupervised” environment unsuitable for the elderly by the Health and Public Safety Inspector. A young couple of youth directors of the New Beginnings moved in not long after Charlie was taken away to a Care Center. It was not a well-kept secret that the Care Center they took Charlie to was little more than a holding pen for the Peaceful Waters Facility for the Aged, which is located only a few blocks away. You can see its smoke stacks from here, and on a windy day get a whiff of its furnaces.
Euth, of course, stands for euthanasia. One acceptable way out for us was to accept the Euth solution. The Euth option was advertised as being a free public service, entirely voluntary, no pressures involved, and the only painless and dignified way for seniors over 70 to go peacefully. Of course, as I and any other older person knew, there were plenty of hidden and not so hidden incentives to make us “volunteer.”
Special food and financial credits were offered to friends and relatives bringing in a loved one. Charlie called it “the seduction of the lambs,” because children were encouraged to help their parents accept the Euth option, especially if their parents were older and had spoken against the regime. I had never spoken out publicly against the system of government, but my way of life and existence was a testament to my stance.
Euth Camp was the street name for these state sponsored facilities for the elderly, euphemistically referred to as “transition centers.” “Transition centers, my ass!” Charlie would say, adding many more colorful expletives to his sentence. “It’s nothing but a slaughter house and a termination and extermination center for anyone they want to get rid of! My public duty is not to die but to live as long as I can, and continue to be a total pain for this degeneration of what used to be called a democracy!”
Charlie had a point. Several unofficial studies indicated that the facilities had a disproportionately high use by members of certain unpopular minorities, cults, and members of religious groups that opposed the new Religious Freedom Act. I refused to conform to their offensive, demonic version of a universal religion, and did not recognize the man called the Global Guardian as the inspired authority on earth in spiritual matters.
In all the official records I was labeled a “voluntarily non-compliant” member of society. I had officially refused to accept a 666 New World Order chip and membership. I showed up on exemption day to reject my automatic membership, which was supposed to be every citizen’s right to do, but they made it most uncomfortable not to accept. Many housing and health benefits, as I found out, were, like banking privileges, tied to membership. Unless you were a bona fide member of this new world order, you could not buy or sell anything legally.
An expression that had become common among youth was an old line from a once popular movie, “May the force be with you!”—referring to a god of forces, rather than the one true God. Well, I was nearly past any feelings of the force being with me, but I felt I still had some usefulness in this world, if only to provide others with hope that life was a meaningful struggle that could be faced no matter what problems it presented. I had gone through difficult times in my life and struggled through wondering what my purpose for living was. It seemed that I had seen and heard or experienced as much as anyone of my age, and sometimes thought that perhaps I should step out of this body into a better world to come. But as I thought about continuing my mortality, I realized that growing older was really an opportunity to grow in new ways and to do new things at a new pace. Those seniors who had stopped living active lives just sort of faded away, because they lacked a purpose in life and they didn’t realize that they could continue to grow mentally and spiritually regardless of their physical limitations. The Bible counsels us that though our outward man perishes, our inward man is renewed day by day.1 And it also says that the Lord does not look at us the way we see ourselves or in the way that others see us. People look at our outward appearance, but the Lord looks at what we are really like inside.2
It was hard to deflect the mental trash thrown at me daily, but I comforted myself in the Lord. I tried not to compare myself to this younger generation and their physical abilities, but rather I would run through a quick assessment of all the things I could do, and see how I could actually enjoy being the age that I was. I even said a little prayer for them. They were just people without a firm foundation on which to build their lives. They knew nothing about the God of love, mercy and forgiveness. I gave my youthful critics the finger sign for belief in God, not the single middle finger sign of contempt for them, but the okay sign with the thumb and forefinger, and the other three fingers held up to visually represent the Holy Trinity.
For an elderly person, it had become increasingly difficult to survive. I had to rely on a kind of barter system where I traded things of value for things I needed, like food. Scrounging through garbage to glean items that have enough value to be traded had become the unofficial occupation of the non-compliant aged. This further stigmatized us in the community as being those dirty “garbage pickers.” This means of degrading us into submission proved to be a very effective and convincing way of getting those accustomed to having a better lifestyle to willingly accept a New World Order chip rather than live in such abject poverty.
Some Christians felt it was shameful to have to associate with other fringe members of society like drug dealers, prostitutes, thieves, and the gangs that prosper in the underworld of the “garbage pickers.” But I was faithful to give them the Word I knew, and many received it with gladness. That’s how I became a leader of the “garbage pickers” and helped to spread the message of salvation. The authorities didn’t break up our meetings, as we were simply there to glean garbage. The way it worked was that I would say a verse or passage from the Bible and the person next to me would repeat it and pass it on. I got the idea one morning after I had memorized a section of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. I said the first verse aloud while reviewing them in my head, and to my surprise the person next to me repeated it and wanted to hear more. Others were also eager to hear, and they loved to hear verses like “Blessed be you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you shall be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. Blessed are you when men hate you… your reward is great in heaven. But woe unto you who are rich!”3 The word soon spread that I was giving people the Words of God and many more came to our garbage heap the following day just to hear the Word.
The Global Guardian had been appointed principal overseer of the ten international regions of the world. The world had been divided in this way after the