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   The World Tomorrow, Garner Ted Armstrong brings you the plain truth about today's world news and the prophecies of the World Tomorrow.

   And greetings, friends around the world. What's happening to the family in the United States of America? Well, for one thing, it's being systematically destroyed; it's deteriorating. It's disintegrating. Sex roles are changing. The traditional so-called breadwinner and homemaker has disappeared virtually from the American scene because nowadays both marriage partners in the so-called typical family have jobs. The erosion of family income is probably mostly responsible for sending more wives to work. That's what most people would say. They have to work because they simply can't keep up with inflation any other way.

   But there's a far more sinister thing happening to the American family these days. And for that matter, to families throughout the Western world and around the world, increasingly, even in some of the communist countries in Japan and other areas where there has been a traditionally close-knit and very solid family structure, we're finding now the news is leaking out that even the Soviets are having difficulty with some of the encroachment of the various problems they like to lay at the door of the capitalistic societies of the degeneracy of the home structure and the social institutions that these roles shifting, changing where father is no longer in charge, the breadwinner, the wage earner, and mom is no longer at home and proud of it. Seem to be something that is happening all around the world and not necessarily in just any one country.

   But what difference does it make? Is anybody getting hurt? Is there anything wrong with that? Shouldn't mom sometimes wear the pants, shouldn't dad sometimes do the dishes? What am I doing here saying that I'm against women's lib? Am I saying that I'm against Title IX? Am I such a Bolshevik that I'm talking about putting women back in the home and keeping them pregnant and barefoot? Like some redneck in Alabama? No, now calm down, you guys. But I would like to ask the question about what happens to the children.

   Well, I'll tell you what happens to children in some of the big cities in the United States. Not very long ago. There was an unbelievable story that came out in the Los Angeles Times about sexual abuse and exploitation of an estimated 30,000 children in the Los Angeles area alone. These were predominantly boys, little boys, ages 6 to 17, and they were victims being subjected to every conceivable kind of sex crime, including acts of sadomasochism and the like. It showed that virtually every geographic area and segment of the Los Angeles society was affected. And it also showed that nearly all of these pathetic kids came from a broken or a neglected home, came from a home where mom was at work and where probably they didn't even know in many cases who dad was. These kids, according to some of the policemen who probably were near to tears as they tried to describe it, were merely kids who were looking for a little affection. And yet they fell into the hands of some of the unbelievable slimy, filthy rotten perverts of which apparently Los Angeles literally teems. They have their so-called gay societies and they're not happy about being queer or gay, but that's the way they like to talk about it. And so consequently, these children are being victimized almost like a white slavery market. They are beginning to be used in the pornographic market and the like and sexually exploited up to 30,000 of them. This revealed just recently in the Los Angeles area. Is there any connection between what is happening to our people? In a statement of the prophecy of Isaiah, the third chapter of the 12th verse (Isaiah 3:12), that says, "As for my people, children are their oppressors and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err and destroy the way of your paths." Any connection between Bible prophecy that said, if we break the 10 commandments of God that are there for the preservation of the home that those commandments are going to break us. You ought to write for the current number of the Plain Truth magazine and get the real truth about what's happening to a lot of these sexually exploited young children, boys, ages 6 to 17 and one of the largest representative age groups was about age 12. That's the sixth grade. The sixth graders without a dad at home. Did you know that about half of the children born to Washington residents, the capital city of the United States last year were born out of wedlock? Do you know that for many years in some of the other big cities of the country? It's been estimated, especially among some ethnic groups and up to 50 more percent of all children born do not have a legitimate father?

   Now, this was the known statistics that proved that in the first year, the first time that the proportion had exceeded 50%, according to the official statistics in the capital city of the United States of America, home of the free and the brave, the exporter of more Bibles and religious literature than any other country. The nation which proudly prints on its bills that we trust in God. The nation which passed a law through Congress years ago to add a little line to the pledge of allegiance to the flag. One nation under God. Well, maybe we ought to add another word to that line and say that every time we salute the flag, one nation under a curse from God because we are increasingly under a divine curse.

   You know that nationwide about 13% it is of all children are born to unmarried women. When you look at some of the various ethnic groups, you'll find that that ratio goes soaring up out of all proportion because of a lot of factors, whether they're economic, whether they're social or racial or what. But among blacks in the United States, 47.1% of all children were born out of wedlock in 1974, the most recent year for which nationwide data was available. Among white, 6.5 percent of births out of wedlock. In Washington DC, 57% of all children born to blacks were born to single mothers last year compared to 12.9% for whites. Officials said the high number of blacks in Washington, about 3/4 of the population obviously accounts for the high proportion because it's a higher proportion of blacks in that city. So that's not necessarily nationally a representative of the black community, but it definitely shows that because of pressures, whether it was resulting from way, way back in the days of the Civil War in the South or whether it's resulting from the still very slowly moving civil rights problems in the United States and the lack of a strong black father figure in the home, whether it's because of the economic conditions which force a larger number proportionately of black women to work to care for those children. These and many other factors no doubt obtain. But the facts are that the capital of the United States of America has now got to hang its head in shame by saying that more than half of all the babies born in that city are illegitimate. And you know, for the first time, the number of legal abortions obtained by Washington DC residents exceeded the number of births. So there were more abortions, more babies as they were being formed and shaped in the womb actually killed and aborted legally in the capital city of the United States of America, then there were the total number of live babies born of which half of them were illegitimate.

   Now look at the total, if you'd like. You got two figures of 100% you're dealing with there. I suppose it really means that only about a quarter or less of the actual pregnancies in the capital city of Washington DC resulted in legitimate births.

   And of course, unfortunately, most of those were born in homes that probably have little if any chance of providing the kind of an environment that is going to guarantee that little tiny percentage of children born into a, into a home where there is a father present, have an opportunity for stability, for the right kind of education and for really going somewhere in life you know, the watchwords of the United States Institution of the Home, I suppose, used to be words like permanence, security, stability, responsibility.

   Remember back years ago when young teenagers who were contemplating marriage would probably be told by dad and mom, are you able to assume the responsibility of a wife? Do you think you're ready? Do you, do you have a little bit of a nest egg in the bank? Do you own any property? Do you own your car? Have you got a good solid job? The young kid today would probably say, what are you talking? What's that got to do with it? I don't need those things just to get married. Probably wouldn't last longer than a trip to Vegas and back anyway. What difference does it make?

   And so today, even an awful lot of kids who are still striving for the word security or consistency, the watchword of us marriages of decades ago don't really see that they need to wait until they're mature enough to accept the responsibility, meaning age 25 and on up, perhaps in many cases, don't need to wait until they're out of debt and have some sort of financial security. Don't need to wait until they finish their education. Don't need to wait until they're mature enough. Have studied and have thought and pondered and absorbed as much information as they could get about child rearing, just what children are and how to deal with them, how to treat them, how to educate them, how to take care of them. So that they actually become educated merely because their physical bodies by the process of nature are able to engender children does not. It seems a lot of people don't understand this automatically mean that their minds are capable of really taking care of those kids, their bodies can produce.

   But even in that idealistic situation of so many young people going to the altar these days, firmly intending to establish a home. Entirely, too much of it is by caprice and by accident and without proper planning and preparation and not at the proper age.

   Just the other day, the Census Bureau reported that in June of 1975 the proportion of women who got divorced between the ages of 25 and 29 is more than tripled. Gone up to 17% from only 5% back a few decades ago. There were 691,000 divorces in the first seven months of 1976 and 9% rise over the same period in 1975 in 1975 divorces increased 5% over 1974.

   And right now, if you were to ask for a showing of hands in most audiences or just take a survey, you'd find almost a quarter of all American marriages, married couples have a divorce someplace in the background of one partner or both. And at the present rate, then it's one out of three marriages ending up ultimately in divorce. And of the great majority of those who remarry and nearly all of them do about 80% sooner or later, 20% of those will divorce again.

   I was at a school one time, aviation school and the secretary was kind of chortling over coffee that she just got a call from her divorced husband and she was getting a divorce from him and he had apparently sworn up and down that he was never going to marry again. She had just been given the word on that very day and I guess he'd been married two or three times before that, he married her. Well, he called this newly divorced bride to say that as soon as that divorce was final, he was marrying again. She thought that was hilarious. It showed the kind of stability the guy had. I didn't know whether or not any children were involved in that case.

   But it's amazing how a lot of these young people like to whine that uh this is the so-called victimless crime between consenting adults where nobody gets hurt. Nearly 1 million teenagers become pregnant every year. As a matter of fact, you're happy now to endure that in the comic section with your morning toast and coffee. If you follow some of the comics in the big cities, nearly 1 million teenagers became pregnant last year and about 50% of all out-of-wedlock births are accounted for by teenagers. About one-third of these in an abortion and about 20% of the approximately 10 million females aged 15 to 19 will experience a premarital pregnancy before they are out of their teenage years.

   Now, what happens to the kids while cause and effect is obvious to anyone who wants to admit it is there and all you've got to do is to check with the police department of any big city and talk to some of those cops that have to deal with a constant scream of juvenile offenders who are continually trying to feed a drug habit, who are put out on the street that come from a broken home who grow up on the streets whose associations are petty hoods and crooks and criminals, pimps and prostitutes, drug pushers and sellers, addicts and freaks, criminals of every low life scud and crumb you can find underneath a garbage can and you expect these kids who have no father figure, no strong family unit being put out on the streets in that kind of environment and inside the absolute jungle.

   At many a, a school hallway, restroom and classroom has become where the kids that don't want to smoke this stuff just about come reeling out of their, out of their senses on the the the the huge cloud of pot that is in the air inside the school restrooms. What chance have these kids got? We say nobody's getting hurt what difference does it make? Well, crime is a gigantic social issue. A gigantic growing social monster. A problem that reaches into the lives of multiple millions of Americans.

   It wasn't until 1974 that we could begin to add a new fact to our history books where we could now say, as we teach these children in grade school, well, kids, all you boys who were born in 1974. Now for the first time in history have a better chance of dying, the victim of a brutal crime as a citizen of the United States than the chances you would have taken, had you put on the olive grab uniform of Uncle Sam's army and gone to battle in World War II. Fact, that's fact by 1974 every boy baby born in the United States began to face worse odds on eventually losing his life as the victim of violent crime than the odds he faced of going to war in uniform in World War II.

   Now, are we under some strange kind of a curse in the United States of America? You better believe we are, you can discount whether or not we're identified in the pages of Bible prophecy, which I can prove that we are. You don't need to believe that or accept that you can scoff at that, argue with it or ignore it, do whatever you choose. So I'll guarantee you one thing. There are laws which are living they are hidden, they are unseen yet they act upon us. And there is a great record of the two great opposites of the blessings for obedience and the cursing for disobedience. Given in a couple of chapters buried way back in forgotten portions of the Bible in the book of Leviticus, the book of Deuteronomy.

   I'm gonna turn to chapter 28 in the book of Deuteronomy right now and read a little bit of it to you because this is exactly what is beginning to happen to us in the United States. Now, first, nobody's gonna argue with me that the United States of America is a God worshiping, God-oriented obedient to God law-keeping orderly society to dredge up an old quotation from way back out of the early sixties. I think it was H. Rap Brown who once said and, and enraged a lot of people because he was a, a civil rights activist and I guess an anti-Vietnam war activist or whatever.

   And, and he said, quote, violence is as American as apple pie. End quote. A lot of people took exception to that. They didn't like that. I don't know whether Rap Brown was trying to say it should be or that he liked it that way. People assume that maybe he did because he was a practitioner and a preacher of violence for getting his way or getting the way of the group or whatnot. Well, I guarantee you as an assessment of American life. It's a true statement.

   All you gotta do is look at television, look at the book racks, look at the magazines, look at what you see going on in the streets, look at the school rooms, the hallways and the classrooms, the grade schools, junior high and high schools all around the United States violence is as American as apple pie. It's come to pass.

   Well, here in the book of Deuteronomy chapter 28 (Deuteronomy 28:1-5), it says very clearly that if we would keep the commandments of God, then all these blessings would come upon us. Blessed. It says in verse three, would you be in the city? Are our cities blessed of God? Are they wonderful places to be beautiful climates, beautiful streets? No unbelievable ugly shanties and shacks of broken down, clapboard, unpainted buildings, no brownstone apartments, no gutted old buildings that have been ravaged by vandalism and fire. No hideous ghettos, no dreary mile after mile after mile of unbelievably ugly apartments and government housing projects where the crime has moved indoors into the corridors and the elevators instead of in the streets are our cities.

   What what city is it in the United States where you can say this is a blessed city. This city is blessed of God. It's a happy city, a beautiful city, free of crime, a city that is wholesome and healthy and well, a city that is not an economic blight in trouble, not about to go bankrupt. A city without huge stifling, unbelievable jangling nerve ending traffic jams, a city not in need of some dramatic rapid transit solution. A city that is not filthy with pollution. A city that is not ridden and diseased with crime. A city that does not reek with pornography. Try to find one. Let me know when you find it, it's not in the United States. I don't know where you're gonna find it, but it's not in the United States.

   Now, if you talk about a little tiny town someplace with about 150 citizens and all of them determined to keep foreigners and strangers and other people out. You might show me a town that doesn't have an awful lot of crime. I don't know, maybe there is such a town someplace but police statistics now tend to show that even in the suburban areas and the small towns and the rural areas, crime is rising faster so far as its rate is concerned that even in some of the big inner urban areas, he said, if you keep God's commandments, all of those 10 points that really Jesus expanded enlarged upon and brought spiritual emphasis to in the Sermon on the Mount that are living and that apply that are active today. Those laws which would guarantee peace, guarantee success for families, guarantee good crops, good weather, guarantee protection from enemies from abroad, guarantee a good, stable solid national economy.

   But we're not keeping those laws. Nobody in this country is going to argue with me that we are, we all know that the nation is a non-law-abiding country, people freely. And in some cases gayly admit that they don't keep the 10 commandments of God. So let's get on to the other part because there's no reason to go on with all the blessings that we are not experiencing. Blessed shall you be in the field? Blessed shall be the fruit of your body, the fruit of the ground, the fruit of your cattle, the increase of your, your kind, the flocks of your sheep. Blessed shall be your basket in your store. What store? We don't even have any reserves for food grains anymore. We send that to the Russians or the Chinese or somebody.

   So he said, but in verse 15 (Deuteronomy 28:15), it shall come to pass if you will not hearken under the voice of the Eternity of God. Oh, well, now we come down to the United States because that's us. That's Britain, that's South Africa, China, I should say. And Russia and every other nation on the face of the earth, as far as that's concerned, it's every nation, not just necessarily a handful of countries. It shall come to pass. If you will not hearken under the voice of the Eternal your God, to observe, to do all of His commandments, which we are not doing and his statutes, most people don't even know what those are never read them. Never heard of them. Couldn't tell you what they are. Wouldn't know where to find them, which he said I command you this day that all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you, cursed shall you be in the city.

   Now, that sounds more like a, a logical billboard to see on the freeway leading into an awful lot of American cities. This city is a cursed place to be. I mean, it would be more accurate. I mean, if you want to say welcome to our Happy City and you're driving into the southern part of Chicago maybe or welcome to our Happy Town just as you're trying to wind your way along into Detroit. You know, welcome to, to beautiful Houston which has more murders than all the British Isles and Scandinavia put together every single year. Uh something like that we could put on the billboard. Welcome to Los Angeles pornography capital of the world where 30,000 young boys ages 6 to 17 are being exploited by sadists and are being sold in a white slave trade for pornographic movies and utilized as if they were were girls by perverted men. Welcome to Los Angeles capital of filth in a choking sea of smog with hideous pollution, stifling traffic jams rising crime, incredible divorce, broken homes and a huge so-called gay which is to say miserable community. There will be a far more accurate billboard.

   Now, God's word said, curse it shall you be in the city? And we're cursed, but we're not cursed because God's cursing us. God is not up there telling all these people curse you. My child, curse you. He's not sitting up there in his heavenly arm chair. Well, I want the city to be cursed today. This is the city. I'm gonna curse today. Zap. That's the curse that descended on the city. Nope, that is the way it works. We curse ourselves by doing what we do by doing what comes naturally by living contrary to the laws of God, ignoring them, just paying no attention to them, whatever, having some form of religion. Oh, yes, for Pete's sake. They've got so called gay churches. They got characters mincing up and down the aisles and, and these guys, I guess wear dresses and they're proud of it. I don't know. But, but people actually think that, that God doesn't mean what he says in Romans, the first chapter about people who do that kind of thing receiving in themselves that recompense, which is exactly fitting and proportionate to the crime, which is wretched and is more protracted until the time they finally become so absolutely, mentally deranged that there's virtually no way to ever fight back from it. God plainly says no such person is ever going to enter into his kingdom. Of course, that doesn't make any difference to so called harmless homosexuals, but I guarantee you it will make a difference eventually. That's like a lot of people.

   I mean, it's more fun to riot in the summer. You're not gonna see any riots in a snowstorm. Very, very seldom people riot when it's raining. Winter is not a good time to riot, any more than getting on your knees and repenting before God is when you got a full stomach and, and kind of, uh, maybe a head full of, of wine or something. I mean, when people are going their own way and just going along and, and lustfully fulfilling the physical appetites, they're not going to repent. It's only when they're lying there, mangled and bruised and cold and hungry or tossed around in life, wrapped at sea or falling out of an airplane or tumbling off a bridge or running with their clothes and hair of fire out of a burning building or lying there with half of their body gone. The doctor saying, I'm sorry, but only God can help him now at time like that. Then people say, oh, you know, I really wish that I'd uh hey Lord, uh you up there. I, I need some help. I'm in trouble down here today, but as long as they're getting away with it, there's no problem. Crooks aren't sorry. As long as they're getting away with the robbery, a lot of them blubber and whale and weep. Oh, come on, give me a break, fellas.

   Let me go. There was a guy that we caught one time our, our P.E. director had to actually chase some idiot peeping tom out of our girls locker room across campus and a couple of guys tackled him on the lawn. Now, up until that time, this creep was creeping around and ogling girls. You know, he was married. I don't know why I didn't go home and turn on all the lights and slam the bedroom door and, and old ogle his wife. I'm sure she wouldn't have minded. But he decided he wanted to ogle these girls. So he was one of these peeping toms creeping around places where he shouldn't have been.

   Well, now he probably would never have repented of that until he was lying on the lawn with a couple of guys with a stranglehold on him with his arms pinned by his back. Somebody saying, "call the cops," you know, and he's lying out there with a mouth full of die congress saying, "come on fellas, give me a break, please. I'll never do it again." Literally cries, you know, just, "oh, it'll ruin my life, my reputation, my family. I'm just really going down the drain here." He was ready to repent then.

   Now, that's the way most people are, repentance is not for good times. It's for hard times. So that's what God's gonna give us. He's gonna give us hard times because he wants us to repent. He wants us to get down on our knees and call out to him and say we're a wretched, filthy rotten sinner and good for nothing and don't even deserve the next breath. But please, can you forgive me?

   Now, when people begin doing that, then the blessings will come back. But as long as they don't, he said, curses shall you be in the city? And we could even put up billboards. This city is under a curse. Look at it, you can see it from 100 miles away that smog there. That's part of the curse.

   He said, "cursed. Shall you be in the field? Take a look at the pattern of broken lives of farms, ending up in the hands of the banks of people just losing out on generations of family property because of drought and wonder, wonder whether or not we're under some strange kind of a curse."

   He said, "cursed shall be your basket in your store." How many reserves do we have? We're dependent now, far more, almost 50% going toward that now, on Arab oil, we not only don't have basket in store, meaning reserves to fall back on in terms of food grains, foodstuffs, energy or anything else.

   But we're depending upon various nations who believe in various pagan gods and anti-christian god religions and nations. We're probably gonna end up finding ourselves aligned against someday and sending them all kinds of sophisticated weapons they can fight us with and depending upon them for our energy supplies.

   Well, I got to break off for lack of time. Come back and tell you more about this next time maybe. But in the meantime, if you want to get your name on the mailing list of the most up to the moment magazine that pulls no punches about exactly what's happening to us. Why we're under these curses and what God's word says is happening to the nations of Britain, Australia, South Africa, Canada, the United States in the light of Bible prophecy.

   Then pick up the telephone, do yourself a favor and dial that toll-free number 800-423-4444. While you're at it, ask for that booklet on, The Modern Romans, The Modern Romans showing that we're living just like the ancient Romans did and head in the same direction.

   We don't change our ways, the Plain Truth, The Modern Romans free of charge, no price if you will call right now. 800-423-4444. Or you can write to me, Garner Ted Armstrong. Pasadena, California, until next time. Garner Ted Armstrong saying goodbye, friends.

   You have heard the World Tomorrow with Garner Ted Armstrong, sponsored by the Worldwide Church of God, for literature offered on this program. Send your requests along with the call letters of this station to Garner Ted Armstrong, Pasadena, California 91123. Or you may dial this toll-free number 800-423-4444.

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Broadcast Date: 1977