It was 79 A.D. when Mount Vesuvius blew its top and buried Pompeii and its sister city, Herculaneum. The ol' gal has erupted since. She killed 4000 folks in 1631. "Hell hath no fury like a woman's scorn."? (Learn more about the risk associated with Vesuvius at: http://www.cotf.edu/ete/modules/volcanoes/vmtvesuvius.html)

I visited Pompeii some years back. Ralph R. of my engineering staff was with me. Vesuvius was puffing out smoke and I looked at Ralph and said, "Damn! I think it is going to blow again!"?

I was uneasy!

Over the years homes near Vesuvius have been constructed over recent lava flows. The people that live there plan to stay there knowing that Vesuvius will erupt again, probably sooner than later.

All this despite the fact that Vicci Betushus said as Pompeii was being clobbered by rock and ash, "Iuppiter (Jupiter), Iuno, Minerva, Vesta, Ceres, Diana, Venus, Mars, Mercurius, Neptunus, Volcanus, and Apollo are all against us!"?

Well, maybe that was not a fact.

Maybe there wasn't a Vicci Betushus.

I confess: There wasn't.

I made it all up.

Now Katrina and her pals have been clobbering the southeast at a gallop. The devastation has been terrible. Refugees have been scattered across our country and even live near me in a little town that you never heard of called Castleford, Idaho. It is well named because there is no castle there nor a ford but I know that at least one of the hundred guys that lives there has a Ford. Anyway, the sun-bathed southern refugees will want to get out of there in January because they will be freezing their tootsies off.

While all of this is going on, some TV preachers and other "benevolents"? have said that God is showing his anger against an evil people, especially those who lived or live in New Orleans. Well, New Orleans must have been full of sinners who have now been killed, maimed, or scattered on the wind.

It's all nonsense of course. The devastation in recent years from hurricanes covers many states. Both urban and rural areas were smashed by the furry. More saints than sinners have been dispersed or worse. Don't forget that God saved repentent sinners, who are the same as nonsinners, at Nineveh. Do you think he has changed? Noah moaned about it, but God saved them anyway.

The recent intensity has been so great that federal, state, and local governments have been totally intimidated. But don't blame God! He isn't sitting around dreaming up bad weather, earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanic eruptions. These things are what we like to call natural. Our planet is still cooling and is unstable. The sun is not that old reliable ball you think it is. It cycles every 11-13 years and disrupts things as it does so. Yes, it affects the weather.

If polio was God's punishment, it was removed by research as were many other diseases. Floods are controlled by dams. Farms are saved from erosion by proper plowing.

I could go on.

I think that more research will be done in regard to hurricanes. So far, we have let folks know that: One is on the way! We must go beyond that and learn how to suck the energy out of a storm and redirect its path before it can do bodily harm.

The folks in the southeast are not going to stay away from their native land. They will rebuild and suffer again and again. That's just the way it is. They are there for good times and for bad times just like the rest of us.

It does no one any good to say things like, "They shouldn't build so close to the Mississippi River because it's always flooding. Why should we pay for their stupidity?"?

Folks will always live by the Mississippi not ten miles away from their fields and where they can't see the water go buy.

Instead of saying, "It's God's punishment,"? shouldn't we say, "Folks need our help and I intend to help them in any way I can."?

That's what most of us are doing, isn't it?

copyright John Taylor Jones 2005