Revelation 17:17-18

17 For God has put it into their hearts to carry out His own purpose by acting in harmony in surrendering their royal power and authority to the beast, until the prophetic words (intentions and promises) of God shall be fulfilled. 

As always we see that our Father is in total control, even in wrath and tribulation. A great example of our Father controlling people without their knowledge can be found in Isaiah 10. 

I send [the Assyrian] against a hypocritical and godless nation and against the people of My wrath; I command him to take the spoil and to seize the prey and to tread them down like the mire in the streets. However, this is not his intention [nor is the Assyrian aware that he is doing this at My bidding], neither does his mind so think and plan; but it is in his mind to destroy and cut off many nations. Isaiah 10:6-7

I love these verses and there are so many more that say the same sort of things. Far too many people love to talk about our free will, when we should be talking about our Father’s free will. He alone is Sovereign and He alone rules all things. To believe that we can have a will that is going to disappoint or go against His will is simply foolish. 

18 And the woman that you saw is herself the great city which dominates and controls the rulers and the leaders of the earth.

The woman is a great city that dominates and controls all of the rulers and leaders of the earth. You ever hear of Vatican City? Our Father directs the leaders of the world to give up their power to the anti-christ, whose headquarters is among the seven hills. There just happens to be seven hills that surround Rome. And in a world that is being ravaged by war, natural disasters, and super inflation, the Catholic Church will have the wealth and unregulated infrastructure that the countries of the world will need, and the anti-christ will control the purse strings. The anti-christ will dominate and control the leaders of the world, because he will have the wealth that they need and he will not have the laws and regulations of a country to bind him. 

You do not need to be an economist to know that the governments of Europe and America right now are spending far more than they have. Their citizens are demanding that they do it. At the first sign of trouble people demand their governments to act and they do, even if they do not have the money to do it with. The seeds are being sown right now in Europe and America for their governments to look towards the Roman Catholic Church to bail them out. It will take billions of dollars and the Catholic Church has billions of dollars.