The Real Conspiracy

Recently a close friend, whom I greatly admire, told me that he had a hard time believing that the World Trade Center towers fell as a result of the planes that were crashed into them. Usually, I don't take comments like that seriously; they tend to come from people who are slightly unhinged and to be followed by incredibly bizarre explanations, such as when a Kuwaiti told me "the Jews" were behind it all. (The Lady, who is half-Jewish, was surprised to learn of her role in the September 11th attacks.) But this friend is level-headed, intelligent, studying for the ministry, and solidly patriotic (as evidenced by 8 1/2 years enlisted in the Air Force, and now a commission as a Second Lieutenant).

His own qualifications don't cause me to believe that theory for a second, and I would challenge anyone to find a structural engineer who actually believes the towers fell for some other reason. But it does go to show we all can be drawn to any explanation which posits that something bigger is going on.

These days, there are conspiracy theories for everything: the JFK assassination, September 11th, the Iraq War, aliens, the economic crisis, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, health care, immigration, AIDS, gun control, the Roman Catholic Church, and Christianity as a whole. A 1997 movie even capitalized on the trend. Virtually none of them have been proven, all are perpetuated with the scantest of evidence and most far-fetched of reasoning, and many have in fact been disproven. But they persist. As soon as one is debunked, another pops up in its place.

Maintaining a genuine conspiracy is incredibly difficult. Charles Colson, infamous for his role and Watergate and now famous as the founder of Prison Fellowship Ministries, often recounts the pitiful attempt to hold together the Nixon White House in the face of increasing probes into wrongdoing. Only a few of the most powerful men in the United States of America were involved, and the worst punishment they expected to face was disgrace, or possibly a light prison sentence; Colson's 1-year sentence came as a surprise. They held their conspiracy together for all of... 2 weeks. That's how long it took before one of them defected.

The probability that a secret will be leaked increases exponentially with the number of people who know. All it takes is slight pressure, or a slight mistake, for someone to slip up. For instance, if 50 people know a secret, and each has only a 1 in 1000 chance of spilling the beans in a certain time period, then the probability of the secret getting out is:

1- (1-0.001)^50 = 5%

Not bad, although still risky. But what if the heat is on, ever so slightly, and now the probability of someone breaking is even 1 in 100?

1- (1-0.01)^50 = 39%

Or what if 100 people know?

 1- (1-0.01)^100 = 63%

The odds are looking poor. But this analysis fails to take into account the fact that the first one to talk will probably have a better chance of saving his or her skin.

The idea that our lumbering and often-inept American federal government could manage to maintain a vast conspiracy is simply laughable. The idea that a massive corporation, employing tens of thousands of people and interacting with the public continually, could be secretly running the world is equally farcical.

What makes us so susceptible to conspiracy theories? Why do we want to believe that there is some secret cabal controlling everything, some sinister individual pulling the strings? In science, theories that poorly explain things or lack confirmation are usually thrown out. Why do these theories persist, when time and again things can be better explained by the ordinary temptations of greed, power, sex, or just plain incompetence?

In the Modern Era, we would like to believe that science has exorcised all of the demons from our world. There is a perfectly rational explanation for everything. Human beings do things, even bad things, for simple and comprehensible motives... and that's it. The world works according to certain laws. And beyond that, there is nothing but personal subjective opinion. There is no grand story, no big picture. The world simply is what it is, and anything we can't explain will be explained soon enough by physics or evolution. (This is, by the way, the worldview of The Economist).

But these explanations, now matter how well they work on the immediate level, are strangely unsatisfying. The pieces are all there, but somehow they don't add up. And the theories ultimately lead to dead ends.

Deep down, we know that there is something else at work. We don't just "want to believe," we actually sense that there is something truly nefarious behind it all, working the invisible strings for malevolent ends. We have lost the capability to describe who or what this is. So we turn to conspiracy theories - or we settle for our modern explanations.

C.S. Lewis once remarked that a man who will not believe in God will believe in anything. We are born with an innate drive to worship, and something will ultimately be on the altar of our heart.

The corollary to this, is that whoever does not believe in The Devil, will believe in conspiracy theories. A recent poll shows that only 68% of Americans believe in a personal devil, and in my experience far fewer actually take that Being seriously. But having rejected as old-fashioned nonsense the real Conspirator, the true Enemy - with all his accomplices - we chase one human conspiracy after another for the slightest of reasons. We know there is something bigger - and far more evil - behind all that we see, but we are suppressing this knowledge.

Instead of concocting our own silly theories, we ought to take Jesus at his word: "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven" (Luke 10:18). Yes, there is a Devil, Satan, the Enemy, or whoever you wish to call him. There is a personal being behind it all, seeking to destroy us, to pervert all that is good, and to hijack all of Creation. And although his notoriety may at times compel fear, he has discovered that in most societies, anonymity is far more effective. As the thief "Verbal" Kint says in The Usual Suspects, "The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he doesn't exist." The Biblical explanation is in fact the best fit with reality, the best explanation for the world in which we live, and the most useful knowledge for living a truly meaningful life.

But if you don't like that, there's always The X-Files.

Ancient Paths

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND

One of the greatest blessings of our current assignment is the requirement to leave the country every 2 months to renew our visas. We've visited Dubai, Cairo, Istanbul, and now Geneva. While we were captivated by the lively energy and artistry of Istanbul, no place has made me think as much as Geneva. For this city of less than a million people, at the tip of a lake and the edge of the Alps, has left its mark on the world like no other.

The Genevois are unique. They are French in language - with a surprising number ignorant of English - in architecture, and in food, but the similarities end there. The French exhibit a constant insecurity over their language and culture, compounded by a tendency to despise all others. Genevans are confident in their own identity and welcoming of all others. The French paint, philosophize, and riot (at least annually). Genevans make watches, run banks, research the origin of the universe, and work for world peace (over 160 international organizations, including the Red Cross and the United Nations Organization, are based here). They value beauty and are grounded in friendships. They care for the environment. They defeated the French Duke of Savoy, solidifying their independence almost 300 years before joining Switzerland. And they have a well-justified, unambiguous pride in their history.

Never has the history of an entire city been so dominated by the legacy of one man. For nearly 500 years, Geneva has been defined by the legacy of a French refugee: Jean Calvin.

The second most important figure in the Reformation, after Martin Luther, Calvin's thought and ministry continues to shape Christianity to this very day. Although famous (or perhaps infamous) for his controversial ideas regarding predestination, his 4-volume Institutes of the Christian Religion remains a towering achievement of systematic theology, covering every aspect of individual and corporate Christian life. He wrote rigorous commentaries on nearly every book of the Bible, setting a standard to which even his detractors still aspire. Under his leadership, Geneva became an international city of refuge, its population doubling as persecuted believers were received with open arms regardless of nationality. His vision for reforming all of life according to the Scriptures transformed Geneva, and ultimately much of the world.

Calvin's life was marked by tragedy and difficulty. Before settling in Geneva, he spent 3 years "on the run" in western Europe, living under assumed names to avoid persecution by papal authorities. He was frequently ill, and for the second half of his life was unable to travel to visit his parents and siblings in France. Single until the age of 31, he married Idelette, a widow with two children - both of whom subsequently died. After only 9 years of marriage, Idelette died, and the one son they had together died as well. In his farewell speech - shortly before his death in 1564 at the age of 54 - he declared, "all that I have done is itself at base worth nothing... I am a wretched creature." At his own request, he was buried in an unmarked grave.

Calvin wrote over 2000 letters to individuals both prominent and common throughout Europe. Those, such as John Knox, who studied at the university he founded fanned out across Europe and the British Isles, the Americas, and even Africa. Today over 100 million Christians trace their own spiritual heritage to Geneva, and several times that number have been touched in some way by John Calvin's passionate study and preaching of the Bible. His revolutionary concepts of representative democracy, justice, the rule of law, religious freedom, care for the poor, free markets, free inquiry and widespread public education have transformed the modern world. The Puritans were his spiritual heirs, and he was described by one historian as "the virtual founder of the United States of America."

Having spent our first afternoon exploring Calvin's legacy and Saint-Pierre Cathedral where he preached, the next morning we took a train to Lausanne - the home of the International Olympic Committee and site of the 1974 Lausanne Covenant. The 45-minute ride took us through the Swiss countryside and many smaller towns, with mountains to our left and Lake Geneva to our right. But what truly captivated us was the cathedral overlooking this picturesque university town.

The exterior is eye-catching, but the interior is cavernous. Although we saw a nun emerging from a side door, the cathedral bears the marks of the Reformation with faith expressed through natural-light architecture and magnificent stained glass. At the very front, surrounding the altar and beneath the spire, is a set of windows depicting powerful scenes from the Jesus' final hours and crucifixion. But what captivated us the most was a triptych facing south, towards the lake. The three windows are titled, "Le Miroir Des Science", "Le Miroir Historique", and "Le Miroir Moral" - each depicting mirrors through which truth is plainly revealed to us. A picture of the first window is below:

The panes, from bottom to top, refer to Work, Arts, Science and Philosophy. The central window portrays Adam and Eve leaving Paradise, the Revelation of God in Jesus Christ, the Church, and the coming Kingdom of God. The window to the right portrays Humility, Truth, Justice, and Charity.

This reflects an ancient Christian view of how God reveals Himself: through nature, through our conscience and the things that make us human - that is, the imprint of God on us - and through the public acts of Jesus in history. Everywhere they looked, they saw God's glory reflected. The Truth was not a secret - all that we know and experience testifies to Him.

We sat in awe for some time in the illumination of the three windows, before finally walking backwards out of this massive sacred space, seeking to collect as much of its majesty as possible.

Back in Geneva that afternoon, we sat in a typically European cafe and continued our slow read through the Bible. (We had intended to read the whole Hebrew Bible together in a year, but that was over 2 years ago and now we are in Jeremiah). As we slogged through prophecies of judgment, destruction, and death, one sentence lept out with hope.

Thus says the LORD: "Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls."

- Jeremiah 6:16

That was just what our post-modern world needed: ancient paths. I thought of John Calvin, preaching 470 years ago in an 800-year-old church from a 2000-year-old book. I thought of the Lausanne Cathedral, a 1000-year-old building telling stories in stained glass from the dawn of human existence. These stories, these public claims about the reality of God and man and life, gave us the ancient paths we were unwittingly searching for.

Ironically, I had recently been reading Dan Brown's latest novel. He has a knack for seamlessly weaving fact, fiction, and utter falsehood into a fast-paced story - and The Lost Symbol was no exception. I thought of Brown prattling on about the "Ancient Mysteries" (always capitalized) which would supposedly enlighten and empower mankind. There is certainly a place for mystery - how else could you describe the Trinity? - but what would these supposed secrets truly give us? More power? Our technologies have already given us more power than we could imagine, and the record of the 20th century is that we used that power more often for evil than for good. Can you imagine building a city, a society, a government, a university, or even a meaningful individual life on mysteries revealed only to a select few?

A world that has lost its way does not need hidden mysteries, but revealed paths.

Not everyone can make it to Geneva - though the trip is worth it - but a visit to Switzerland is not necessary to find these Ancient Paths. All it takes is an open Bible, an eager mind, and a willingness to learn from all those who have walked them before.