Forging a Ring

Last night I happened to see a television programme about Christianity. Naturally, given the proclivities of our media, it was presented by an atheist scientist gleefully gloating over the replacement of Christianity by Scientism as the effective established religion of the chattering classes.

It's been noted that successful religions tend to demonise their predecessors, and this programme about the Enlightenment period of the 17-19th centuries, gave a banal glorification of those saints of science, Galileo, Harvey and Darwin - almost a new trinity. Indeed, following the example of Pope Gregory, who ordered Augustine's mission to England to take over the practices and places of worship of the previous religion, merely re-naming them, so that the populace would become more readily accustomed to the new management; some of the programme was even set in a church, and church music was played as background to the scene at CERN, (the large hadron collider in Switzerland), described as a cathedral of science.

The choice of Christians to be fed to the lions of media mockery, was of course fully in accord with the tenets of political correctness. Although the most vibrant sector of Christianity appears to be amongst the blacks, we were not shown any of them. That's perhaps a little disappointing, even discriminatory, in a country where the second highest dignitary next to the Archbishop of Canterbury, in what is technically still supposed to be the established church of England, the Archbishop of York - is a black imported from Uganda.

Not so long ago, amongst evangelical sects popular with blacks, it was reported that some of the more superstitious had taken to beating and killing children who were suspected to be witches. Material there, one might suppose, for the rational and materialistic to investigate. One might even suppose that keen rationalists could be interested in the mentality of the blacks who, only a few years ago, transported children from West Africa to London to be murdered so that some of their body parts could be used in black magical procedures to benefit those who could pay for them. Hmm, pre- Christian practices still surviving or reviving, or possibly naive Christians confused about the Real Presence?

Ah, but no ... the doctrines of political correctness require blacks to be regarded as holy people - although less so than those who claim a patent on the term. Consequently the selected lamb had to be white, and turned out to be American; presumably one of those least affected by the Obamessiah whose utterance of the great mantra, 'Change', caused all liberal media hearts to flutter; even if so far it's proved a less creative word than the traditional 'Fiat Lux '. Should he turn out to be a failed messiah, who disappoints the expectations of his followers, will he, I wonder, become known as the Obamination of Desolation?

America, we were told in tones of hushed incredulity, is a place where a third of the population still takes the Bible literally, and prefers the creation account of Genesis to that of the Great Prophet Darwin (PBUH). Perhaps not incidentally, it's also a place that's still a lot more pleasant to visit on an expenses paid trip than, say, Libreville, Liberia, Lagos or London.

The unrepresentative representative of Christianity turned out to be an astrophysicist who believes that dinosaurs roamed the earth at the same time as humans. This scientific solecism so shocked the programme makers, who had arranged for the interview to take place in a garden which has models of dinosaurs interspersed among the trees, that the camera lingered on several white women wearing long dresses and bonnets, as if to show us how old fashioned are these Americans. Literal mindedness all round. Well, they showed that 'single vision and Newton's sleep' may have more than one dream.

The next foreign trip took us to Rome. It's a fair bet than our intrepid scientists and media folk won't be planning a trip to Riyadh for a programme on Islam and Science. They're not crazy. Heads might roll. Rome is a lovely destination. It was pleasant to see the statue to Giordano Bruno, burned as a heretic in the Piazza Navona in the year 1600, and sit in it's shade quaffing a cooling beverage while listening to a local academic. It's also very safe since the Inquisition was packed away in a cellar of the Vatican. Bruno was a useful stick with which to beat Christianity, but he was quickly dismissed as too much of a mystic and insufficiently scientific. Similarly with Harvey. No time for poetic imagery; facts only please.

After a full and frank confession by a Catholic priest that he believed firmly in the dating system of Science, and abjured the errors of the past, it was time to visit the museum showing the Inquisition's implements of torture. This was full of facts, very scientific. The scientist was impressed by their documentation and methodology, almost at home as he stroked the manacles and showed how the iron clamps worked.

Having established the correct atmosphere, we were taken to Switzerland and escorted through the cathedral of science. A Revered Scientist told us he does not altogether exclude the possibility of a deity, but for him it is not a working hypothesis.The building looks ugly, a grimly rectangular entrance, guarding access to the working dungeons below. Vast expenditure, scant results, ugly environment, pompous jobsworths - you know it's a government project!

It's built like a prison, and that's what it is. It's designed to imprison sub atomic particles in a narrow ring, using very strong magnets, and accelerate them in opposite directions, observing and speculating about the results of the collisions.

It has one feature similar to something found in many cathedrals. They have beautiful high Rose Windows bringing light into a sacred space. This excludes daylight from an infernal space, but has a low circle of several layers of what look like metal bricks around the central ring. They're probably magnets. The visit to the torture implements of the Inquisition starts to seem like a preparation for visiting this place. Those circular manacles and clamps, made to fit the human body, look like precursors of this shackle intended for the body of nature. They were made of iron, and iron is famous for its magnetic property. It is magnetism that prevents the particles escaping from the ring, which holds them as effectively as iron holds a physical prisoner. No wonder the scientist seemed so fascinated with the implements of torture; he's the spiritual successor of the Inquisitors.

It's of a piece with the Enlightenment motif. Sir Francis Bacon, father of the New Philosophy, or science as we now call it, wrote that Nature was reluctant to yield her secrets and so had to be 'interrogated with power' - tortured. That was not just a fanciful metaphor as it seems today; in the early 17th century the belief still lingered that there is a living spiritual presence in nature. Anima Mundi was less wishy washy than the modern Gaia. Some have dared to equate her with the Virgin Mary, but that might have earned them the attention of the Inquisition, or of Protestant heretic burners. There are scientists today who speak of observer participation influencing events, and there have been strange people like Schauberger or Keeley,who sought to co-operate with nature instead of coercing it. Latter day alchemists, whose own abilities seemed to enable events that others could not replicate - very scandalous to the religion of Scientism, which still dominates the intelligentsia.

Confessions under torture, we know what they're worth. Obsession with facts and denial of meaning. Knowledge limited to the service of wealth and power. That's the dark side of Science. It's also the dark side of Religion. And of the State. The Inquisitor and the Scientist are one.

It's rather like The Lord of the Rings. Tolkien had wisdom. Saruman the White pursues knowledge. At first he is on good terms with Nature, then he falls under the dominion of the great Eye ('I', or Ego) and misuses his knowledge to pervert the forces of life into means of achieving personal power and domination of both society and nature. The Scientist is a servant of Saruman, who is a servant of Sauron the spiritual force of evil, who has forged the rings by which all life and consciousness is to be controlled. It doesn't have to be that way.

What do we find the scientists doing in their underground cathedral of science? They're trying to forge a ring! It's not the One Ring, it's not even one of the great rings, they don't have the spiritual depth for that, but it compels a lot of human attention and resources and directs them to a sinister implement for torturing nature, apparently merely because they think they can. The Manhattan Project was a precedent, we know what that spawned, and that they still went ahead with the first test, despite not being quite sure that it would not unleash an unstoppable chain reaction which would destroy the world. They don't believe in anything but physical facts and their own egos. They can't imagine a spiritual force manipulating their egos. For many, it may be their 'Precious'. This may not be the last stage. The Ring, or the Power behind it, may have a stronger will to which our foolish scientists and greedy rulers succumb. Some may become Ringwraiths, Nazguls of Science.

This is quite a step from the banal television programme with which we started. The Shire was a long way from Mordor. It's interesting to see where a religious, symbolic and mythological consideration of Science masquerading as Religion might take us.With apologies to Tacitus, one may say that they make a desolation, and call it science!