Trail West Dispatch #10 November 15, 2025

 “Believe in Truth.  To abandon facts is to abandon freedom.  If nothing is true, then no one can criticize power, because there is no basis on which to do so.  If nothing is true, then all is spectacle.  The biggest wallet pays for the most blinding lights.”                                                          --Timothy Snyder

Unwillingness among Christians to face the facts has been one of my greatest personal disappointments in recent national events.  This is especially the case when “fact-blindness” is coupled with partisan political loyalties, political processes, and support for political figures.  As Snyder puts it, “You submit to tyranny when you renounce the difference between what you hear and what is actually the case.”

All of us have probably believed and even passed on something that proved later to be untrue.  When that has been the case, I hope that we have responded by making our acknowledgement of error as public as we have made our original falsehood—even if the original mistake has happened unwittingly. 

What is of far greater concern than unwitting errors, however, is conscience-compromising errors.  For example, when we have become invested in a certain false political narrative, we might fall into the trap of disbelieving everything that counters that narrative.  Then every “disbelieving” choice further erodes our conscience--until debasement of all kinds no longer triggers even a flicker of recognition or regret.

In national news, several major shifts took place during the past week.  The longest government shutdown in history ended, and a vote to compel the release of the Epstein files passed in the House of Representatives.  Without delving into the details of those news bits, two main takeaways are that many people’s food assistance and health care funding is taking a major hit, and that concerted efforts to conceal the leader’s past entanglements with a deeply immoral individual (Epstein) have taken a hit as well.  Many former supporters of the regime feel wronged because of their loss of benefits.  Others feel betrayed by the president failing to keep his campaign promise to release the Epstein files immediately after taking office. While it’s too early to tell, these events may signal a shift as well in partisan loyalties and voting. 

Next Sunday’s SS lesson is taken from Matthew 25:31-46 where Jesus gives us details about the final judgement.  I think of this judgement as the ultimate repudiation of falsehoods, and the occasion of facing ultimate consequences for believing lies instead of truth.  The passage also provides reassurance for those who embrace truth as revealed in Jesus.  This window into the certainty of judgement and the means for determining one’s eternal destiny seems like the most trustworthy basis possible for a critique of power.  Otherwise, the “blinding lights” will predominate and empty spectacle” will proliferate, and too many people will have consciences too blighted to recognize the black-and-white realities before them. 

One thing that has not shifted recently is that many “foreigners” still live in fear, regardless of their legal status.  Jesus sees the strangers (foreigners), the hungry and thirsty, and those who are imprisoned.  He tells us that how we treat them is a determiner of our fate in the final judgement. Matt. 25 quote below:

“³⁴Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. ³⁵ For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, ³⁶ I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.... ⁴¹Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. ⁴² For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, ⁴³ I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.”                                                                                      --Miriam Iwashige