Chernobyl, the Dictatorship of Relativism, and the Errors of Russia

I'd been listening to Whittaker Chambers' book Witness recently. And last night, I first got into some of the coverage of the new HBO miniseries Chernobyl. Both give a glimpse into the nobility and sacrifice inherent in the Russian character, as well as the insanity, lies, and slaughter at the heart of Communism.

In light of Our Lady's clear warning at Fatima about Russia and the toxic intellectual pollution that was and would emanate from the ancient country, there is something perfectly symbolic about Chernobyl. There is something perfectly symbolic about a series of lies, of acts of insanity and/or carelessness, of hubris, leading to a tragedy of historic proportions. And there is something symbolic about the further lies told in order to save face, in order to protect the reputation, the influence, the misplaced trust in the Communist Party, in the Soviet system, in man and his ability to control all things, to replace God.

Our Lady warned us:

... If my requests are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace; if not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, causing wars and persecutions of the Church. ...

Like the toxic cloud arising from the exposed core of Chernobyl, those many errors have arisen and spread out of Russia these past 100 years. And chief among them is "anything in the name of."

Anything in the name of the worker.

Anything in the name of justice.

Anything in the name of our party, or our state, or our country, or my family, or national security, or...

Anything in the name of the true, the good, and the beautiful, including telling a lie; doing evil; creating ugliness.

Anything in the name of, which inevitably leads to betraying the thing in whose name you have been acting.

Everything in the name of--yes, do everything in the name of God! Do everything with your eyes fixed on the good, the true, the beautiful, and do everything for love of them.

But anything in the name of is a fast track into the lowermost depths of hell.

J.R.R.Tolkien did a masterful job of dissecting this temptation in Lord of the Rings. Gandalf, Galadriel, Sam, Aragorn, Faramir--all are tempted to take up the One Ring, the Master Ring, in order to defeat the Dark Lord Sauron, and all refuse it, knowing that they could win, but in the winning, would lose everything. Denethor, Boromir, and Saruman were not so wise.

So it was at the root of Communism, and before, in Tsarist Russia. Anything in the name of the state; anything in the name of the preservation of our system; anything in the name of the Revolution; anything in the name of Soviet Communism; anything in the name of Comrade Stalin; anything in the name of defeating the Nazis; anything in the name of winning the Cold War; anything in the name of putting down counter-revolutionary forces; anything in the name of political correctness; anything in the name of...

So the tsars and their Okhrana helped give birth to the Revolution and to the many iterations of an internal security apparatus that eventually became the KGB, and then post-Soviet FSB, and the Russia of Vladimir Putin. Anything in the name of helped spawn anything in the name of once again. Oppressors and oppressed switched places, and set in motion the next cycle of revolution; switched places again, or perhaps merely reshuffled the cards for the next hand.

Anything in the name of gave us Chernobyl. Anything in the name of gave us the Cold War.

Anything in the name of justified the culture of the lie in the Soviet Union so well exposed and so aptly criticized by Chernobyl. Anything in the name of creates the People of the Lie dissected by M. Scott Peck, George Orwell, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, Vaclav Havel, and St. John Paul II.

Anything in the name of is the dominant mode of politics and economics tempting us across the world today.

Time, once again, to say: Pray the Rosary daily for peace in the world. Make the First Saturday devotion. Learn about the Blessed Virgin Mary, and do the devotions to the Immaculate Heart.