MITRA: WikiLeaks opened wicked leaks
They churned out in drips and drabs, at times in deluge.
Say hello to a new world of right to information and goodbye to confidentiality.
Julian Assange might not be a god of morality, but his audacity to make the world powers dance on his journalistic pin cushions has been unassailable so far.
Bureaucrats hate him, while the avant-gardists are just starting to taste new blood by curtseying him.
By threatening to reveal huge amounts of stashed-away funds in Swiss and other banks, to uncovering war planning and delisting war efforts, Assange has already proven to be a thorn in the flesh of world’s rich and famous.
Yet, with all the power of political and ethical tsunamis unleashed by a journalist already, Assange is dreading the real prospect of being deported to Sweden to face more legal tunes.
His untimely dalliances with two wispy Swedish women have not only made him captive in his friend’s London home, but he is having to fork out some expensive legal-bill payments in order to be allowed to carry on his revelatory work in peace.
WikiLeaks revelations will perhaps be old hat in months to come, but there is a book that has been current for ages and whose pages would shockingly expose secrets, both accusing and appealing, as can never be done by any humans.
In several places in the Bible, ominous warning is given by Jesus and his apostles to be ready for the grand Book of Life and Death launch.
Some allusions to this effect are in Luke 12:2-3: “There is nothing covered up that will not be revealed, and hidden that will not be known.
“Accordingly, whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in the inner rooms will be proclaimed upon the housetops.”
Add to this the disastrous consequences of standing before an omniscient God, both now and in the hereafter, and the odds are that every person in this Creator’s earth would look behind his back constantly to avoid ugly embarrassment and ultimate death sentence.
When the Bible declares that “it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God,” it surely alludes to someone of higher investigative capability than any Assange or the Bonds of the world.
More than 3,000 years ago, a mighty king in the Middle East was aware of the hounding power of the mightiest King Yahweh.
His battle-weary powerplay, as well as his infamous adulterous liaison, were both open books to the One who had placed him on the throne.
Recognizing this, the king wrote, perhaps both in desperation and in appreciation,: “You know everything I do; from far away you understand all my thoughts . . . you know all my actions” (Psalm 139).
In the face of iron-clad guarantees by the divine eyes, prescribed in the law of God, to discover our hidden sins and to bring them out in the open, nevertheless King David felt His optics were too sharp.
Stashing away a few millions or even billions of dollars in Swiss or Belgian banks and not being caught might not require heroic efforts on the part of celebrities of the world.
When David convinced himself God was all around him, he affirmed God’s all-knowingness in these words: “You scrutinize my path and my lying down, and are intimately acquainted with all my ways.”
The story is told of a little boy who was eagerly looking forward to the birthday party of a friend who lived only a few blocks away.
When the day arrived, a blizzard made the sidewalks and roads nearly impassable.
The lad’s father, sensing the danger, was reluctant to let him go.
The youngster reacted tearfully: “But dad, all the other kids will be there. Their parents are letting them go.”
The father thought for a moment, then replied softly: “All right, you may go.”
Surprised but overjoyed, the boy bundled up and plunged into the raging storm.
The driving snow made visibility almost impossible and it took him more than half an hour to trudge the short distance to the party.
As he rang the doorbell, he turned to look out into the storm.
His eye caught the shadow of a retreating figure.
It was his father.
He had followed his son’s every step through the storm.
WikiLeaks may have some “eye in the sky,” but there is only One with sights all around and a mind that penetrates the thoughts and intents of the heart.
The good news is that we, as His puny subjects, need not run away from Him but run into Him straight to find our temporal and eternal safety.
Narayan Mitra is a chaplain at Thompson Rivers University. KTW welcomes submissions to its Faith page. Columns should be between 600 and 800 words in length and include a headshot of the author, along with a short (paragraph) bio on the writer. Submissions can be sent by email here.
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