One power to rule the world and distort the future forever. That’s not a fantasy anymore.

The Lord of the Rings is certainly one of my most beloved movies, maybe even top of the list. Last evening I discovered a delightful young lady giving her commentary on YouTube as she viewed the movies for the first time. How delightful and refreshing to see it through new eyes and to know that Tolkien’s tale made visual by Peter Jackson 20 years ago is gaining an enthused following among people the age of my children. Loving the books and these movies speaks very well for their moral character. Because Tolkien’s tale is a great argument against the lust for power, the power to enslave other people.

For any of you who may not know, Tolkien’s three books follow the arduous adventures of a small person of courage who must make his way into the very heartland of evil against impossible odds to destroy a magical ring of power which will enable a terrible satanic tyrant to enslave the entire world if it falls into his grasp. This small hero must not only overcome obstacles and terrors outside himself if he is to succeed and save the world, he must overcome the corruption of the lust for absolute power whispering in his own heart. If he submits to the Ring he will become a slave forever and the whole world will fall into darkness.

Peter Jackson was largely faithful to Tolkien’s books and the best lines of dialogue in his movies (all three of which were shot simultaneously) are direct quotes from Tolkien. One of the most striking quotes is this exchange:

"I wish the ring had ever come to me. I wish none of this had ever happened."

"So do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All you have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to you.”

I can’t help feeling that that colloquy describes the time I’m living in. And I must decide what relation I will have to absolute power. Because there really is a real absolute power threatening us all, both out in the real world and even creeping into our minds.

When Tolkien wrote his tale the world was convulsed in the titanic struggle of tyrants and democracies we call World War Two. It was an epic and terrible time when the best and the worst of human nature made the battle of gods and devils a reality on earth and a terrible object of power was forged, namely the world-destroying atomic bomb.

The Ring of Power has become something close to reality.

What is the heart of the problem? It’s not one powerful object, not even the hydrogen bomb. It’s that the necessity to control the new technological power with even newer technological power has given birth to a corrupting lust for absolute control over all of humanity. And slaking that lust has become within reach for a few human beings.

The power to control all of humanity, born out of the fear of nuclear war, has been developed and seems to be within the grasp of very few people. Very few powerful people can now put into operation technical and political mechanisms to control us all for the dream of The Greater Good.

New powers of control have risen in the form of Artificial Intelligence and vast global communications forums and information management. Mind control on a mass scale has become a possibility and a terrible temptation for those few who can grasp the levers of control at the top.

These powers of control are in the hands of a fabulously wealthy club with very few members. The top ten richest and most powerful humans on earth are headed by Bill Gates and the handful of controllers of all the world’s social media and news media which shape mass opinion, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and Jack Dorsey.

Bill Gates has power no one human should ever be trusted with. He started his empire with Microsoft and then he moved into the control of World Health and the vaccine business. Through the corporations he controls gene-altering experimental injections have been created and distributed. He and his allies and employees claim these injections are vaccines that will cure a disease which, it now appears, may well have been created in laboratories Gates controls. Millions of people world-wide are being corralled like animals to receive experimental injections that alter their bodies and their children unborn forever. Most people don’t believe such a thing is possible. But it’s real.

One power to bring them in and in the darkness bind them. One power to rule the world and distort the future forever. That’s not a fantasy anymore. It’s right here and now. Who could not wish that this terrible time had not come. But that is not for us to decide. All we have to decide is how we will use the time that has been given to us.