Mar
8
Conspiracy Thinking, Truth, and Consequences
“There are reasons to question whether authorities are telling us the truth. Doing so does not make you a conspiracy theorist. But abandoning truth and reason does.” — O. Alan Noble, Dispatch Faith
The Dispatch newsletters are, I admit, not exactly my favorites. I often disagree with their takes on socio-political matters, or at least some of their assumptions and/or conclusions, and they make me… uncomfortable. But, they’re the professionals, so it’s worthwhile to read their news summaries and occasionally an article or two of theirs — for example, to get data on a topic I’m not very familiar with, or just to “hear” from the center-right, non-MAGA, not-crazy-about-Trump segment of the commentariat.
Once in a great while, they put out something that I find especially helpful or insightful. A few weeks ago, for instance, I shared from a Dispatch Energy article. This week I wanted to excerpt from the “Truth and Its Consequences” article (2/1/2026) by O. Alan Noble at Dispatch Faith, because it throws a much-needed spotlight on a common phenomenon that needs to be addressed. I added italics in a couple places that I wanted to give a little extra attention…
FYI, if you think this cautionary essay doesn’t apply to you, you’re wrong.
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What are we to do with the fact that Christians, like myself, claim to believe in what pastor-theologian Francis Schaeffer once called “true truth” and yet seem to be no less likely to fall into the traps of political tribal thinking and even conspiracy theories? On the one hand, many evangelicals like myself were raised to believe in “absolute truth” and were warned against threats of creeping secular “relativism” and “postmodernism.” But on the other hand, Christians (of all political persuasions) regularly promote ideologically driven propaganda, misinformation, conspiracy theories, and untruths.
In fact, according to one survey by the American Enterprise Institute, white evangelical Republicans are more likely than nonevangelical Republicans to believe a host of conspiracies, including something as farcical as the QAnon conspiracies. We claim to believe that God defines the truth, yet we play so fast and loose with the truth, allowing our commitment to political tribes and cultural movement — and even fears — to drive our sense of what is true. As a result, rather than being models of prudence and temperance in our public speech, Christians are often indistinct from the world. We buy into the same conspiracies, rush to the same judgements, follow the same fears and agendas as everyone surrounding us.
What would it look like to act differently, both in the wake of major, divisive news stories and in the mundanity of everyday interactions?
Consider the typical play-by-play: A shooting happens, we come to a conclusion about the cultural and political meaning of the shooting before the facts are in, and we begin sharing any bit of information we see that confirms our prior conclusion as soon as we see them, whether or not they are true truth, as Schaeffer would say. (And now AI-generated images can appear to confirm our views or at least make the “truth” open to interpretation.) Then as facts do come out, we either deny them if they don’t agree with our preconceived conclusion, ignore them and distract ourselves, or we find some conspiratorial explanation of our correctness. But rarely will any of us admit that we were wrong to jump to a conclusion.
The reason anyone does this is that we have bought into a preconceived cultural or political vision of the world and are choosing to interpret everything through that lens. Everything is part of an agenda: Our Agenda or Their Agenda. And to admit you are wrong is more than just to humble yourself, it’s a blow to the Agenda. And we can’t allow the Agenda to be harmed because the Agenda is a way of explaining the world, a way of making moral order of our society, of judging right and wrong, of deciding who the bad guys are, of giving us hope for the future, of understanding why everything is a mess right now and how we can fix it. It’s important to have a cultural/political vision of the common good, but when that vision becomes an all-encompassing agenda that runs over human values and divine laws and even truth, it is no longer for the common good.
Of course, Christians are far from the only ones acting irresponsibly in this way. In our digital and divided age, many people are so captured by ideologies that they disregard truth for the sake of their own conclusions. But what is particularly egregious is that we Christians claim to have a high view of truth. We believe that truth is God’s reality (not our own) that we must conform to. When we don’t, we harm ourselves, our neighbor, and creation, and we separate ourselves from God. That’s fundamentally what lies do: They are a breaking of the world, an undoing of creation and order itself. But truth is the way of life. It allows us to build each other up through moments of sincerity, to create societies and culture through a shared sense of reality, and to seek justice through a clear understanding of the past. To love the truth is to love God and your neighbor.
All this means we must take into account the reality that people have reasons for doubting official narratives and questioning authorities. Whether you have objections to the way the state handled the COVID-19 pandemic or the Alex Pretti shooting, there are reasons to question whether authorities are telling us the truth — doing so does not make you a conspiracy theorist.
But abandoning truth and reason does.
Nor should we implicitly trust narratives given to us by the news media. Although it is problematic to speak of the “media” as a unified force in an age when it is so diverse (The Dispatch being one example), there have been plenty of examples of news reports that were wrong, stories that went nowhere, or allegations that were false. Some of this is just the reality of reporting. Some of this is due to biases creeping into newsrooms. But it’s not wrong to question a news story if you have good reason to do so.
So what’s the alternative to giving into [sic] tribal political thoughts and conspiracy theories? Two virtues: prudence and temperance. Cultivating these two virtues doesn’t inoculate us from falsehood, because we are still fallen and will make mistakes. But doing so does incline us away from habits of self-deception, bias, and the propaganda promoted around us….
[The author then goes on to examine the virtue of Prudence, followed by the virtue of Temperance. He finishes with the following…]
All of us are called to know the truth and love it. And loving the truth means seeking it with our whole hearts. The virtues of prudence and temperance can form us and shape our affections toward what is real and true, what many of us evangelicals were raised to believe are defining qualities of our faith. We will still occasionally fall prey to error and propaganda. It’s everywhere and we are vulnerable creatures. But there’s grace for that.
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We are all guilty to some degree of “political tribal thinking”, buying into “conspiracy theories”, etc., and I appreciate the author’s efforts to call us not only to awareness but to repentance. I hope you will pray with me that we as a people — and professing Christians in particular — pay more attention to these circumstances and do our best to exhibit prudence and temperance when determining what, when, and how to responsibly think, believe, and comment (if anything) on such matters.
