Yes, it really was a salute. And yes, it’s a little bit too late. And yes, the people who own industry, technology, and the mechanisms of power—the richest among us—have consolidated their influence into something eerily reminiscent of the Ten Kings of Revelation 17 and 18. In fact, this entire moment feels like it was foretold in those chapters: the entanglement of empire, capital, deception, and the slow corrosion of what we once thought of as truth.
So what do we do?
Yes, it’s too late in the sense that the structures are built. The mechanisms are running. The system has perfected its ability to obfuscate, manipulate, and even fabricate reality. But death is never fatal—not according to Jesus. And so even in this moment of despair, there is another story to tell.
The War on Reality and the Crisis of Trust
For those of us who have spent years enduring backlash and vitriol simply for questioning the status quo, this moment is particularly painful. We know what it’s like to be doubted, to be told that our resistance is irrational, that our refusal to accept dominant narratives makes us dangerous, divisive, or even wicked. Many of us have spent years untangling ourselves from a theological imagination that told us not to trust ourselves—that divine truth was only accessible through certain authorities, that we needed someone else to tell us who we were, what was real, and what was true.
But now we are in an age where truth itself is under siege in ways we could not have predicted. Artificial intelligence can generate convincing deceptions: a face that is not real, a voice that does not belong, a body manipulated to say or do things that never happened. Deepfakes make it impossible to know if what our eyes are seeing is real. Information warfare is no longer about persuasion—it is about obliterating certainty altogether.
This is empire’s final move: to destabilize reality itself.
The Power of Epistemological Freedom
In this crisis moment, the only way to source truth is within.
For those of us who have already learned to resist false narratives about ourselves—narratives that told us we were lesser, unworthy, broken, or depraved—this moment is familiar. Empire has always tried to gaslight us into submission, and it has always used power to redefine reality in ways that serve its own interests.
But we have something they do not.
Somewhere in everyone’s ethnographic tradition are stories of people who resisted false narratives. Stories of people who refused to let empire define their dignity. Stories of those who pushed back when power tried to erase them. The lie of empire is that it knows better than us, that it alone can determine what is real and what is worthy. But the gift of the Womanists—of Katie Cannon, of those who refused to be named by others—is epistemological freedom.
Even when they call your truth a lie, tell it anyway.
The Coming Storm and the Call to Imagination
In an age of deepfakes and artificial intelligence, the ability to fabricate perception is limitless. And when people become uncertain about reality, they panic. History tells us what happens when those with power feel destabilized: they strike preemptively. They double down on control. They search for scapegoats.
This is going to be a long four years. This logic does not end well.
But I believe something else, too.
I believe because of what the trees say.
I believe because of what I see in nature.
I believe because I have lived long enough to know that death is never the final word.
What will save us is an imagination born of epistemological freedom. The ability to dream beyond the manufactured reality that empire presents to us. The courage to trust the truth we know in our bones.
Death is not fatal when it comes to life.
There is a witness to that everywhere.