Recently on an international flight, the well-dressed, middle-aged man seated beside me was working away on his computer. While we both had laptops, mine was clearly a Chevrolet to his Cadillac. I could see that he was doing some very advanced mapping. Since we had plenty of time, I eventually asked him about his work.

With the reluctance of an important man who didn’t seem to have time to share his own Tolkienesque “precious,” he said that he was watching an archaeological dig in Africa. I replied with a supposedly well-informed “uh-huh.” But inside I knew that nobody jetting in a plane could observe someone in Africa. Yet, that was clearly not a movie playing on his screen.

I gathered my courage to ask him a few more questions. The man was, in fact, watching a dig, and he showed me how he had called it to his screen. From a large world map, he highlighted a place in Africa, where, within a few nano-seconds, an area appeared on the screen. This was no ordinary, get-your-driving-directions Mapquest map. It was both topographical and geological, with mountains and elevations presented clear as a bell. He then refocused, and it was plain that the lens had captured about a square mile of Earth.

My palms began to sweat. I had never seen such a thing. His laptop was obviously accessing highly powerful satellite images. Slowly, I realized that I had become intimidated by that machine sitting next to me, and its owner noticed my reaction. With a veiled delight, he asked if I wanted to “see” too. As I stammered a “sure,” he pushed the next button.

There they were. Detected and tracked by their heat, humans were working, actually digging, in the dirt. I responded to the “mission impossible” type graphics with as much sophistication as possible, and breathed out a knowledgeable “cool.” Not impressed, he turned back to his work, and I buried my confused brain in my own work.

After sufficient time had elapsed (perhaps enough to forget the sophomoric reaction of someone who wrote his dissertation on a typewriter), and after he closed the lion’s mouth seated beside me, I finally asked him what he did for a living. The gentleman must have been bored, so he opened up and mentioned that he was in charge of the Smithsonian Institute’s Museum of Natural History. Yeah, right, I thought. But in response to my further questions, he grocery-listed the number of Ph.D.s employed in each of the various departments. That information, combined with the stealth satellite technology in his little black box, nearly put my doubts to rest.

We talked some more, and I asked about his family. He showed me a picture of his wife, who was attractive and obviously dressed for a grand party. However, as I looked more closely, I couldn’t help but notice her beautiful necklace—one that would regale any wearer.

Before continuing the story, I need to mention that 30 years ago on our honeymoon, my bride and I drove from Pittsburgh to the Smithsonian. While in Washington, we saw the famous Hope Diamond. In the picture of the man’s wife, I saw the glittering gem again. This time, the rock was dangling from her neck.

He obviously enjoyed that I noticed. I learned that, as director of the Smithsonian, he has personal access to all of its treasures. His wife is permitted to wear the diamond, even in public. There were no more doubts in my mind about what this man did!

Here was my apologetic chance. Strapped beside me for a few more hours was a Harvard-trained scientist who happened to run the gigantic Smithsonian. Armed with a quick prayer and a mental rehearsal of information on Creation, the age of the Earth, and the antiquity of humanity, we went at it. To each of my questions and objections to his responses, he gave the orthodox reply of the religion of the Big Bang, the cult of the primordial slime, and the ethics of a world that was created without absolutes.

Those sad responses did not surprise me. No matter how many earned doctorates one has, contemporary science cannot give satisfying answers to the deeper questions of purpose and meaning. What was fascinating to me was that what I read in Christian books about contemporary scientific theory was confirmed in this flesh-and-blood encounter. The Harvard doctor’s emotional reactions to pointed challenges revealed his underlying philosophical assumptions. The man was simply and clearly unable to handle probing questions concerning his view of the origin and the nature of the cosmos.

His response reminded me of the few times that Jehovah’s Witnesses knocked on our door. When confronted with their theological heresy concerning Christ (they deny His full deity), the Witnesses’ eyes inevitably glazed over, and they repeated whatever mantras they had been trained to regurgitate in response to the question. Dr. Smithsonian was no different. Nothing that I could say cracked his diamond-hard shell. Sadly for him (as well as the Jehovah’s Witnesses), they are encased in a shell of death.

The story so far connects to what I learned from an RP elder who teaches at a major university. This minister/scientist told our presbytery about his own encounters with such stubbornness of heart in the scientific community. No matter where the technical evidence led, the brother concluded, one place it could not take his colleagues was to the “scientific heresy” of a God who created the world in an intelligent fashion.

Knowing that, scientist Stephen Meyer’s story shouldn’t surprise anyone, but it still does. Meyer, a Cambridge Ph.D., published an article entitled, “The Origin of Biological Information and the Higher Taxonomic Categories” in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington. As has been reported in secular newsprint as well as by Christian media, the Proceedings editor (not author Dr. Meyer) was actually fired for permitting the publication of such a “blasphemous” article.* Dr. Meyer’s “unpardonable sin” was simply the supposition that the development of new cells and species, from nothing, required sufficiently complex biological information that indicated some type of prior conscious activity. This supposedly erroneous position, of even the possibility of an intelligent design for the universe, knocks over all the burning candles at Darwin’s evolutionary altar. Even the scientific possibility is an attack on the goddess of random biological origins, and, therefore, the ungodly scientific community must do whatever it takes to snuff out any such light.

It is here that the story connects back to the man in the airplane. The Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington is directly affiliated with the Smithsonian Institute. The Proceedings fired editor, Dr. Sternberg, had occupied a spacious office in the sprawling complex nestled in the nation’s capital. Not only was he dismissed for permitting such an article to be published, but the Smithsonian administration will no longer even allow him access to their collections—thus effectively terminating Sternberg’s entire scientific career.

Meanwhile, the director’s wife can still dance with the Hope Diamond dangling around her neck. It is a treasure that Dr. Smithsonian apparently will keep for her no matter what the cost. This story of the abuse of power, intrigue, and human cost makes J. R. R. Tolkien’s tale of the ring of power seem much more real to me than ever before. Like Tolkien’s tragic character Gollum, it appears that Dr. Smithsonian would sacrifice anything around him to retain his “precious.”

• See the Wall Street Journal, as cited by Gene Edward Veith in World magazine, Feb. 19, 2005, p. 26. As is the case with such journals, the scholarly article had been submitted by the editor for review to three outside experts—and was approved by them for publication.