Democracy, like God, is often said to be dying because its followers are too heartless to believe in it, and perhaps that is partly true. More likely, however, the adherents of democracy have failed to realize, as have the adherents of other ideologies, that static ideologies are as short-sighted as idolatrous concepts of Deity localized in time and space. The democratic principles of the European Enlightenment have, to date, remained local rather than global and have thereby, in an increasingly global age, become idolatrous travesties of their originals. To remain moral, then, one must rethink the application of dynamic democratic principles to the changed consciousness of global concerns.

In a corridor of the royal palace in Amman, Jordan, there is a large photograph of King Hussein. Or rather three photographs within one frame, so arranged that as you walk by the picture keeps changing—in the manner of those pictures with a three-dimensional effect. This changing, multiple picture is a good metaphor for the Middle East, where things are very often more or less than they seem and where truth depends largely upon the angle of vision.

Our group became aware of the relative nature of truth within forty-eight hours of the beginning of our trip. Warmly greeted at the Cairo airport by members of the Ecumenical Advisory Council (which includes Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant churches), launched upon an exhausting and impressive round of dinners and interviews with cabinet ministers, educators, journalists, and religious leaders, strolling by the Nile after a dinner at the Papal Nuncio's residence, we felt both important and welcome. Twelve hours later we were arrested as spies.