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I just finished reading The Last Templar (2005) by Raymond Khoury. It’s not the usual sort of thing I consume, but every once in a while, I’m attracted to these conspiracy theories, Catholic church conspiracies, historical and archeological mysteries.

It started out great. Strange goings on in Jerusalem in the late 13th century with the city under siege and the Christians about to be overrun. An escape to sea with a mysterious package that contains all the wealth and hopes of the Templars.

In present day, the Metropolitan Museum in New York City is displaying rare artifacts from the Vatican including one little-known encoding device. Four men dressed like knights (later identified as Templar) raid the Met, kill a security guard by beheading, and steal a bunch of wealth as well as the encoder.

Archeologist Tess Chaykin is attending with her mother and her nine-year-old daughter. She’s close enough to the fourth horseman to hear him say a phrase in Latin which translates “The truth will set you free.”

The FBI investigates lead by Special Agent Sean Reilly who has his own tragic backstory and just so happens to be a Catholic.

The Vatican sends Monsignor de Angelis as their liaison to the FBI and the investigation.

We are also privy to three of the four horseman including Gus Waldron who is trying to unload his portion of the booty fast, even though he was told to wait at least six months. He ends up being the lead Reilly needs to find the others. However, there’s someone else who is picking off the horsemen one by one. Is it the fourth horseman or someone else?

Like I said, the story started off well enough and even later on managed to hold my interest, even though the two protagonists were pretty stereotypical.

Within the first third of the book, we find out that the fourth horseman is former Professor Bill Vance, an expert on the Templars. Five years before, his wife died in childbirth. Her doctors recommended she have an abortion, but their Priest strongly advised against it, leading to her and their daughter’s death. This sends Vance over the edge, fueling his fanatical hatred of the Catholic Church.

The encoder is the key to deciphering hidden documents written by the Templars that, if revealed, will destroy not only the Church, but (supposedly) all three Abrahamic religions.

The person hunting the horseman is de Angelis. The Vatican has too much to lose if the Templar’s secret is revealed and he will to anything to prevent this. de Angelis has also been trained by the CIA and is working in conjunction with them (why does the CIA care about the Catholic Church?)

Sean and Tess join forces (of course) in a race against time to find the secret, but for different reasons. Tess really believes that destroying faith would make a better world, while Sean is horrified that what has sustained him since the suicide of his father could be a web of lies.

The book falls into the all too familiar trap of blaming religion for all wars and evil. The idea is that people mainly fight over differences in faith, and without religion there would be no fighting (shades of John Lennon). It’s actually the reverse. Religion is used many times as the excuse when in fact, what fuels almost all wars is greed, desire for territory, and power.

How many European Kings used Catholicism to destroy how many indigenous populations around the world? The Kings didn’t care about spreading the Word, they cared about wealth, power, and possessions.

About two-thirds into the book, the author goes all “Ayn Rand Atlas Shrugged” on the reader, presenting in three separate and lengthy dialogues his apparent views on how Christianity is false and the world would be better off without it.

The emphasis of the Templar’s secret also shifts from destroying Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, to just destroying Christianity. As it turns out, the big secret is the discovery of “The Gospel of Jesus Christ.” In it, Jesus admits he’s just a man, not divine, not sent by God, not born of a virgin, and did not rise from the dead.

Yeah, if all that were true and could be proven in an absolute sense, it would destroy the Christian faith (but not really affect Judaism or Islam).

A number of the reviews on Amazon express outrage on how anti-Christianity the book is. Some people also advise Christians not to read the book if they are weak in their faith.

But the book is 100% fiction. Yes, I suppose some atheists could use the arguments it contains, but it’s all employed for the sake of the plot. This is entertainment, not a comparative religion class. Relax.

Actually, the end of the book reverses that tone and also cops out.

Tess finds the “Gospel” but is unable to read it because it is in Aramaic. Vance gets his hands on it and almost escapes, but Sean chases him down and Vance, still holding the Codex, falls off a cliff into the sea.

By then Tess, who had abandoned Sean in the wilderness in Turkey to join Vance on the biggest treasure hunt of her career, had resolved to destroy the Codex. Both she and Sean had been rescued from a shipwreck by fishermen on a small, Greek island where they are driven by their faith in Christ. It’s their simple faith and goodness that changes Tess’ mind. These are people she cannot destroy.

We never know if the Codex was genuine or a fake but Sean did find out from a high ranking official at the Vatican that they knew all along Christianity was a fraud. They weren’t trying to preserve the one true faith, they were trying to save their wealth and power.

Sean has been honest and trustworthy with everyone including Tess but on numerous occasions she’s lied her ass off to him for the sake of her career (though at least once it was to protect her family).

Sean, for his part, ignored his bosses at the Bureau, impulsively joined Tess on her trip to Turkey, then joined de Angelis, a man he knew to be a murderer, on his trip to the Vatican and his quest to stop Vance and Tess from finding the Codex.

Sean ends up killing de Angelis when he attempts to sink the ship Vance and Tess are on. Both Vance and de Angelis are two sides of the same fanatical coin, desperate to save their own perspective and willing to kill for it.

In spite of Tess’ faithlessness, Sean stays with her at the end, which is ridiculous.

It would have been interesting if A: They had saved the Codex, B: If it (somehow) had been authentic (remember, this is fiction), and C: revealing the contents to the world would have made people act better toward each other.

In real life, even if the Codex dated back to the proper period, there are so many explanations for how it could be a fake (very likely a fake) that there’s no way to be sure. One book supposedly written by Jesus wouldn’t destroy the Church, and even if it did, it wouldn’t destroy Judaism and Islam. Even if it did, even if all religions were wiped from the face of the Earth, in real life, wars, strife, greed, hunger, poverty, and everything else bad would continue. That’s because human nature, not religion, is the real culprit.

God isn’t the problem. Faith in God isn’t the problem. Human nature corrupting religious practice is the problem. Many people put in a position of authority will use that authority for their own gains. The same can be said for priests and presidents. The book’s climax reveals that humans can also be positively influenced by their faith, human nature can be overcome by a more divine vision and behavior emerging from a transformed life.

It’s best to view this novel as an action, adventure, mystery and set aside any authentic commentary on faith.

Like I said, 100% fiction and in the end, only so-so at that.