At the risk of sounding repetitive, I return this week to the still developing story I’ve followed in two recent columns. Although instances of combat between proverbial “good and evil” causes across the globe are certainly not lacking in these days of maximum peril, the most obvious case for a Devil’s Advocate to focus on remains the killing of American conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Charlie’s sainthood appears as a given. As I suggested in an earlier column, there may be lurking in the background a second candidate for sanctity: Charlie’s widow, Erika.

Let’s make no mistake, Erika’s status as a living being has not changed. And, even after grabbing the reins of her late husband’s business, there is little reason to think that she may share his fate of martyrdom any time soon. But her impressive turn-the-other-cheek performance at Charlie’s funeral, where she publicly forgave her husband’s killer, was a sign that she may be vying for canonization at some future date. It could be merited, if only because turning the other cheek has become an extremely rare attitude to take in a Christian nation that has heavily invested in the ethos of getting even.

Erika’s putative case is nevertheless increasingly fraught with ambiguity. Many in the media have begun monitoring her behavior, past and present, for signs either of exemplary virtue or unsaintly compromise. Was her founding — at the age of 17 — of a Romanian charity for orphans in Romania entirely above board? Should we take seriously the outrageous claim that it was a cover for child trafficking? Some who wish to identify Erika with the Devil believe there may be a connection with human trafficking ringleader Jeffrey Epstein! Via the mutual friend, US President Donald Trump, of course.

On the saintly side, others see Erika as a potential political savior. Writing for Monocle, writer David Kaufman believes she could emerge as Trump’s successor and take over the leadership of the MAGA movement. She might even rise to vice presidential, if not presidential heights. “A Lara Trump/Erika Kirk ticket remains wildly improbable,” Kaufman writes. “But improbability is what seems to get the Trumps elected.”

Louis, Erika and Jack Kennedy

This highlights another more general question for anyone interested in determining what qualifies or disqualifies a virtuous person for sainthood. Can a saint be a politician? Similarly, can a politician be a saint?

History tells us that the answer to the first question is unabashedly yes. We have the case, for example, of St. Louis, France’s 13th century King Louis IX, who participated in the Seventh Crusade and returned to live and rule not only virtuously, but with a commitment to personal austerity.

No saint is entirely faultless. There were a few serious marks against Louis, in particular his embrace of a military crusade, which any modern pope would unfailingly condemn. But St. Louis atoned for that unnecessary act of aggression. The contemporary chronicler Matthieu Paris recounts the king’s admission that “it’s the whole of Christendom that has, because of me, been cast into confusion” (“c’est toute la Chrétienté qui a connu à cause de moi la confusion”).

At the very least, Louis manifested a trait that has disappeared from the contemporary political lexicon: acceptance of accountability. In his final testament, Louis instructed his son and successor, Philippe III, to “let your heart be tender and full of pity towards the poor,” a sentiment no modern political leader would be tempted to articulate, for fear of alienating the party’s donors. Louis remained blissfully unaware of the modern practice of trickle-down economics that dictates reserving one’s tenderness for the wealthy.

As for the complementary question — Can a politician be a saint? — the answer, at least today, would appear to be a resounding “No!” To be elected, overpromising (some call it “lying”) is the cardinal rule. Once elected, hiding inconvenient truths quickly becomes a habit. If that doesn’t work, denying the truth by fabricating and managing a coverup becomes not just a frequent expedient but a carefully honed skill.

And so, after this medieval digression, we come back to the question of assassinations and accountability. Sixty-two years after US President John F. Kennedy’s assassination, the essential truth is just beginning to trickle out of the carefully sealed container. Call this the effect of the brand of “trickle-out journalism” practiced by journalists such as Jefferson Morley. Thanks to Jeff’s probing, we’re just now beginning to learn about an essential character in the 1963 drama: CIA Assassination Chief William K. Harvey.

Were Americans at the time aware that there was someone in intelligence whose title was “assassination chief?” I certainly wasn’t taught that in high school or college. Harvey was never even mentioned in the supposedly exhaustive Warren Report on the JFK assassination. Now it appears he may have played a central role. Among other things, we now know that he and his wife had a close relationship with mafia boss and assassination specialist Johnny Rosselli, who was collaborating closely with the CIA at the same time he was being investigated by the FBI. Harvey’s widow commits a wonderful Freudian slip at the end of this short video when she explains that Rosselli had been recruited “for assassination purposes on Kennedy…” and then corrects herself, “on [Fidel] Castro.”

Telling a “holey” story (a story with holes in it)

Fast forward to the aftermath of the Kirk assassination that is now creating havoc in political circles in the United States, and even within Trump’s Make America Great Again movement. Wishing to stabilize the narrative and avoid the kind of speculation that hundreds are now engaged in on social media, the FBI and the media promptly offered the American public an awkwardly packaged story about a sexually ambiguous 22-year-old, Tyler Robinson.

Here’s the story in a nutshell: The young man hated Kirk so much that he climbed up on a rooftop, succeeded in firing a single fatal shot into his victim’s neck with his grandfather’s bolt-action Mauser firearm, which he then disassembled in a few nanoseconds before running across the roof, jumping to the ground and then coursing away to hastily drop the equally hastily reassembled rifle in a nearby wood. The young man had the presence of mind to make his way to a nearby Dairy Queen and order an ice cream. He then calmly composed a series of text messages to his lover, written in an archaic version of US English, describing every significant detail of the operation, which concluded with the instruction to delete everything, an order which the lover promptly disobeyed.

Now it seems that numerous people, some with true investigative talents, found certain features of that narrative a little hard to believe. Alternative or, at least, complementary theories have emerged, some of them easily debunked (such as that of an exploding microphone on Kirk’s t-shirt). Certain circumstantial elements concerning the actual event are so bizarre they merit our curiosity, if not our undivided attention. The role of George Zinn, for example. This 71-year-old man in the crowd immediately confessed to being the killer but clearly was not. According to News 5 Cleveland, following his arrest Zinn “claimed to have done so ‘to draw attention from the real shooter… adding that he ‘wanted to be a martyr for the person who was shot.’”

Police reported that Zinn’s treatment after arrest “delayed the investigation into Kirk’s death and took up law enforcement resources needed for the investigation.” Does any of this suggest that he may have been part of a conspiracy? No subsequent news about Zinn or his motivation has since been revealed. As for his desire for martyrdom, I can affirm as the Devil’s Advocate that the man had no credible avenue towards canonization, not only because he isn’t Catholic (Zinn is Jewish) but also because he was subsequently booked for possessing child pornography. I should point out that this last detail might not have prevented him from joining the priesthood, but sainthood would in all cases remain out of the question.

Enter papal delegate, Candace Owens

The question of religious affiliation has become a major topic, thanks in part to the latest revelations proffered by a confirmed Catholic, Candace Owens. She was close to Kirk and had apparently exerted some influence over his and Erika’s religious sentiments. Challenged by Kirk’s Protestant friends, Owens produced proof, in the form of a verified private group chat and tweets, that Charlie was turning away from his traditional Zionist backers, distancing himself from Israel and seriously considering converting to Catholicism. In a tweet earlier this year to Owens, Kirk stated: “Catholicism is looking better and better.”

All that gives Kirk comforts the popular campaign to canonize Charlie. But that isn’t all. According to Owens, there may even be a historical parallel with the life (and death) of Jesus Christ. Candace firmly believes that, like Jesus, Kirk had been betrayed by one of his own from his nonprofit, Turning Point USA (TPUSA). This implicitly raises an unanswered question: Who may have been the Judas Iscariot of TPUSA?

At one point, Owens appears to suspect Erika herself of being passively complicit, at least to the extent that as the new CEO of TPUSA, she has timidly avoided pushing for an investigation into the identity of the betrayer and the actual killer. Owens is careful to make no outright claims. Instead, she reveals some inside information she claims to have received from friends of Kirk that in the 24 hours before his murder Charlie was convinced “they were trying to kill him.” She makes no claims about who the “they” may have been. But, given her narrative, suspicion naturally lands on Kirk’s Zionist backers, against whom he had been rebelling.

Owens warns that it’s too soon to draw conclusions. She asserts simply that the truth will come out. She may be right. Following the JFK assassination, the legacy media maintained a monopoly on what evidence might ever be made available to the public. Who knows? What took 62 years to reveal about events of November 22, 1963, may, in the case of the Kirk shooting, only take 62 days thanks to alternative media. If that’s so, we’re nearly at the half-way mark.

Owens is a fully baptized, confirmed and practicing Catholic. Maybe she’s thinking about her own case for canonization in a distant future. But her suspicions about Erika being complicit in Kirk’s murder (a suspicion other online sleuths seem to endorse) may be wrong. Kirk’s widow may be playing a Muhammad Ali rope-a-dope game, inciting the betrayers to have confidence in her only to be exposed for their duplicity at the appropriate moment.

What we’re watching has turned into a complex chess game and a diabolical dialogue that sometimes resembles the script of a new Hollywood production we might call, “The Anger Games.” It already involves the FBI, politicians, lucrative businesses on the margins of party politics, foreign powers, influential media personalities, random influencers, a pair of unconventional young lovers and various other actors and actresses cast in supporting roles. An evil deed was done, but by whom and with what intent?

In other words — and this is where this Devil’s Advocate has to pay attention — we’re all asking the question: Who are the saints and who are the hidden devils in the story? We have no choice but to keep watching and gathering both facts and opinions.

Louis IX’s dossier was a much simpler case to deal with.

*[The Devil’s Advocate pursues the tradition Fair Observer began in 2017 with the launch of our “Devil’s Dictionary.” It does so with a slight change of focus, moving from language itself – political and journalistic rhetoric – to the substantial issues in the news. Read more of the Fair Observer Devil’s Dictionary. The news we consume deserves to be seen from an outsider’s point of view. And who could be more outside official discourse than Old Nick himself?]

[Lee Thompson-Kolar edited this piece.]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy.