What with 10-year-old girls being raped and the POTUS talking to a man he called a "pariah" and text messages being deleted by the Secret Service on 1/6, I have to step away and be really intentional about considering beauty.
I've never had to look too far to find beauty in this world. Last night as I was leaving the church after a Parish Security Team Meeting, I looked over at a grove of trees next to the cemetery and saw fireflies in the dusk.
I'm still not quite sure what has delighted me about them but they always cause me to gasp with awe and wonder, which is followed by sensations around my heart of pure delight.
They are magical, no? I don't know why they light up like that or what causes them to light up light that. And, honestly? I don't want to know. I want to believe there's magic somewhere in their bodies and they were created to remind us that life is beautiful and magical and thoroughly delightful.
And then, there are the images that have been coming to us from the James Webb telescope. Have you seen them?
It's just magnificent. Breathtaking. Amazing. Magical.
Jane Rigby, an astrophysicist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and the telescope’s operations manager said that they've always been out there. We just had to build a telescope to go see what was there.
Okay, it cost $10 BILLION. Over time. Totally worth it.
Because of the speed of light, she said that we are seeing these clusters of galaxies and nebula rings and possible water vapor as they were seen 13 billion years ago - about the same time that the sun and the earth formed.
And, I thought it was pretty amazing to stand in front of the Pyramid in Egypt and realize that Moses stood before them in his time. I mean, think about THAT and then think about the age of the images we're seeing from outer space.
The picture I've chosen to show fascinates me the most. It is the star-forming region of the Carina Nebula, one of the largest stellar nurseries.
Now, I'm going to pause right there because I sound like I know what I'm talking about and I don't. So, I looked up some stuff.
A nebula is a distinct body of interstellar clouds. A stellar nursery is a place in the cosmos where star formation takes place.
Star formation? Yes, star formation. Star formation is the process by which dense regions within molecular clouds in interstellar space, collapse and form stars.
I didn't know any of that even existed or happened, did you?
For all I know, we could be talking about fireflies.
Which we could be, actually, because human, animal, and plant life on planet earth where we live have about 97 percent of the same kind of atoms.
Just take that in for a second.
When you think about it, we are really no different than any other small, insignificant specks of dust in the cosmos. In fact, what we're seeing - these amazing sparkling images - are more than 13 billion years old.
Which is why we, in our own way and from time to time, light up and sparkle and twinkle. It's in our DNA.
We have magic in our bodies and I think fireflies are sent here one season every year to remind us of that.
Anyway, that's what I'm thinking right now before I turn my thoughts back to what to do about the really awful ways we creatures on this Planet Earth have and continue to screw things up so badly, that we cast darkness over each other and the whole planet.
I invite you to look at the stars and look for fireflies in the night. Let the healing powers of awe and amazement and wonder and delight soothe your soul and lighten your broken heart.
Maybe, so healed, we will be able to begin to heal ourselves and the world - or maybe, just stop hurting each other and the planet. Just for a few moments in time, anyway.
I've never had to look too far to find beauty in this world. Last night as I was leaving the church after a Parish Security Team Meeting, I looked over at a grove of trees next to the cemetery and saw fireflies in the dusk.
I'm still not quite sure what has delighted me about them but they always cause me to gasp with awe and wonder, which is followed by sensations around my heart of pure delight.
They are magical, no? I don't know why they light up like that or what causes them to light up light that. And, honestly? I don't want to know. I want to believe there's magic somewhere in their bodies and they were created to remind us that life is beautiful and magical and thoroughly delightful.
And then, there are the images that have been coming to us from the James Webb telescope. Have you seen them?
It's just magnificent. Breathtaking. Amazing. Magical.
Jane Rigby, an astrophysicist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and the telescope’s operations manager said that they've always been out there. We just had to build a telescope to go see what was there.
Okay, it cost $10 BILLION. Over time. Totally worth it.
Because of the speed of light, she said that we are seeing these clusters of galaxies and nebula rings and possible water vapor as they were seen 13 billion years ago - about the same time that the sun and the earth formed.
And, I thought it was pretty amazing to stand in front of the Pyramid in Egypt and realize that Moses stood before them in his time. I mean, think about THAT and then think about the age of the images we're seeing from outer space.
The picture I've chosen to show fascinates me the most. It is the star-forming region of the Carina Nebula, one of the largest stellar nurseries.
Now, I'm going to pause right there because I sound like I know what I'm talking about and I don't. So, I looked up some stuff.
A nebula is a distinct body of interstellar clouds. A stellar nursery is a place in the cosmos where star formation takes place.
Star formation? Yes, star formation. Star formation is the process by which dense regions within molecular clouds in interstellar space, collapse and form stars.
I didn't know any of that even existed or happened, did you?
For all I know, we could be talking about fireflies.
Which we could be, actually, because human, animal, and plant life on planet earth where we live have about 97 percent of the same kind of atoms.
Just take that in for a second.
When you think about it, we are really no different than any other small, insignificant specks of dust in the cosmos. In fact, what we're seeing - these amazing sparkling images - are more than 13 billion years old.
Which is why we, in our own way and from time to time, light up and sparkle and twinkle. It's in our DNA.
We have magic in our bodies and I think fireflies are sent here one season every year to remind us of that.
Anyway, that's what I'm thinking right now before I turn my thoughts back to what to do about the really awful ways we creatures on this Planet Earth have and continue to screw things up so badly, that we cast darkness over each other and the whole planet.
I invite you to look at the stars and look for fireflies in the night. Let the healing powers of awe and amazement and wonder and delight soothe your soul and lighten your broken heart.
Maybe, so healed, we will be able to begin to heal ourselves and the world - or maybe, just stop hurting each other and the planet. Just for a few moments in time, anyway.
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