What We Know

It gave rise to us – “created” us, if you will, through the unfolding of various processes.

We cannot see it from the outside, cannot know if referring to it as “it” fits less well than using a personal pronoun. Does this reality that transcends and incorporates persons such as ourselves likewise transcend terms such as personal and impersonal?

We see in the wider universe what we see in ourselves.

Some look at the vast stretches of empty space and see evidence of meaninglessness. But if we look within we see empty space as well. If we stood on the edge of an atomic nucleus and looked out, the distance would overwhelm us, and perhaps persuade us then too that there is no interconnectedness, no greater structure, no meaning.

And yet that atom might be within a person, within you or me, and the lives we live which incorporate that atom we and others might indeed consider meaningful.

There are connections, but we do not always see them. Remember that the space between us is no greater than the space within us.

If we ask the question “Is there a God?”, what answer should be given? If one means specific gods depicted in ancient texts interpreted literally, then of course such entities, seemingly part of this vast universe and less than it, are placed in serious doubt, although there are traditions going back deep into antiquity of taking such stories as symbols of the very sorts of transcendence we do encounter in reality.

But if we ask if there is something greater than ourselves, which encompasses us and gives rise to us, and which is a mystery we cannot fathom but which inspires in us awe and wonder…how could we possibly say “no”?

There are some things we claim to know with certainty when the evidence may not support it sufficiently to persuade others, or when it is something deeply personal rather than general. Yesterday as I drove to work, the sound of Vaughan Williams and the billowing clouds in the autumn sky moved me. But I cannot assume that they would move everyone in the same way. Why is it that we can disagree about such matters, and yet the very similar domain of religious beliefs, language and symbolism leads to heated conflict?

What would happen if all of us who share this sense of awe and wonder at our existence, and a value for life as rare, precarious and precious, focused on what unites us rather than on those things about which we disagree?