Today I read a news item that said that the core of Earth is a liquid-solid as hot as the sun and affects our magnetic field. And here we are walking around on Earth’s surface without a thought for its monstrous blazing hot center that keeps us in existence.
Over the course of time humankind has discovered mind-boggling features of creation. Some of these we take for granted. We look up at the night sky and see stars whose beauty travels light years to reach us. The birds that flock to our feeders are descendants of the dinosaurs. Instead of one kind of flower in the world, about 240,000 species have been identified. After nine months a a new human being emerges from a woman.
Scientists have discovered that besides tasting sweet, sour, bitter, salty our taste buds detect umami. All of our cells contain a protein called lamina that binds them together and it is in the form of a cross. I marvel at how quickly a cut on my skin heals itself. I also wonder how it is that I don’t fall out of my narrow bed during the night!
This quotation from one of St. Augustine’s sermons that reminds me of the Master Creator behind the incredible things in the universe:
| Admire God’s wonderful works; come out of your sleep. Are you only going to admire extraordinary miracles? But are they any greater than those that daily take place before your eyes? Are people astonished because our Lord Jesus Christ satisfied several thousand persons with five loaves (Mt 14,19f) and are not surprised that a few seeds are enough to cover the ground with abundant harvests? They are filled with wonder when they see our Savior change water into wine (Jn 2,19); isn’t it the same thing when rain goes through the roots of the vine? The author of both these miracles is the same… |
| Our Lord worked miracles and yet many despised him… They said to themselves : « The works are divine but, as for him, he is only a man. » Therefore you see two things: divine works on the one hand and a man on the other. If those divine works can only be carried out by God, could it not be because God is hidden in this man? Yes. Be very attentive to what you see and believe what you do not see. He who calls on you to believe has not abandoned you to yourself; even if he asks you to believe what you cannot see, he has not left you without anything to see to help you believe what is unseen. Isn’t creation itself a faint sign, a faint manifestation of the Creator? In addition, look at him who comes into the world and works miracles. You were unable to see God but you were able to see a man: therefore God became man so that what you see and what you believe should be but one. |
Others have echoed his thought: Nilos Kazantzakis wrote, “I said to the almond tree, ‘Sister speak to me of God.’ And the almond tree blossomed.” Teilhard Chardin wrote, “The great mystery of Christianity is not the appearance, but the transparence, of God in the universe.” And a hymn of St. Gregory Nazianzen declares,
“All things proclaim you—
things that can speak and those that cannot . . .
All things breathe you a prayer, a silent hymn of your own composing.”
Enjoy this video of St. Francis’s “Canticle of Creation”:
• What aspect(s)of the cosmos amaze you?
2 Responses
How tiny things can be as well as huge. The vast variety of everything— flowers, animals people even minerals elements!
Mind boggling. Thanks for the reminder
My pleasure!