I watched the sunrise this sabbath morning. I spent those few moments enjoying the theater of nature—something I haven’t taken the time to do for awhile. The clouds, arching over the peaks of the mountain carried a tinge of grey but after a few blinks I began to see the lines of sun bursting through their lackluster air. It turned their gloom into several vivid tones of orange and yellow. As I was fixed on the exceptional scene a bird suddenly took flight off of a lamp post near to where I was. It flew through my view and in front of the rising sun over that mountainous skyline while I smiled in perplexed awe at its dreamlike movie-esque quality. The bird could have been a common pigeon, but my mind, in the light of the heavenly array, rested on the idea that it might have been a dove. It may not have been to be sure, nonetheless, it was beautiful. It, in the still morning, ranged its sounds over the steel city from the waves of unfettered wings whilst briskly cupping the air propelling itself upward to wherever the limits of its design would take it. All the while, it very likely remained unaware that it was partaking in a surreal and wondrous display right before my very eyes.
You know, some say that there is no purpose in this life. We are all just here by dumb luck and there is no real rhyme of reason for living—or anything for that matter. I have to admit that there is an appealing element to this train of thought. It does battle with the poetic, the irrational, and my all too human nature. Yet, that passionate swirling that stirs wonder in our hearts, that causes the corners of our lips to spontaneously curl upward is unavoidably there rendering to oblivion the suffocating sense of purposelessness when the goodness of nature, in sublime creation, endows us with its blessings. Give me some time and I can stir even the most crestfallen to feel awesome causing them to surrender their dogmas to the beautiful, the lovely, the inspired callings one hears in the silent glory of the morning sun. However, those pessimists, try as they might, even though I adore their dolorous faces, in no amount of time could they deprive me of that wonder nor show to me that it falls to pieces in dark of the abysmal nothingness. The light remains, and is even more brilliant in the minds-eye when beheld from the bottom of a well. That is, even when we see none, we search for it, and in the yearning depths of our most fundamental desires, through anger, pain, animosity, and tears of our wordless sorrow, we will find it rests, in the silent moments on the grace of God as we lift our heads toward heaven despite darkness pervading our weakened, wet, and battered cells.
Often times I try to steer away from overly poetic or melodramatic prose. You may not have noticed. I really do try to tone it down. I do so because there is this dogged scientist in me, battling and criticizing every word I write. When I read over my poems, my metaphors, my spiritual assertions with the eye of a chemist, I realize there is no machine which can register that wonderstruck swirling, and that it, every word in which inspires awe can just be washed away as it appears that their foundations are whimsical at best and fly to pieces upon the critical analysis of those who know better, or those who’d assign spiritual experiences to the catalogue of neurology alone, disavowing divinity.
I remain conflicted. I have just read, nearly immediately after the rising sun, the introduction to The Alchemist. It was written by its author, Paulo Coelho, in 2002. I nearly cried as he spoke of personal callings, becoming an instrument of God, and the Soul of the World. These things, these concepts are so deeply remarkable that they seem to resonate in our bones and leave us in a state of wondrous ecstasy in their reflections. They strike us to our core and cause us to weep. But how can—and this is a serious question—how can we speak of them? How can we justify speaking of our wordless love in lieu of the data? You’d never hear the staunch empiricist talk seriously of such things—The Soul of the World? Really? Are we to assume that there are individuals, perhaps ourselves included, who are privy to knowledge that goes unseen to the instruments of science? Are we to think that there is some profound ability of the human construction that allows some eternal insights into the universe that justify us to speak on their behalf? Depending upon who you are, you might want to shout “of course there are!” and I might be one of those people who stands up and shouts in unison with you in the vigor of my heart. However, there is a profound problem that I wish we all would acknowledge more often.
What does it mean that biologists have found no such soul? They’ve explored nearly every corner of the human body with all sorts of scopes and machines paying close attention to the heart and the brain, yet the spirit is nowhere to be found. The same can be said of neurologists, chemists, physicists, and every other branch of science you can think of. To all, I ask, where is the spirit if it is not merely a thought in the imagination?
I know that many of you might, upon reading this question of mine, feel somewhat disconcerted. You might feel so because there is a part of you that is offended that I would even dare to ask that question. Others of you might immediately jump to the conclusion that science isn’t perfect and has a long way to go. Some of you might even be concerned for my spiritual well being. If you say, to the question of what it means that no soul has been found, that it means that “they” simply, haven’t found it yet, you must then, explain to us off the grounds that you assert that it is there, how it is that you have found it and can justify asserting that it is actually there. What are the implications of subjectively being aware of your soul whilst remaining unable to objectively show that it exists? I am not trying to tear down faith. I am pleading with all to ask questions which make you uncomfortable. Perhaps there is a problem with the question itself. But please tell me, what is the problem? For me, one of the questions that arises from this sort of thinking elicits such starstruck avenues of thought that it excites the very essence of who I am and begins to provide real pathways to understanding. What do these problems say about the nature of the universe?
Whatever it says, and I have my thoughts on it, I stay constant in my assertion that it remains on each of us to search our own souls vigorously to find a way to justify thinking that these insights that provide us with this ecstasy of wonder is actually a manifestation of truth. Why do we need to strive to justify it? Because unless we do, we become slaves to those who would manipulate our lackluster and unexamined faith. This will lead us to spiritual darkness. How can we profess knowledge from a spiritual source when we also unabashedly (and often unawares) profess our own prejudices to be true, as well. Spiritual enlightenment feels good, yet, so does believing that your race is privileged with better blood. How terrible the outcome when these good feelings become entangled. How do we determine what is of God and what is of our own conjuring?
Is there a difference between this spiritual rightness and this professed rightness that we ignorantly pedestal? Surely, there is. But again, how easy is it to muddle together something that is less than true that resembles the promptings of a so called spirit of truth, and then at that point how are we to determine who is and who isn’t inspired? Why aren’t all of us right regardless of what we say or what our belief is? Or how about only Christians are inspired? And then again, have you never felt the rush and stirring of the soul concerning something that you later, heartbreakingly, found out to be untrue? How can this be? Can you feel something to be true that isn’t? Well, I’d say that a lot of people do. Imagine, if you, upon soaking in those rays of the morning sun and indulging in the pleasurable activity of writing a poem about your love for it, were suddenly scooped up by an alien who showed you that the star that you cherished and considered to be the life giver of your world who painted these wondrous scenes across the sky was nothing more than an artificial spotlight in a dome created by some advanced unethical scientist performing experiments on us lowly human beings. Does then, your love of the sunrise have to become a love of an artificial glass bulb moving across the sky by a mechanical arm lubed up by WD-40? Or what if upon hearing the tear inducing testimony of a person praising God, you discover that the events purported to be true which this person described in order to praise heavenly things were wholly fabricated. Would you then concede to the fact that the spirit told you something was true that wasn't? Or would you then say that it wasn't the spirit and it was just our emotions. If all of these things can be, then I ask again, how do we justify speaking of such things if we are so easily deceived?
Again, I do not say these things to disavow the spirit. In contrast, I hold the spirit of truth to be a foundation stone of which I rest the whole of my ideology. But rather, I say these things to address problems that I think we all are concerned with but often can’t find the words to converse with them about. Much like a philosopher, I do not have the answers, yet, I recognize the immense importance of contemplating these things and conversing about them with others. It is on us, those who speak of wonder and love to speak of it with as much sincerity of heart as we can possibly muster. When we do this we acknowledge those little specks of uncertainty which may not be divine and we wrestle with them in the laboratory of our soul, poking and prodding them until we recognize whether love and goodness plays a part in their role or not. Ultimately we begin to see a clearer picture because our wrestling with the spirit refines our character and brings about goodness which cannot be denied by even the most resolute pessimist. We need not always wrestle in the same arenas as everyone else. But unless we are challenging our own limits and not falling into complacency with our moral view, we do love, truth, and beauty a disservice.
Speaking of love. I know, in the manner in which I have addressed that as much as one is capable of knowing, without regard to microscopes, that there is a science of the soul. Now, indulging in the poetic, I’d say, according to my understanding and out of demand of my own conscience in contrast to the empiricist in me, that it, this lovely science, remains behind the scenes much as that rising sun gleams o’er the horizon through the grey and is only witnessed by those who take the time to reflect upon it. It is omnipresent whilst remaining obscured by our lack of desire to look. But once it’s beheld, not only do we begin to stir in silent praise of nature and its God, we see in that light of truth, mere pigeons transform into doves, and maybe, in like fashion regular people transform into angels on the playing field of our own souls, which our ours and ours alone with God to discover the truth of all things in spite of those mechanical deceptions that may or may not inspire alluring poems out of the hearts of the innocent who have tried their best to do good in the face of evil.