Awe and Epiphany

Two recent blogosphere pieces address the interplay between trauma and faith. The anonymous author of Kobayashi Maru is facing the loss of a brother; MaxedOutMama recalls her battle with neurological impairment. And Sigmund, Carl & Alfred post reactions and thoughts stimulated by each.

Both posts resonated with my view of what prompts faith -- awe -- and how faith is revealed -- epiphany.

Kobayashi Maru:

My brother asked the priest an age-old question: what is this prayer thing? what am I supposed to do? how do I pray? The priest replied: prayer is like catching a butterfly; do not struggle and run after it; be still and it will land on you. Nice metaphor, he thought. Beautiful.

Priest leaves. Ten minutes pass. My brother sits quietly. My sister-in-law comes home with my niece who runs in the door ahead of her. Without saying a word, my niece runs to her toy chest, opens it and pulls out... a stuffed butterfly... and sets it gently in my brother's lap. "Daddy", she says, "I want you to have this because I love you very much."

He was in awe. I was in awe when I heard it, (amidst the giggles of delight that my brother had seen the wonder and power and grace in that little scene.) And really, we all should be in awe.

MaxedOutMama:

The best way to describe it is as patterns of light which had meaning. I could look at each tiny bit of light and see how it connected up to everything else. I could perceive when all was darkness and the patterns of light moving and growing and expanding and becoming. I could also see the end of creation, when almost everything would be/had been filled up with light. It was unbelievably complex and beautiful. Nothing sapient could experience the smallest touch of that and not feel delighted joy.

I could see choice. Do you understand that? You could see how one active (sapient/human) being's choice knocked out a bit of light that could be and another active being's reconnected that light, you could see the choices of beings blocking the light. You could also see choices of beings creating channels that moved, shifted and twisted or would twist back to fill darkness and connect back up with marooned light that would have died out on its own. Everything was happening at the same time, even though cause and effect were present. There was information in this. Incredible amounts of information-filled wonder and delight. . .

I will pray that [Kobayashi Maru's brother] feels the ringing of the bell shudder through his bones and that life burns so brightly in him that he is restored to health, but I will also pray in the full confidence that God has provided what is truly necessary and that Kobayashi Maru's brother will not ever be truly lost to us.

I will pray that the fire that grows things (that reverses entropy, that creates) comes back through the barrier and takes root in everyone that is suffering and everyone that has suffered and everyone that will suffer. . . But for here and now, . . . only listening to the ringing of the great bell will ease us in our confusion and enable us to feel joy in proportion to our losses.

I've spent a lifetime glimpsing the awesome -- meaning wonder and grace, not awful -- such as when the organ's 32 Hz pipe opens just as the sun breaks through bathing me in a stained glass rainbow. I've infrequently experienced a sudden clarity and understanding -- communication with God and/or man (see definitions 3a and 3b) -- beyond prior limits to my logic and knowledge; yet the message is logical and knowable. I've not yet heard that bell--but still heed and observe with open ears and unfiltered eyes.

I pray to God all -- especially those who suffer -- experience awe and are illuminated by epiphany. Perhaps that's what believers mean by faith.