Monday, May 03, 2004
Man Abhors a Vacuum
Our priest spoke in Mass about how hard it is in modern times to hear what God wants us to hear. We fill all silences with noise and wonder why we don't hear from God about our vocations and prayers. It made me think of when we give a gift to baby and watch them open it. The baby pulls apart the gift, delighted with the paper and the box, and never understands what part of the package is the treasure and what part is these trash. We're just like the babies throwing away the gift and playing instead with trash. We toss away God's voice in the silence given us and take instead the flash of music, TV, radio, video games. We find empty wrappings and immediately fill it, color it, cover it, change it... destroy it without ever realizing there was a gift inside.
Scientists say, "God abhors a vacuum," to explain the physics of empty spaces. But it's really Man who abhors emptiness. There is vast emptiness throughout the universe and sound, outside the atmosphere, does not even exist. If God abhorred a vacuum, He would have filled it, don't you think? It is Man who orbits into the emptiness and bounces sound across the silence of space. It's Man who hates an empty sheet, who sees great plans in vast unbroken ground, who breaks even Time itself into smaller and smaller pieces until, at last, there is no Time left. And it's Man who claims the still, small voice of God is gone when all the while it's there, inside a forgotten gift beneath the tree, waiting to be opened, wrapped in silence.
Scientists say, "God abhors a vacuum," to explain the physics of empty spaces. But it's really Man who abhors emptiness. There is vast emptiness throughout the universe and sound, outside the atmosphere, does not even exist. If God abhorred a vacuum, He would have filled it, don't you think? It is Man who orbits into the emptiness and bounces sound across the silence of space. It's Man who hates an empty sheet, who sees great plans in vast unbroken ground, who breaks even Time itself into smaller and smaller pieces until, at last, there is no Time left. And it's Man who claims the still, small voice of God is gone when all the while it's there, inside a forgotten gift beneath the tree, waiting to be opened, wrapped in silence.
