by Demi Prentiss

Misinformation. Disinformation. Outright lies. Twisted truth. So many of the words we hear and see are not intended to communicate truth or inspire hope.  The outcome for many is a deep, corrosive cynicism or paralyzing despair – or both.

We can often find more clarity when we venture beyond words, and use the real world for our touchstone. The deeper truths of life are plainer when we, as they say, “touch grass” – ground our experiences in the natural world, and ponder the truth we encounter there. Cultivating a bedrock foundation of creation’s wisdom as we engage wonder instead of analysis.

While the speed and complexity of communications have magnified the difficulty of remaining grounded, the need to go deep is not new.  Every time we run into God’s gift of diversity, the resulting culture shock compels us to question where we look for deep truth, and how we discern our North Star.

Mei Li, a new immigrant from China in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Flower Drum Song, offers wonder as a tool for gaining clarity:
“My father says
That children keep growing,
Rivers keep flowing too.
My father says
He doesn’t know why,
But somehow or other they do.

They do!
Some how or other they do.

“A hundred million miracles,
A hundred million miracles
Are happening every day,
And those who say they don’t agree
Are those who do not hear or see.
A hundred million miracles,
A hundred million miracles
Are happening ev’ry day!”^[1]
Lyrics By Oscar Hammerstein II  Music By Richard Rodgers

The miracles aren’t confined to the natural world.  Amazingly, when we choose to partner with God as cocreators, we can grow in ways that we can hardly imagine.

As Br. Curtis Almquist, SSJE, reminds us, “The most amazing thing about miracles is that they happen. They still happen. Saint Paul had his own miraculous experiences, repeatedly, which led him to write that ‘[God’s] power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine.’ Don’t give up. Give in. Give into the reality of God’s magnificent, sometimes amazing work in us and through us. Watch for it. Wait for it.”

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^[1] “A Hundred Million Miracles” (Rodgers/Hammerstein)
© 1958, Copyright Renewed, Williamson Music Company (ASCAP) c/o Concord Music Publishing