"SEEK WHAT IS ABOVE, WHERE CHRIST IS SEATED AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD. THINK OF WHAT IS ABOVE, NOT OF WHAT IS ON EARTH" says St Paul in his letter to the Colossians (beginning of Chapter 3). This is a powerful message given 2,000 years ago. How does it apply to our current world in 2022?
When I was a child, my brother and I loved to spend time watching the thousands of stars in the sky. We were also looking for the sudden apparition of "etoiles filantes " or "shooting stars" in English. On a special night, we even saw a multitude of them looking like a "rain of falling stars". Are you looking at the stars? Are you thinking of WHAT IS ABOVE OR WHAT IS ON EARTH? Are you seeking God? Are you looking for the sacred beyond yourselves?
On July 12, the front pages of newspapers were covered with AMAZING PICTURES of stars, planets, and galaxies as we had never seen before. I do not have a television, but I am sure that you saw many of these pictures on your TV screens. They were just spectacular. They were the first pictures shown by the new "James Webb Telescope", able to see further than ever before. What amazed me the most was to learn that these pictures were "5 billion years" old!!! Unbelievable! Many of the stars seen in these pictures may no longer exist, having collided with others!!! Some people still believe that God created the world less than 10,000 years ago... Now, we may have to add six more zeroes: 10,000,000,000, i.e., 10 billion years, or more...We do not know. Only God knows.
Science discoveries may shock us, but they are nothing compared to the infinite power of God. Science discoveries will never contradict our Faith in God. God created the world. He knows better than anyone else...We believe that God created the entire universe out of nothing. This is a mystery that man cannot explain. This is our Faith, a Gift from God. One of the greatest scientists of all time Albert Einstein said that the more he discovers new laws of physics (e.g., constant velocity of light, quantum mechanics) the more he believes in God.
You may wonder why I am writing about scientific discoveries. I believe that one of the reasons why many of our youth abandon the practice of the Faith passed on by their parents is that we live in a world more and more dominated by scientists and technology. We live in a world more and more dominated by pictures/ facts, and less and less by words/supernatural. Youth are more and more attracted by pictures on social media or video games, or statistical facts/numbers and less and less by words in classical books or miracles performed by
saints ...
Coming back to the pictures of the James Webb Space Telescope, they may attract our younger generation by their colors, patterns, and geographical statistics but I doubt that our youth may reflect on their meaning in our relationship with God, the Creator of all things "visible and invisible".
As a teenager I loved mathematics and physics: mathematics because you know exactly whether an answer to a problem is right or wrong, physics because it forces us to look beyond what we see and think about beyond ourselves. As an adult, I was attracted by Theology, the study of the divine/supernatural. I was eager to learn more about human existence in relationship to God. As a priest today, my focus is on how to help people to get closer to God, and how to develop a closer, more intimate relationship with God. In that way, I believe that the pictures of this new space telescope can make all of us reflect on our Littleness in comparison with the immensity of the universe, but also on our special relationship with God. Yes, the earth is small, yes God first chose Israel a small country, yes God chose a humble young girl in a tiny village to be the Mother of His Son. Despite our “littleness", God has chosen each one of us to be His son or daughter through baptism. Yes, each one of us is special in the EYES of GOD.
SEEK WHAT IS ABOVE, where CHRIST is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not what is on earth. LOOK UP! DO NOT LOOK DOWN! CHRIST LOVES YOU! CHRIST IS ALL AND IN ALL! HE IS OUR SAVIOR!!! HE WANTS YOU TO BE WITH HIM NOW AND FOREVER!!!
One in Christ,
Fr. Alain