God and Beauty

Yesterday I had the chance to be part of a Christian Mass. One of those ritualised masses that I haven't attended for four years now. I was there because I was with people who adhere to the beliefs of Christianity. People that I love and respect and wish for them to be free in thought, and to live their life fulfilled however that may come about.

During this mass I listened and tried to understand why myself, a few years back, was such a Christian devotee. Then the priest  advocated the life of St. Augustine and he said that this man, in his life, referred to his God as Beautiful. At that moment I felt close to St. Augustine. For when I look outside at the trees and the rocks, when I am by the sea and hear the waves dancing on the sand and look up at the glittering stars, what I see is Beauty.

You see, you do not have to have Religion to see Beauty. To feel the Beauty around us. You might believe in God or you might not, but what we all must come to realize is the beauty of life. I think that Religion was the result of this realization. That men and women of old saw Beauty in their lives and the wonders around them and they had to assign a name to this Beauty. They created God to give meaning to the seemingly perfect and magnificent happenings of nature.

However with time, the pure idea of love and understanding of nature and the closeness of man to nature and its beauty got corrupted. Greed and selfishness shaped religion. Religion became the tool to control the emotions of man. It became the weapon of cunning individuals for their benefits, to use against people pure in heart. Those people who were spiritual and saw Beauty in the world were the most susceptible to manipulation.

Yet today, we might be moving away from that manipulation once again. We are becoming closer to the root of our Religion. We are becoming more Spiritual and less Ritual. For the important part to argue about is not the existence of God but the Beauty of life. All humans, believers or not can see this Beauty. They can feel the power of a storm and the sweet caress of a breeze. They can hear the power of thunder and give praise to the light of the sun that warms us on a chill Winter day.

This is what we need to learn. To dream of life. For there is no greater pleasure in life than to appreciate life. Forget about God for a moment and look around you. There is YOU and there is the world right now. Would you rather love life and live it peacefully or would you rather love the idea of God and live life to please him, when in your mind the same reason for God to create life in the first place was for you to live it?

So worry not about God and what came before or what comes next. There is no need for ritual. No need for prayer. For life itself is a prayer. Drinking dew off a flower in bloom or laying down in a field in the heat of the sun is a prayer to life. It is your recognition of this Beauty that matters.

A Hundred Billion Years Across The Universe

Across the vastness of this simple Universe a spaceship tumbles in the fabric of the matrix on its way to Alpha-B112.

"Commander, our trajectory has shifted 2' West in the last ten minutes. Shall I proceed with recovery procedure?"

The commander, a stout man ripe in age looked back at his pilot. He evoked a stern look, "Let our ship veer off its path", he said, "for it seems as if the path we have chosen was only our intended destination, but not the journey which our ship desires to pursue." 

The pilot was confused for a second. He looked back at the commander then back at the flickering buttons on his control-console. Hesitantly he moved back from the console and looked back at the commander.

"Sir, at this rate our trajectory will shift over half a million kilometres from Alpha-B112 on estimated arrival time." His perturbations bubbled up his throat as he made an effort not to look worried while speaking to his superior. "Are you certain of your decision sir?"

"I have seen many great deeds unfold before my eyes Haley", said the commander. "And I have looked deep and thought hard about all this. About the Universe we live in." The commander moved closer to the pilot and looked deep into this eyes. 

"Haley, have you ever noticed strange happenings? Have you ever been vigilant enough and witnessed atypical events transpiring in the darkness that envelopes our spaceship?". The commander now looked outside the circular window on the other side of the commanding room, behind the control-console. 

Haley followed the gaze of the commander and then moved slowly to the window. Peering outside he could see a black curtain dotted with white covering all the corners of the Universe he now looked at. To the East, Alpha-B112 appeared brighter than the neighbouring stars, but was still very far away. 

A lightning cracked to West in the darkness. Haley jerked back and the commander held him firm from his shoulder.

"Have you finally seen it?", said the commander.

"What was that William?", said the pilot, forgetting his manners towards his superior.

Commander William grinned delightfully towards Haley. "It is a glitch my friend. See, our trajectory is deviating from the assigned path and the Universe is not happy about our decision to not correct the mistake."

"But why would the Universe be unhappy about such a thing sir?", said the pilot worried.

"You see, chance had it, our journey was altered by a random event. Tell me Pilot Haley, have you been the one to veer the ship off course?" 

"Sir, I would never."

"Exactly!", snapped Commander William. "It is an act of God! A stroke of luck my friend. Have you ever asked why we always travel to already specified star systems?" The commander now stared blankly towards the middle of the ship's room. 

"Think very carefully Pilot Haley. We always follow trajectories. We have never failed to arrive where we have always intended to go. Yet, we never know why or how our paths have been chosen. We never ask, either. Now, you see, this is a freak event in the nature of our existence. Chance shaped our paths and we veered from our destiny. We are moving away from what had been chosen for us, and the Universe is not happy. I have noticed this before already."

"But sir, what was that lightning really?", asked Haley.

"It was a glitch. An error in the Universe due to our negligence to appeal to correction. It seems as if we are not supposed to keep to mistakes created by chance. We should always fix problems that occur randomly. But today we have not. Do you know what the difference is today Mr. Haley?"

Pilot Haley looked puzzled. "What sir?"

"Today it was me who took the decision."

Outside the ship, lightning started to crack across the black fabric of space. Pilot Haley rushed to the control-console and mashed three buttons in rapid succession. A whoof noise echoed through the room. The lightning spread across the window. 

"Pilot Haley!". The commander's voice was dampened by the echoing noise. "Today we shall touch the hand of God!"

As the pilot kept pressing buttons on his console, the lightning outside the window multiplied and grew in size. The stars once seen dotting the landscape now shuddered and fidgeted here and there across the Universe. A white plane suddenly appeared through the darkness, and through it Pilot Haley and Commander William could see a field of green grass and a blue sky.

"What in the world is that which I see?", asked Haley baffled. William looked deeper into the plane that now was expanding in front of them.

"That my friend, is another Universe. The door has opened for us to leave this matrix Mr. Haley."

"What about our mission?", asked the pilot in turn.

"Where one mission fails, another shall begin." Commander William pressed two buttons on the control-console and the ship took a jolt and accelerated forwards.

"There is no one reality that exist but many", said William, "The Universe we live in is a simulation. A conjecture of the Universe in which we are about to ascend."

And with those last words the spaceship in which they sailed dissipated into a white plane across a black curtain littered with lightning.

Across the vastness of this simple Universe a spaceship tumbles in the fabric of the matrix on its way to Alpha-B112.

"Commander, our trajectory's shift in direction has been accounted for and corrected.", said the Pilot.