by Molly Chabalowski
The Third Thursday of Lent
[John Donne, Priest, 1631]
Jeremiah 10:11-24 Psalms 42, 43, 85, 86 Romans 5:12-21 John 8:21-32
When my husband, Cary, and I married during graduate school, our two worlds of music and science entwined and I first learned a little about the field of theoretical quantum chemistry. Even I, the musician, knew that the molecular world is made of atoms, which are composed of ever smaller bits of charged particles. But I hadn’t given much thought to the idea that we, and all things, are fundamentally made up of electromagnetic waves, which interact with other electromagnetic waves emanating from all the rest of creation. Theoretically, therefore, nothing is truly separate from anything else.
I have expanded my elementary knowledge of this theory (my apologies to the real scientists) and incorporated it into my spiritual thought. If everything is ultimately waves, the electrical impulses of our thoughts as well as the motions of our bodies reverberate through the universe. What a profound premise! This puts a whole new spin (or wave length) on “love your neighbor as yourself.” If waves connect everything, is that how prayer is conveyed and answered? How miracles happen? How love is eternal? How life continues after death?
I do believe that God is within the very essence of our being, of all that is and shall be. Eugene Peters translates Jesus’ words in today’s reading in John 8:21-32 as follows: “You live in terms of what you see and touch. I’m living on other terms. I told you that you are missing God in all this.” Viva the God of Light (waves)!
St. John's Church 