11-23-10

When one of my daughters was young, she loved things that were "shiny". This was her word of wonder.

"Crystals are so spiritual, aren't they?"

"Shiny"

We are immortal because matter is immortal.

As Dawkins says, going back to the way I was before I was born.

This is the fairie world. The material world is spiritual.

Waterfalls, fountains, crystals, tide pools, coral reefs, beeswax candles, chanting, incense, mountains, canyons, fossils, epiphytes, rain forests, fresh air, things that glow in the dark, fireflies,

Now as I feel the age of life creeping on me, as I watch my body gradually disintegrate, I look for some reason, something beyond this decay. I look for something beyond myself, beyond "this mortal coil", something greater- and there is nothing.

This is the stumbling block for every unbeliever: where am I going next? If there is nothing beyond this life- for there is no credible evidence- then what am I, even now? And the answer is, I am this world, this nature, this universe.

I am going to the same place and same condition as before I was born. I am going nowhere else; therefore I am always here: matter into matter.

Decades ago, in my Christian deliberations, I asked, "by what means can we know the Absolute"? It was intended as a challenge to the unbelievers, one of whom I have become. How to know the Absolute- Why did I assume there was an Absolute? The Absolute is nature, this world, now. We are the Absolute, and so is every shiny thing!