The astronomers of centuries past – Ptolemaeus, Copernicus, Kepler, and Galileo, not to mention those Persian or Babylonian sky-watchers we call the Magi – would be astonished and awed by what modern science shows us of the cosmos. (If you haven’t done it already, you might want to browse through NASA’s Image Gallery.) What a boon the Hubble Telescope has proven to be, after its rocky beginnings.
Between Sept. 24, 2003, and January 16, 2004, the Hubble focused on a patch of largely “empty” space. What appeared is known as the “Hubble Ultra Deep Field,” and it is something the mind strains to grasp – around 10,000 galaxies heretofore invisible to the human eye.
Coming back to earth, I ask what it would be like to turn our attention toward our own “empty” space — not for several months, but for a few minutes at a time, and not with a view toward analysis, but simply with a loving gaze?
It is unfortunately true, however, that our society does not encourage the honoring of our empty space. It is both easier and more acceptable to fill up every vacant nook, every idle moment, with purposeful activity, or (still easier) with television or surfing the internet.
Are we afraid of being swallowed up in the void? Perhaps. I believe this is a natural fear. Blaise Pascal, in his Pensées, expressed succinctly what we may feel:
The eternal silence of these infinite spaces frightens me.
(Le silence éternel de ces espaces infinis m’effraie.)
The Hubble directed its focus toward the vastness of outer space and revealed thousands of galaxies. Is it possible that as we gaze peacefully into our interior space, we will find that the silence and the emptiness are filled, not with galaxies, but with God?