I’ve resurrected my shades, despite Expert Advice to the contrary.
Somehow, it just doesn’t seem worth the effort to spend an hour or more tracking down a fresh supply of Solar Eclipse Glasses…in order to safely view a mere four minutes of Celestial Phenomenon. This is especially true, since I live slightly outside the path of Totality. The Big Show won’t be all that big where I live, so if I mark the 2024 version of the solar eclipse, it will be with the eye protection I saved from 2017 – the last time we were treated to “darkness in the daytime.”
The Experts say that’s a bad idea. They won’t – they can’t – guarantee that my 2017 shades haven’t degraded or been damaged. But I know from experience that the real action in an eclipse occurs not up in the sky, but much closer to home – weirdly shaped leaf-shadows projected on the ground in front of me, crickets chirping their twilight sounds all around me, bats and swallows abandoning their perches to begin their nighttime hunts.
So those are the sorts of experiences I intend to seek out this time around, even as I ponder the prodigal nature of living near the path of two solar eclipses that occur less than ten years apart. My grandparents weren’t quite as fortunate: The entire 20th century passed, I’m told, without there having been a solar eclipse that darkened a portion of North America. Prior to 2017, you’d have to go all the way back to 1869 to have tracked one down anywhere near here.
And since that’s the case, I think I’d be inclined to give my grandparents a pass if they sounded a little skeptical about the whole idea – if someone had told them all about what they might see and hear during Four Minutes of Totality. A solar eclipse is the kind of thing you really want to experience for yourself.
As is “resurrection,” I suppose. This week, on Divine Mercy Sunday, we’re treated to the story of the apostle Thomas, who famously took a little while to warm up to the idea of Jesus’ resurrection. Thomas tends to get a bad rap in Christian circles today, but when I meditate a bit more deeply on his reaction, I’m more likely to say “I get it.” The story his friends are telling just doesn’t add up. Dead bodies don’t come back to life.
Only, here we are – retelling that same story more than two thousand years later. So maybe there’s something to it.
Maybe God’s Holy Spirit was in fact present in the breath Jesus shared with Thomas and his frightened pack of friends on that second Easter Sunday. Somehow, in the moment, ruach – God’s creative and creating wind – once again hovered over a formless and confusing scene…and transformed the chaos of the crucifixion into something beautiful and life-giving.
And in that same moment, something like shades fell from Thomas’ eyes, and he could see his world from an entirely new perspective. Not only see it, but participate in its re-creation…by agreeing to explore Jesus’ wounds, and to share His breath of mercy and forgiveness with all those he encountered from that point forward.
That was Thomas’ call then. It is perhaps also our call today, on Divine Mercy Sunday, if only we have eyes to see.
Let us pause now…to recall that we are in the presence of the Holy & Merciful One.
IHS
With Us Still 