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Full disclosure: My writing this week is really just an excuse to use the photo on the right somewhere in the paper.
That picture is what could be seen in the sky around 7 a.m. on Monday, March 15.
In the preceding 24 hours or so, prior to me snapping it, I had been grumbling and complaining that “daylight savings” did its thing and I lost an hour between Saturday and Sunday.
Had the clock remained as it was, I would not have driven out of my parking garage the next day and uttered “wow” upon seeing the gift of beauty in the sky, with the time of sunrise coming an hour later than the last weekday.
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| Sunrise outside Holy Name Heights in Madison on March 15, 2021. (Catholic Herald photo/Kevin Wondrash) |
Being the millennial I am, I hoped what I was seeing would remain intact so I could get a picture of it and share it with others.
“Oh wait, I gave up my personal social media for Lent.”
I still shared it on the Catholic Herald Facebook and Twitter pages. Why keep this sort of thing to myself?
‘Why are you telling me this?’
Just look at it. Wow.
I didn’t do any editing to the photo.
It may not be a 100 percent exact copy of what my eyes could see, but it’s what was captured at the very moment, given to me by the Almighty One.
I could write whole editorials about that photo based around the ideas of “I wasn’t happy about the time change, but I should have trusted in God that something good would come out of it,” or “We need to take time to pause and appreciate the beauty that God gives us every day.”
We’ve heard those generalizations before, and we experience those moments at least once a day.
Those of us who have been at this Catholic thing for a while have heard many of the same philosophical sayings over and over again.
They’re all generally based on the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes.
As far as revelation is concerned, there’s been nothing new for almost 2,000 years.
Nothing new? That’s a good thing!
Considering much of humanity hasn’t gotten it right for a lot of those 2,000 years, maybe it’s a good thing there are no new lessons being thrown our way.
“As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be” is a good thing.
If God and the natural law were always changing, we’d be in even bigger messes than we’re in now.
But God is calling us to live and thrive in a world of repetitive reality.
“I am the LORD your God
. . . You shall not have other gods beside me,” means we are called to worship Him constantly.
If that means going to the “same” Mass every Sunday or the “same” Christmas and Easter Masses every year, so be it.
When we die, we’re in for an eternity of “same”ness, either up there or down there.
Which one would you prefer?
‘So, what does this have to do with a sunrise?’
It’s a sunrise.
It’s a gift from God.
It’s beautiful.
We may have seen better ones before, and we may see better ones in the future.
Since it’s immortalized in photograph, it won’t change. That picture will always be the same.
That’s OK.
It doesn’t take anything away from it.
The phrase “nothing new under the sun” isn’t a bad thing.
Embrace the “same”ness in your lives.
Many of them may be signs that God loves you, has always loved you, and always will love you.