Midlife Meditation

Brace yourselves. This is going to be a rant. I am a skeptic, always have been, always will be. Blind faith is just not in my makeup. I was raised this way by a science-trained father who was a minister in a mainline Protestant denomination--the branch of Christianity that originated with theologians calling bullshit on Catholic dogma--and a New England Yankee mother who believed no gift came without strings attached. I did have a few gullible years in my teens, as most people do, but I quickly outgrew that phase, returning to my default mode of never taking anything at face value or valuing the authority of any source over the content of its argument. At times, this made me a troublesome candidate for ordination, an often disturbing presence in the pulpit, and a frequent burr in the saddle of employers. I say "at times" because, for the most part, I have kept my skeptical opinions to myself. I learned in college that challenging an idea that is believed on faith, rathe...

Faith is an island in the setting sun...proof is the bottom line for everyone. --Paul Simon, "Proof" In the past four years, Amy has seen, touched, heard, felt so many things she never knew were real. And so have I. There are things in heaven and earth that can only be dreamt of until they are experienced firsthand. Images, recordings, descriptions, artifacts can only hint at the thing in its fullness. Even once in its presence, one must be open to it, receptive to its essence, for it to permeate one's perception and alter one's being. I first visited the Craters of the Moon National Monument in 1970. I was nine years old. I found much to appreciate about it, but only at a superficial level. We passed through this volcanic blast zone many times during our years in Idaho. It was convenient and cheap, two essential criteria for us in our perpetually strapped condition. I quickly tired of it; it was not, after all, really the moon, but something wholly other, so...