From the Director - Black holes

Fr Trevor Trotter

Recently I have been fascinated by the news of two black holes circling each other and heading towards a massive explosion.

All the physics of it is beyond me but that this happened nine billion years ago is amazing to me. I do not know what I thought about the size of the Universe but that it has taken nine billion years for the light to come from there to earth means that the Universe is very, very big!

When I put this amazing phenomenon together with my belief that we all live in God and that God lives in the whole Universe, then that makes God very, very big also. I can only stand still in wonder. As a priest, as a missionary, I have been talking about God all my life. I was once warned not to domesticate God. I was being told that I was making God too small. I guess we do this because the immensity of God is hard to imagine. I think I have been guilty of not respecting the wonderful mystery of God. Not only is God so big, God is also close to me, to us. That such a big God wants to be so close to us is also awesome.

By talking about starting a New Year we are acknowledging our cosmic connections. On New Year the earth starts another circle of the sun. So we are participating in all sorts of travel and movements. We are moving with the earth and the sun, other galaxies and eventually we are connected to those ancient, black holes.

Contemplating this reality I am truly amazed. There is a deep truth about the maxim that “we are our relationships”. In this we are in the image of the Trinity which is constituted by the relationships between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. So in contrast to the way many of us think of ourselves as just a small person with a few close friends, we need to look at the bigger picture. We need to see ourselves in the mirror of the Universe. We need to see ourselves as God sees us.

We have amazing connections. We are connected to a huge Universe and to a God who continues to create it out of love. As we become more and more conscious of our relationships, or our connections, we can stand in awe of what our God has done. We think of the bigness of creation, but we are connected to all of it and especially we are connected to the One who is making us daily into his image and likeness. God’s work is not going to stop. This year God will continue to work on us, our world and our Universe. He will continue to love us into fullness.

As we commence this new year let us spend time in wonder. Let us wonder at the immensity of God who holds and creates such a big Universe. Let this love poured out by God be the basis of our hope for a better world. Let our prayer be aligned with God’s desire for us and the Universe – that 2019 will be an even better year than 2018.

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Fr Trevor Trotter
director@columban.org.au

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Comments (2)

  1. Michael Curtin:
    Feb 14, 2019 at 12:38 PM

    Dear Director, I was touched by your sensitive treatment of the immensity and the small individual in your ebulletin opening piece.

    Reply

  2. Joanna Thyer:
    Feb 18, 2019 at 02:36 PM

    Dear Fr Trevor, thank you for this. It is a wonderful piece of writing about the bigness of God that encapsulates much of the mystical thinking of all the Abrahamic traditions. I loved the idea that we are moving with the earth and the sun and connected to the ancient...and looking at the bigger picture...

    Reply


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