Greetings from the center of the galaxy

I couldn't think of a better Christmas day greeting than this one -- a marvelous image of the Milky Way galactic center. (Click on "full size" for higher resolution image.)

Yesterday I saw it as I was garnering churchless inspiration from an astronomical picture book, "Universe: Journey from Earth to the Edge of the Cosmos."

Tears came to my eyes. Sitting on a cushion in my meditation area, I felt very, very small.

Also, very, very fortunate to be living in a time when science could show us so vividly what lies beyond the confines of everyday experience.

The caption in the book, where the image is rotated 90 degrees, says:

Dense star fields (should you care to count them, there are nearly 10 million stars here) announce our arrival at the galactic core. In these bright depths galactic orbits are completed in decades -- it takes our sun 225 million years. A ribbon of dust weaves diagonally across the page leading to the exact point around which we all revolve [top left in image above], where beats our galaxy's dark heart.

"Dark," because a black hole lies at the center of the Milky Way galaxy, having the mass of about four million stars the size of our sun.

But that's not what moved me the most about this image. It was the ten million stars that looked as closely packed together as salt grains spilled on a countertop.

Yet actually the average distance between stars in the Milky Way is about 5 light years, or 30 trillion miles.

Imagine (as if we can) traveling at 186,000 miles per second for five years just to get from one tiny speck in the image to another tiny speck. Equally astounding:

If the Sun were the size of a baseball, the density of the stars in our galaxy would be comparable to scattering fifty baseballs across the United States, so that there would be one star per state.

Ponder those words. Then look again at the full-size image of the galactic center.

I feel hugely more genuine awe and wonder from this reflection of really real reality, than from the Christmas sermon preaching of Rick Warren that I briefly listened to this morning as I channel-flipped through some cable news channels.

"Jesus died for our sins." Oh, yeah? What the hell does that mean? It's just words, dogma, blind belief.

The center of the galaxy ... now that's something you can actually point to, marvel at, have your mind boggled by.

And here's the most astounding thing of all: whatever the unimaginably vast cosmos is made of, so are we. Wherever it ultimately came from, so did we.

One of the most inspiring lines I've ever heard in a movie was spoken by Jodie Foster in "Contact" (which was based on a book by Carl Sagan).

She's a scientist strapped into a machine that's been built from plans apparently sent by an advanced alien civilization. It hasn't been tested yet. She's the ever-so-willing guinea pig.

Not knowing what will happen when the machine is turned on, Foster's character is willing to sacrifice her life in order to learn much more about the truth of the universe.

The countdown begins. A whole lot of shaking and rattling ensues. And we hear her say to mission control:

I’m ok to go..if you can hear me I’m ok to go!

Beautiful. That's the spirit of science. Daredevil truth-seeking.

Mysticism and spirituality, when shorn of fundamentalism, can have the same commitment to understanding naked reality.

Seek the center. Our galaxy has one. Each of us does. Is there anything more satisfying to do?

Comments

[tAo]

Ho Ho Ho... and a very Merry Cosmos to you too Brian !

[Jayme]

Nil is sure: beholding is utter splendor.

Naked reality is difficult to see in the ordinary. It's an addiction to search for ourselves and a release as we come to see ourselves in the mundane. It is this innocent beholding that seats us back in the ground of our own being. I don't know why this release is felt as sacred but this seems to be the primary motivator in why I seek release from mental and physical fixations. Such beholding must resonate deeply across both the rational and experiential worlds as there is no means by which "it" can be understood. In awe, and perhaps through need, the tears flow.

It is beautiful. I wish such beauty were more evident in the ordinary too.

[Elvert Langston Town]

Mysticism and spirituality, when shorn of fundamentalism, can have the same commitment to understanding naked reality.

Seek the center. Our galaxy has one. Each of us does. Is there anything more satisfying to do?
--------------------------------

We can grasp a piece of "spirituality" same as we can take a literal ride on a Saturn ring. Spirituality = "The Church of the Churched."

[Cyfer]

“When a quiet little child, I was dwelling In the House of my Father's Kingdom, And in the wealth and the glories Of my Upbringers I was delighting . . .”

There is no explanation for my extraordinary mental condition. I am always conscious of a luminous glow not only in my interior, but pervading the whole field of my vision during the hours of my wakefulness.

I literally live in a world of light. It is as if a light were burning in my interior, filling me with a luster so beautiful and so ravishing that my attention is again and again drawn towards it. In fact, it is the normal state of my perception now. Light, both within and without, and a distinct music in my ears, are the two prominent features of my transformed being. "

http://www.ecomall.com/gopikrishna/

you can pay me later....