I sit in the airport, sipping an iced coffee and reading a book. My flight is on time, I am early, and the terminal is quiet. The few other passengers at my gate are content to sit and mind their own business, lost in their books or hushed conversations.
And then, quite suddenly, a smell. A scent cuts through the tranquility of the moment and erupts in my nostrils, causing me to scowl.
I know this smell: a sharp concoction of chemicals and colors, one that singes the hairs of my nose. My girls love to dabble in it. Nail polish.
I toss my head to the left, then to the right, searching for the culprit and looking for confirmation. Bingo. An elderly woman just over my left shoulder has summoned from the depths of her bag a small container of nail polish and is applying it with care. She’s nearly done, and the scent soon dissipates.
I turn back to my book, finding satisfaction in my olfactory investigation.
As I sit there, still and quiet, I’m struck by how abruptly and absolutely my solitude was interrupted by an invasion of my senses. How that scent—so sharp, so insistent—made me stop what I was doing and look up and around until I identified its source. How it cut through the moment, grabbed me by the lapels, and spun me around.
I wonder how often such a thing has happened to you: a wailing siren pulls your attention away from the task at hand; a tremor in the ground makes you grab for the nearest railing; a flash of light necessitates a hand raised to your eyes. Through the senses, we read our world. We learn to respond. We better understand our surroundings. We sink deeper into creation.
St. Ignatius of Loyola knew this, of course. He insisted we use our senses in prayer, that through our senses—taste, touch, smell, sight, and sound—we might better find God. We might delve more deeply into the stories of Scripture. We might connect more readily with Jesus, who was fully human and fully divine and who experienced the world through the senses just as we do.
But that moment in the airport did more than cause me to pause and reflect on the prayer potential of my senses. I was struck by the impulse to stop and look, to respond to a feeling in such a bodily way, and to pause all that I was doing and seek out the source of the sudden intrusion. I wonder if God doesn’t speak to us in such a way.
How many times have you had that sudden eruption of grace in your life? Have you noticed a consolation that arrives unlooked for and unexpected? Or have you suspected that there is something bigger at play and that a hand unseen has directed your step?
We feel this most immediately in our senses, such as that smell that causes us to look up and around. But this happens on the spiritual level too. We sense something more, something other—a tingling in our soul that invites deeper consideration. Do we pause in such a moment? Do we look up and around, as I did in that airport, in search of the Source?
Our senses are a powerful avenue through which to pray and encounter God. But I think they are also a powerful parallel through which we might better understand our spirit. The next time you feel that sudden eruption of God in your daily life, take a moment to pause and to look.
God might be trying to get your attention.
Photo by Caroline Badran on Unsplash.