When my first son was born, I lost my breath. I looked at this exquisite, tiny person looking up at me and couldn’t breathe or speak. Time seemed to stand still. There were no words, none that I knew anyway, that could express the depth of the feelings I had in that moment. Gratitude and awe were a part of it, but there was more. There was a sense of being part of a greater whole, a great lovingness in which we all existed in that moment.
The same thing happened when my second son was born.
It also happens when I see clear, star-filled skies, mountain vistas, and autumn leaves. It doesn’t have to be a whole expanse of trees, though; a simple golden leaf can sometimes stop me in my tracks.
My heart becomes so full that it feels like it could burst. Sometimes, I can’t even take it all in and have to turn away momentarily when the beauty overwhelms me. My soul utters some silent gratitude-filled breath of exclamation that only God can understand. Sometimes, my mind issues a silent, verbal response, “I love you. I praise you. I glorify you, oh, my God.”
The transcendent experience is universal, if we have eyes that see. In his book, Living Philosophies, Albert Einstein wrote:
The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom the emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead—his eyes are closed. This insight into the mystery of life, coupled though it be with fear, has also given rise to religion. To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive forms—this knowledge, this feeling, is at the center of true religiousness. (6)
The natural response to these moments of transcendence, according to St. Ignatius, is gratitude. Ignatius advised that we savor such moments and keep a record of them. He points to Mary as an example. In Luke 2:19, we read that Mary, after the birth of Jesus, “treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart.”
Ignatius also believed that the more we cultivate an awareness of the divine action in our lives, the more we will notice that God continually creates beauty in our paths, beauty that demonstrates the greatness of God’s love for us. God is always seeking to turn our eye.
May our eyes be opened. May we take the time to stand in awe. And may our hearts treasure and store up these moments, giving gratitude for them.
Are there moments in your life in which you have experienced wonder and awe? Are there certain places where this often happens? Do you thank God for these moments?
