Category: Spirituality

Overcoming the Limits of Science

Posted on by japineda
from Krisis and Praxis

Retirement came early for me in 2018 after a 30-year career in scientific research because of the limits I encountered following that approach. As I’ve written in my 2020 autobiography Piercing the Clouds, it became increasingly obvious that science could not provide me with answers to the burning, ultimate questions I had; questions about reality, consciousness, the mind, etc. (see My Unease with Science).

Trying to find answers, I convinced myself that knowledge could flow from other sources—such as first person or noetic experiences. Noetic means inner wisdom, direct knowing, intuition, or implicit understanding. It is a way of knowing beyond our traditional senses. Scientists often deride this approach as subjective, religious, even mystical. Their reasoning is that it lacks verifiability since by definition only one person can access such knowledge. And verifiability is the sine qua non of science—otherwise, how can one trust the results? It was, therefore, with a tremendous apprehension that I left academia to pursue such alternative approaches.

Even as this new direction bears fruit, there have been moments in which I’ve questioned the sanity of my decision. I still lack confidence in my own insights, and original thoughts lack truthfulness and validity until someone else confirms them. Hence, it was with a great deal of surprise and relief that I read the latest version of The New Scientist magazine (Jan 2023). Its discussion of the limits of knowledge instantly crystallized the fuzzy thoughts I had that led to my retirement. The coverage validated my decision to leave and motivated me to compose this essay as a summary of the arguments. The intention is to give a clear description, while providing a grounding of support for others’ questioning of the matter.

The first major problem encountered in terms of the limits of knowledge is that, from a scientific perspective, we must first be able to identify, define, and quantify the object of study. This does not prevent its investigation, but makes the process difficult, if not impossible. Quantum mechanics shows that the underlying nature of reality is probabilistic and inherently unknowable. This implies there is a hard limit to our understanding of it. Hence, we know of a handful of subjects that even the laws of nature tell us we can never study scientifically. While such a list is not exhaustive, it gives a sense of where we cannot go:

  • The inside of a black hole
  • Going beyond the edges of the expanding universe
  • Knowledge of the quantum world
  • The origin of life
  • The inner workings of the human soul
  • Consciousness
  • The supernatural 

Part of this limitation involves what scientists have termed “the limit of horizons.” Just like the horizon on a clear day represents a fundamental limit on how far we can see, imposed by the curvature of the earth, the origins of the universe and of life on earth are subject to a type of horizon. For about 300,000 years following the Big Bang, scientists theorize that the environment was so hot and dense that electrons, proton, neutrons, and even photons combined. Then, in what has been called “recombination” the universe cooled enough allowing charged particles to combine to form basic elements like hydrogen. This meant that photons, which have no charge, could no longer combine with other particles and were free to roam, allowing us the ability to “visualize” objects. For now, we cannot visualize the universe prior to recombination—a major constraint. Likewise, biologists can trace all species to a single organism. This last universal common ancestor (LUCA) gave root to all life on earth. Unfortunately, it’s the end of the trail since we cannot study what came before it. Thus, it represents a kind of horizon limiting scientific investigation of the origin of life.

Another major limitation to a scientific exploration is the complexity of nature, its objects, and their relationships. Weather prediction, understanding how a disease spreads, the way proteins fold, and how the brain works are so complex that we can only study tiny parts at a time. Super computers and artificial intelligence are approaches that have helped push the limits created by such complexity. At some point, however, these tools will “understand” but humans won’t—a limit we may have already crossed (see The Evolution of Multidimensionality).

A final limitation is that the tools we have to study nature and its complexities are inadequate. From language to describe the dynamics, to the mathematics that quantifies it, to logic and the science of the formal principles of reasoning, these either don’t exist or are insufficient. Mathematics, for example, has to make assumptions about reality—and its validity rests on such assumptions. Are we sure we are using the right assumptions? Kurt Gödel’s incompleteness theorem states that if you have a consistent mathematical system (i.e., a set of axioms with no contradictions) in which you can do a certain amount of arithmetic, then there are statements in that system which are unprovable using only that system’s axioms. The mathematics is incomplete, and it is, therefore, impossible to prove everything. This problem reminds me of an Emily Dickinson poem on nature which asserts that, “Nature is what we know—Yet have no art to say—”

Given these and other limitations of science, what can overcome them? First is to recognize there are alternative paths to knowledge. Whether we focus on what we consider emotions or knowledge of the heart, action and selfless service, or faith, meditation, noetic, and religious experiences, what we learn from these alternative approaches is that we can indeed capture distinct aspects and dimensions of the same reality. These approaches provide access to unique forms of knowledge which may be indescribable, but an experience that we can still try to communicate to others.

A Content-Addicted Culture

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We live in an exceedingly rich information culture. Indeed, the amount of information exceeds the capacity of our individual brains to process it by orders of magnitude. Not only is factual-based scientific information being collected at prodigious rates, but the amount of non-factual disinformation created by our culture matches its rate. Reality-based information and its imaginary counterpart are apparently not sufficient content providers, for we are now considering developing a metaverse—a universe of infinite made-up possibilities. While human imagination is a source of all these creative outbursts, problems occur when there are no boundaries to its unconstrained nature, no checks on counterfactual thinking, no testing to see whether ideas are true. When we think up stuff and assume it is real, it creates the singular psychological basis for human suffering. Humans have known this insight for thousands of years and yet we march on, like a devastating tsunami obliterating everything on its path or like lemmings on our way to our own destruction.

The driving energy behind this is a mind that lives in scarcity, that is constantly dissatisfied, always searching for more to fill a bottomless emptiness. It is this unfulfilled emptiness that makes us addicted to information, to the content of what our mind can experience. For, while we attend to this content, it prevents us from looking at the core of this emptiness. Such a possibility seems too frightening to consider and so we develop more and more content to distract us. The American social scientist Herbert Simon wrote: “The wealth of information means a dearth of something else—a scarcity of whatever information consumes. What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients.”

Human attention comes in short supply, and when the information it consumes overwhelms it, there is nothing left to attend to our unfulfilled nature. The only antidote to this devastating tsunami of human experience is to become quieter and more intentional. A time of silence occurs when we stop furiously examining the content of our conscious mind. What we discover when we turn from noise to silence is that what we feared, the emptiness we felt, is not really the bogey man we envisioned, but a unique source of nourishment unlike anything ever experienced. We briefly touch what Christ called “the living water” or others refer to as the “I AM.” Silence is one of the few remaining ways we express a widespread, shared experience of sacredness.

The more we drink from this silent emptiness, this living water, the less dissatisfied we become, the less we are interested in the content of our consciousness. Instead, we become more interested in that which contains it all: consciousness itself. We lose our addiction to information, and at the very end of such a process, we identify with the silence itself, which, in fact, contains everything.

The Human Spiritual Experience

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“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience; we are spiritual beings having a human experience.” – Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

What if mystics and spiritual masters are right about us being spiritual beings having a human experience? Is there anything in what we know about the brain and its development that may be more associated with such an idea than with the standard materialist explanation? I interpret a 2021 meta-analysis of brain connectivity by Edde and colleagues as evidence that we should not easily dismiss these types of alternative explanations.

A set of biological rules or algorithms govern brain connectivity changes during normal development, maturation, and aging and, forming and shaping the macroscopic architecture of the brain’s wiring network or connectome. The standard model, shown in the Figure below, predicts that as we develop prenatally and during the first few years, local neural connections form first, followed by more global connections. This initial growth occurs in parallel with synaptogenesis, where macroscopic connectome formation and transformation reflects an initial overgrowth and subsequent elimination of cortico-cortical fibers. For most of the middle period of development, we see a plateau in the process and a strengthening of these connections. As we reach old age, the prediction is that things reverse, with global connections losing strength and finally local connections being affected. This inversion of the developmental process during aging accords with the developmental models of neuroanatomy for which the latest matured regions are the first to deteriorate. The graph below illustrates this inverted U-function of brain connectivity during a lifetime.

Mostly, studies of the human connectome support this standard model. The quirk in Edde’s recent analysis is the unexpected observation that it is local networks that begin losing strength in aging, while global networks maintain or even increase. The implication is that we lose focused, specialized functions with aging, but maintain or strengthen global, integrative functions. If we are preparing for death, why would this be taking place?

For a potential explanation, let us turn to a simplified spiritual model of development that closely matches these new observations (see Figure below). Initially, an understanding of our true nature (the spiritual path) provides the insight that ego development, while natural, interferes with knowledge of who we really are. We gain insight that we form highly local and specialized functions early in order to protect our fragile sense of being. These processes strengthen during adolescence and early adulthood (ego development). Time and further insights (e.g., identifying exclusively with this ego) during middle age propel us to embark on a process described as ego-death or at least diminishment. We seek to undo the local and highly functional networks that arose during ego development. The outcome of this effort is a switch in perspective, which many term realization. This basically describes a switch from identification with ego-based processes to a sense of the larger unity of which we are part. Realization can occur at any time in development, but usually after some effort in reducing ego-based thinking. Realization means a major strengthening of the global networks associated with the unity experience. This is more in concert with the proposal that “in the fifth decade of life (that is, after a person turns 40), the brain starts to undergo a radical “rewiring” that results in diverse networks becoming more integrated and connected over the ensuing decades, with accompanying effects on cognition.”

Why do we have diminished memory function as we age? While clinical disorders such as dementia exacerbate this condition, the natural trend in aging is for a reduced capability. Why? Perhaps the materialist models are wrong and what we are seeing, as supported by Edde et al., is a reduction in localized functioning, while strengthening of the global unity functions. For me, this preparation to join this larger unity in death would seem like a better explanation for what is happening in aging. This is in contrast to the idea that “the networking changes likely result from the brain reorganizing itself to function as well as it can with dwindling resources and aging ‘hardware.’”

Human Interconnectedness: Billiard Balls or Gooey Chocolate?

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Most of us are quite aware of how connected we are. This awareness has produced several ways to think about, describe, or view this connectivity. The ideas run the gamut from highly interconnected to loosely so. The extent to which the internet has made us aware of these relationships, with more people and more information from around the world, it has become front of mind. Since how we think about nature structures our reality of it, it seems necessary to reconsider how we might view our connections to others.

Many people view these interactions from the perspective that we are more like billiard balls that inevitably come in contact with other billiard balls as we run around the world doing our thing. It recalls the classic view of the structure of reality at the atomic level. That matter comprises extremely tiny particles called atoms originated about 2500 years ago by Democritus, a Greek philosopher. However, the idea was forgotten for approximately 2000 years. Then, at the beginning of the 19th century, the English chemist John Dalton brought back Democritus’ ancient idea of the atom. Dalton thought atoms were the smallest particles of matter and envisioned them as solid, hard spheres, like billiard balls. Currently, matter as energy, electron clouds, or probability waves have replaced the old billiard ball model of matter.

Yet, the classic notion of matter has affected our conceptualization of human interactions. We view the inevitable result of human billiard balls making contact and colliding as producing change, but namely to redirect or reorient our own trajectory. If the impact is great, it may cause emotions to engage and the interactions can rise to another level. Even at this level, we think that our internal environment remains unchanged, except perhaps for a brief flash of exasperation, anger, or resentment.

As the collisions become greater and more pronounced, we may acknowledge that the changes stay with us for a while, perhaps even a lifetime. The accepted modern paradigm to describe this dynamic is what I characterize as independent arising. Each of us is seen as an independent agent, a billiard ball, exerting control over what we experience. Thus, what we feel and how we respond depends on our own mind, allowing itself to experience and determine our actions. There is a level of autonomy, control, and agency we attribute to our behavior.

This model, however, is incomplete and does not explain all of human behavior. Therefore, it is time to recognize alternative explanations. One of these is that we may be more like balls of gooey chocolate when we encounter and collide with others. When we do, we leave a trace—sometimes messy, sometimes not. Therefore, it isn’t unusual to hear someone say, “I needed a shower after meeting that person.” The psychic residue of our interactions can affect our internal being, our psyche and spirit, and can be difficult to wash off. I characterize this as dependent arising.

A sophisticated description of this idea is the doctrine of dependent arising, which stands at the heart of Buddhist doctrine. It describes the principle of conditionality or the links that arise between experiences. My simple understanding of this doctrine is that these links and our experience of those links arise dependent on every other circumstance we encounter. They arise because we have a body, emotional reactivity, perceive incoming sensory information, conceptualize such information, and develop a conscious awareness of these experiences. Or, to put it in more modern terms, we are born with a body whose function is to create connections and links between experiences, add emotional valence, and reflect on them.

Martin Luther King Jr. captured the point I want to emphasize about our deep interconnectedness in what he expressed about injustice. He said, “We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly.” The concept of interbeing introduced by Thich Nhat Hanh also reflects our deep interconnectedness, where everything relies on everything else in order to manifest. Likewise, biologists describe how our human bodies are shared, rented, and occupied by countless other tiny organisms, without whom we couldn’t “move a muscle, drum a finger, or think a thought.” Indeed, our body is comprised of trillions of bacteria, viruses, and other such organisms. Without them, we wouldn’t be able to operate, think, feel, or speak. In fact, the analogy applies to the entire planet, which can be conceived as one giant breathing entity, with all its working parts connected in symbiosis.

We are not separate entities or exist independently, but are a continuation of one another, as Thich Nhat Hanh has argued. This garment of symbiotic mutuality that we represent gives a different perspective on what it means to be in a relationship with others. It thus calls for a rethinking of how much agency, control, and independence we actually have and to structure our spiritual path accordingly. By spiritual I mean a recognition of the validity and impact of our deep interconnectedness.

A Universe in a Grain of Sand

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Webb’s first deep field image, showing the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 as it was approximately 13 billion years ago. Credit…NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI
Auguries of Innocence
BY WILLIAM BLAKE
To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower 
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand 
And Eternity in an hour.

It is, we are told, a grain-of-sand view,
A heavenly purview,
This fish-bowl image of the universe.
A James Webb telescopic picture of the sky.
Unfolding before us this morning in July.

A myriad galaxies, with myriads of stars.
Far from our own galaxy, Jupiter, and Mars.
So striking in their beauty and mystery.
So incomprehensibly comprehensible
So indispensably dispensable.

It feels godlike to hold infinity in one’s mind,
And glimpse eternity in a single frame.
These may be the auguries of innocence,
As Blake said so long ago,
Brought about by human intent, though.

This unique view of the face of God.
Both mystical and real.
Is at once natural and surreal.
I cannot comprehend the distances shown,
Nor guess the mysteries of this unknown.

I cannot fathom something so sublime,
Nor understand the compressed time.
I cannot grasp the science at its source,
Nor know the future course.
I see excitement and giddiness
In those who brought it into being.
As they grasp the future they’re foreseeing.

It’s a doorway to a playground
Of future possibilities,
Of unlimited capabilities and imagination,
Of contact with other civilizations.
A fresh dawning for the human mind,
Offering a new path for humankind.

The Pale Blue Dot

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By Carl Sagan

Consider again that dot. 
That's here. That's home. That's us. 
On it everyone you love, 
Everyone you know, 
Everyone you ever heard of, 
Every human being who ever was, 
Lived out their lives. 
The aggregate of our joy and suffering, 
Thousands of confident religions, 
Ideologies, and economic doctrines, 
Every hunter and forager, 
Every hero and coward, 
Every creator and destroyer of civilization, 
Every king and peasant, 
Every young couple in love, 
Every mother and father, 
Hopeful child, inventor and explorer, 
Every teacher of morals, 
Every corrupt politician, 
Every 'superstar', 
Every 'supreme leader', 
Every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – 
On a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

Sagan’s beautiful statement was occasioned by seeing the photograph of the earth in space as a pale blue dot. I read it recently and affected me as only beautiful poetry can. It also reminded me of what Harold Ramis, American actor, comedian, director, and writer, said about carrying two notes to remind you of who you are. The first note reads, “The universe was created for my delight.” The second note says, “I am a meaningless speck of dust in the vastness of the universe.”

Ramis’s point was that life occurs in the rhythmic oscillation between these opposite poles, of meaningfulness and meaninglessness. The rhythmic oscillation of this dance occurs outside and within your conscious awareness, but in either case, you are a participant.

Nisargadatta Maharaj, an Indian guru, offered a similar sentiment when he said, “Between looking inside and recognizing that I am nothing and seeing outside and recognizing that I am everything–my life turns.”

You, me, the earth and everyone else born in this speck of dust are both nothing and everything.  

Jumpstarting the Mind to “Wake Up”

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This essay discusses jumpstarting the mind to wake up psychologically and spiritually. I extracted parts from my upcoming book, Transforming Anxiety Into Creativity.

Many scholars who study the mind describe individuals as having an original sense of wholeness, or self. As a child, this sense of self is active, adaptable, energetic, curious, and creative. It is unencumbered by problems, with an attitude of openness, eagerness, and lack of preconceptions. Along the way, we develop an ego, and living a joyful, stress-free, and fear-free life turns problematic. We experience worries, anxieties, uninhibited thoughts, fears, overwhelming feelings, and seeing no way out of difficult circumstances. When these negative experiences persist and affect our mood, thinking, and behavior, they disrupt the normal flow, joy, and unity of life and obscure its natural wonder. When the interruptions and disruptions become unmanageable, they are the basis for physical and mental disorders, autoimmune and emotional disturbances, heart problems, addictive behaviors, and suicidal ideation. Even worse, if negative ideations become a recurring issue, the inevitable consequence is psychopathology.

What is the source of this problem? The major reason seems to be that out of the original unity to which we are born, a separate ego crystallizes during development. Individuation or ego-self differentiation is a normal aspect of development, but the schism between what is real and what is not creates problems when not understood. Ego creates an illusion of separation, as it emerges from the normal push-pull dynamics of resisting and accepting what life presents. Many justified reasons, including our initial dependency and the potential harm negative experiences have on an immature mind, make our tendency to resist life more prevalent than our acceptance of it. Over time, resistance becomes stronger, reified, and real to the point we identify it as our true self and as our exclusive response to life.

Numerous solutions to the ego-self differentiation problem have been put forth from behavioral, psychological, and spiritual perspectives. The most enduring solutions are those that help us understand the source of the conflict and, from that point of view, its solution. In my book, Transforming Anxiety into Creativity, I recognize and understand the problem by combining a neuroscience background with a personal understanding of the mind based on knowledge and experience with Zen Buddhism. The solutions I present are easy to understand and available. Yet, they are difficult to put into action, as they call for a genuine change in perception and awareness.

What is the principal message? That awakening and self-realization are psychological and spiritual solutions to ego-self differentiation. From a spiritual viewpoint, awakening or “waking up” refers to understanding one’s true nature, the unity of life, and our role in this greater sense of connection. It means you wake up from the illusion, the dream-like experience in which you feel separated from life, to the recognition that you are and always have been integrated with it. This recognition of unity is a remembrance, a going back to what you once knew.

Far too few people recognize the source of their mental suffering and the ability they have to do something about it. As Henry David Thoreau put it, “The mass of men leads lives of quiet desperation.” Likewise, many descriptions of the spiritual awakening experience are too confusing to be helpful. These descriptions, however, boil down to the notion that one must first recognize “that belief in my thoughts is not in any way definitive of my true inner self.” This simple yet powerful insight starts the process of de-identification with the egoic mind.

When de-identification takes hold and you can honestly say, “I don’t believe that thought,” it is like the sudden giving way to the bottom of a pail of water. The filters through which the world is experienced are metaphorically cleared and cleansed. Your ego or “I” momentarily disappears in a rush of awareness, liberated from identification with resistance to life. The expansive consciousness, obscured by the limited ego, is suddenly liberated and appreciated. You become conscious of being conscious and encounter unlimited awareness. The experience brings a sense of freshness to the wonder of sense perception and of who you are.

This awakening experience is a process, one that can be gradual (including multiple small awakenings) or fast(er). Neither fast nor slow is better or worse, they only differ in the timing of the changes experienced. Our culture makes us skeptical of fast means since they bring to mind miracle-like processes, with not enough time to understand them. Thus, there is more discussion and focus on slow means. Like seeing a therapist, we recognize it may take a dozen or more years to resolve the issues. Slow solutions, like mindfulness meditation, spiritual study, ethics, and prayer, seem rational, are more likely to lead to a positive outcome, provide longer lasting solutions, require less effort, etc. In reality, our deceptive egoic mind creates these “explanations.” De-identification with thoughts means its own disappearance and so it wisely favors a slower demise. Yet, with one immediate change in perspective, which we are all capable of doing, we can jumpstart the mind to wake up.

Traditions like Yoga, Vedanta and Buddhism agree that the end goal of awakening, or enlightenment, is already here and now, that it is our true nature — or the true nature of reality. Thus, not that we have to achieve or become it, we simply need to remove the obstacles (the egoic mind) to realize its expression. Thus, knowing that you once held this treasure differs from never having had possession of it. So, above all else, the path to awakening requires the conviction that what you aspire to is real, since you once had it. While you may no longer identify with such a mind, you have not lost it, and it is possible to recover. This journey to waking up is a voyage of rediscovery.

The two broad approaches to removing the obstacle of the egoic mind are to either emphasize the need to transform and purify the mind (or even transcend it altogether). This is the gradual approach carried out through practices such as meditation, spiritual study, ethics, devotion, etc. Or, the fast(er) approach, which emphasizes the “already present” aspect of enlightenment. This focuses the teachings more around inquiring into your true nature and simply living in the present with non-attachment.

Living in the present with non-attachment provides an immediate doorway for a return to the extraordinary mind you once had, the one associated with a joyful and creative life. This is not a novel idea, but there are now science-based explanations for why such a switch works. Bringing attention to the immediacy of the moment changes the focus of attention from the mind’s ruminations of the past and future to the awareness of present circumstances and holding such thoughts in awareness. Nonattachment means not getting emotionally involved with the thoughts, but observing each mental dustup that arises without judgment. This is the most important action to implement. When done correctly, living in the present with non-attachment stops anxious, unmanageable thoughts in their tracks. The effect is immediate and, with practice, long-lasting.

That turning point, a longer-lasting experience of the present moment, marks the awakening experience and a recognition of the original unity you once had. It is a rebirth in which you find yourself childlike, but with greater appreciation. The opportunity for true living opens up—an ability to see things as they really are, without resisting them, and a genuine enjoyment of life.

If you have questions, direct them to: jpineda@ucsd.edu.  

A Neuroscientist’s Spiritual Journey: The Podcast

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My passion at this point in life is to share my professional and spiritual insights with others. This podcast is one such attempt. Here is where you can find it:

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmga5Z4JdHziQjtCdnVhYuw/videos

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-middle-way-with-dr-matthew-goodman/id1566423470

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/24QlEy5FOCTSQTWjsoOCRZ

In my creative endeavors, I try to explore how true seeing, hearing, feeling, and thinking can quiet the overactive mind and how this allows silence to become the fountain of creative thought. From such silence, I’ve experienced the emergence of a new perception and awareness. This awareness of unity is infused with intrinsic joy, love, and empathy towards others, and filled with a deep and uncompromising dedication to what is true and real.

Professionally, I am Professor Emeritus of Cognitive Science, Neuroscience, and Psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego. Having joined the Department of Cognitive Science at UCSD as a founding faculty member in 1989, I remained for the rest of my 28-year academic career. My hope is that my work impacted and inspired generations of undergraduate and graduate students to take on hard questions in the neurobiology of the human mind. 

I have authored many widely cited papers in animal and human cognitive and systems neuroscience and edited one academic book (Mirror Neuron Systems: The Role of Mirroring Processes in Social Cognition). This book is a collection of research on the functional significance of mirror neurons, which includes my work on autism. It is one of the most cited and downloaded books in the field.

For the last twenty years, I became interested in spiritual matters as a bridge to a fuller understanding of the mind. This led me to explore Zen Buddhism, train with a master teacher, and develop my creative side. This led to the publication of two books of poetry (Quieting of a Mind and Dawning of a New Mind) focusing on mind-brain relationships with an emphasis on spirituality, mysticism, environmentalism, and social activism. Most recently, I published the story of my journey and the bridging of science and spirituality (Piercing the Cloud: Encountering the Real Me).

Unblemished Grace

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A Prayer for Ukraine

Whether in war or in the streets,
Whether alone or in a group,
Whether deliberate or not,
My aching heart reflects
On what it takes
To end a human life.

What cruelty, anger, and lack?
What unattended, frozen heart?
What distorted, twisted mind?
What unexpected fate?
Conspire to end a life which God’s
Wondrous goodness has wrought.

I see the twisted hands
Bound behind the back.
The naked bodies strewn
Among the ruble of disdain.
Blood everywhere,
Defiling our human soul.

The mother-child in mid flight,
Gunned down by a fellow being.
Thrown into the open grave pit,
Replete with hands and feet
Stretching out in silence
Toward our wounded heart.

My tears fill with anger and rage.
Despair blooms and I must act.
Yet, a helpless sense overwhelms
My feeble thoughts of change.
I stand paralyzed, unable to move,
And can only surrender to the pain.

I know the love my heart holds.
A delicate, precious, beautiful flame
That is extinguished when ignored,
Yet grows into a roaring fire
Of love, compassion, and goodwill
When attended and desired.

I know the world from this radiance,
And act in service of the grace it gives.
Thus, despite the brutality I see,
I find it worthwhile to remember
That the grace of goodness lives
Even in those whose evil is unleashed.

They act this way only because
In ways large and small,
They, their families, and their world failed
To nurture that fragile flame,
That unblemished grace of goodness
That gifted them with life.

I lift my voice in silent prayer
for such waste and wretchedness,
And offer my wounded heart
To the valiant souls in its wake.
May they experience life from its radiance,
And act in service of its grace.