Armodoxy for Today: From Dot to World

In keeping with the themes we’ve been discussing this past week, today I’d like to share with you a message from astronomer and planetary scientist, the late Carl Segan, with an epilogue by Jesus Christ.

In 1990, the spacecraft Voyager 1, after spending 13 years exploring parts of our Solar System had reached the edge of our planetary neighborhood. Before departing, it turned around one last time toward planet Earth. It was over 4 billion miles away from home when it snapped a picture and radioed it back to us. If you looked extremely close at the image, and only after it was pointed out to you and you took a second, third and fourth glance at it the you might see a pale blue dot against rays of scattered light caused by the Sun. That image, is planet Earth

In 1994 Carl Segan wrote the book.  “Pale Blue Dot.” In it he reminds us that that dot is home. Everyone we have known, loved or hated, every historical figure, from pauper to king, every barbarian and their warriors as well as every ethical teacher and their disciples, who has ever been studied, have all existed on that pale blue dot.

He goes on to warn humanity of the fragility of life, and the importance of honoring and respecting what we have with one another and our environment on that pale blue dot.

Take a look at Segan’s book and his observation of that tiny dot in the universe that we call Earth. You find a prominent scientist, futurist, and thinker talking about the ethics of being human. You see, the scientist and the priest are not too far off each other. They, both begin and end their days with dreams.

Armodoxy points to the universality of the message love, faith and hope. You don’t have to scrape the edges of the Universe to find this truth, it is in each of our hearts. The challenge is to implement the what exists there, and recognize that that pale blue dot is home.

In the Gospel of Matthew we read, an expert in the law, tested Jesus with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22)