Can we reach God?

Ave Maria! In anticipation of his visit to Germany, his homeland, this Thursday through Sunday, Pope Benedict XVI recorded a message for German public television. The Holy Father concludes his message,which can be viewed here, with these words:

"Perhaps you will ask me: 'But does God exist? And if he exists, does he care about us? Can we reach him?' It is true of course that we cannot put God on the table, we cannot touch him like a utensil or take him in hand like any object. We must again develop the capacity to perceive God, a capacity that exists in us. We can intuit something of God's grandeur in the grandeur of the cosmos. We can use the world through technology because it is made in a rational manner. In the great rationality of the world we can intuit the creator spirit from which it comes, and in the beauty of creation we can intuit something of the beauty, of the grandeur and also the goodness of God. In the Word of sacred Scriptures we can hear the words of eternal life that do not come merely from men, but that come from him, and in them we hear his voice. And, finally, we glimpse God too in encounters with persons who are touched by him. I am not thinking only of the great ones: from Paul to Francis of Assisi to Mother Teresa; but I am thinking of the many simple people of whom no one speaks. And yet, when we meet them, there emanates something of goodness, sincerity, joy, and we know that God is there and that he touches us too. So, in these days we want to try to return to seeing God, to return to being persons through whom the light of hope might enter the world, a light that comes from God and helps us to live."

Yes, we can reach God!  Nature has always been a very special and particular place where I can stretch out my hand and almost touch His face.  This runs in my family.  It's in my blood and in my sister's as well -- it's part of our being "Dick Mansfield's girls."  I continue to be astonished by the fact that, as Gerard Manley Hopkins so powerfully penned, "The world is charged with the grandeur of God."  With Joseph Mary Plunkett, I too "see His blood upon the rose" and hear His voice in "the thunder and singing of the birds."  For me as for Ralph Waldo Emerson, "beauty is God's handwriting--a wayside sacrament."  Edna St. Vincent Millay's poem "Renascence" resounds within my own heart, and her glorious exultation is my frequent song: ""God, I can push the grass apart and lay my finger on thy heart"! 

And now, a word from the other Mansfield girl, my big sister Ann L. Krumrein.  No, a thousand words and even more.  Whoever said that one picture is worth a thousand words must have had foreknowledge of Annie's many wonderful gifts and talents.  After crouching in a field for over an hour, "waiting for this moment," she captured this magnificent full Harvest Moon, aka Barley Moon or Corn Moon. 


Full Harvest Moon by Ann L. Krumrein

Thank you, Annie, for sharing your Harvest Moon with us! Thank you, Holy Father, for reminding us that we can intuit the beauty, grandeur and goodness of God in nature.  Most of all, thank you, dear God, for giving us such a beautiful world!  Amen!  Alleluia!