Seeing signs, hope amid tears

Bill Knight column for Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday, Sept. 25, 26 or 27

Watching baseball, I wonder whether players who point to the sky after hitting home runs or striking out opponents to end innings are tempted – after whiffing with the bases loaded or giving up a game-winning hit – to stare up and shake a fist at God.

That seems especially relevant when there are wildfires, hurricanes and earthquakes, plus U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, fighting in Syria and ethnic cleansing in Burma, and threats by President Trump and “Supreme Leader” Kim to push the planet toward nuclear confrontation.

Daily readings on Sept. 6 included some of Psalm 52, which provoked thoughts of woe and worry, and – oddly –  calm and comfort.

“Why boast thou thyself in mischief, O mighty man? The goodness of God endures. The tongue devises mischiefs; like a sharp razor, working deceitfully. Thou loves evil more than good; and lying rather than to speak righteousness. Thou loves all devouring words, O thou deceitful tongue…

“The righteous also shall see, and fear, and shall laugh at him: Lo, this is the man that made not God his strength; but trusted in the abundance of his riches, and strengthened himself in his wickedness,” the Psalmist added. “I put my trust in the grace of God.”

Days later, after leaving a family campout in Oregon’s Columbia Gorge, a fast-moving fire there devastated the area, scorching more than 50 square miles of waterfalls, trails and timber east of Portland, and it was tempting to cry out, “Really, Lord?”

Woe seems everywhere, but bad things can be as inexplicable as the mystery of the Universe, of existence itself. So it can be a conscious choice to decide to count blessings and be accountable, whether it’s humanity’s effects on climate change or the weaknesses and sins we all can exhibit.

Plus, there are “signs” that can bolster our faith. While not secret “codes,” such fascinating patterns at least seem like greetings, heavenly reminders that people can show love – not unlike the Old Testament says that rainbows are symbols of God’s post-Flood covenant.

“Hang in there,” they whisper.

Three other phenomena come to mind.

* The “Golden Ratio,” sometimes called “the Divine Mean,” is a geometric proportion shown as a rectangle with a length about one and a half times its width, seen as a shape pleasing to see. Shown not only in math by Euclid, art by Salvador Dali and music by Claude Debussy, but in shapes of river deltas and architecture, the arrangement of leaves and the atomic structure and more mundane examples such as playing cards and light switchplates, distinctive hammers and the Easton Zapper III softball bat, it’s been appreciated by the likes of astronomer Johannes Kepler and Italian mathematician Leonardo of Piso

* That Leonardo, known as Fibonacci, also defined the “Fibonacci sequence,” which starts with two 1's, with each following numeral determined by adding together the previous two – 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, etc. It shows up throughout Nature, in the lineage of honeybees and sprouts of pineapples, plus in Indian math and computer algorithms, and in literature, movies and other popular culture. In fact, artist and inventor John Edmark created some stunning sculptures using the Fibonacci sequence to show that what you see isn’t always what’s really there. In the San Francisco Globe a couple of years ago http://sfglobe.com/2015/01/14/3d-printed-sculptures-look-alive-when-spun-under-a-strobe-light/, Edmark said his blend of art and math helps “amplify our awareness of the sometimes tenuous relationship between facts and perception”

* That week earlier this month, as wildfires decimated the West, the solar eclipse offered another example of celestial encouragement. As astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson, an agnostic, wrote, “Earth’s Moon is about 1/400^th the diameter of the Sun, but it is also 1/400^th as far from us, making the Sun and Moon the same size in the sky – a coincidence not shared by any other planet-moon combination in the solar system, allowing for uniquely photogenic total solar eclipses.”

So forget fist-shaking. Trust and faith may be strengthened for us to resist despair and fear.

Try to smile through tears, if  not laugh.