Love giving itself, losing itself and finding itself in love, and Love returning to itself, giving itself back in love — this is the eternal pattern of the universe. The nucleus throws out its protons and electrons and they circle round it, held by the attraction of Love. Beyond the molecules and atoms, beyond the protons and electrons, there is an energy, a force of life, continually welling up from the abyss of being in god, continually springing up into the light of the Word, continually flowing back to it source in the bliss of love.
The function of faith is not to reduce mystery to rational clarity, but to integrate the unknown and the known together in a living whole, in which we are more and more able to transcend the limitations of our external self.
~ from NEW SEEDS OF CONTEMPLATION by Thomas Merton
