One night, as I kneeled beside my bed and prayed, I gazed through my window at the starry night. I thought of how God was THROUGH, and yet BEYOND, all space. Suddenly, I had the sensation of being surrounded by a musical harmony like a great anthem, only inaudible to the human ear. Then I just seemed to evaporate until I too was THROUGH and BEYOND the stars.
I was completely filling space, and the musical harmony was completely filling me. I did not see the proverbial Light, I experienced it. I did not hear the anthem, I was it... I understood that everything was part of God, everything in the universe was one.
~ Janice in "Re-Visioning Childhood Experience" by Edward Hoffman
Drop down, ye heavens, from above,
O sky distill your balmy showers,
For now is risen the star of love
From the rose Mary, flower of flowers:
The clear Sun whom no cloud obscures,
Surmounting daylight undefiled,
Has come down from Heavenly towers
And unto us is born a child.
~ from "Nativity" by Wm. Dunbar (1500) modern version by Wendell Berry
