Blog 2709 – 03.30.2023

Beautiful

Beauty, they say, is in the eye of the beholder. I believe that if we train our eyes to look deeply we will always see the beauty in ourselves and in others. Like love, beauty is all around us but we are more likely to see it more clearly when we have first learned to see it in ourselves.

The Ugly Duckling is the classic tale of a little duckling that did not fit the standard appearance of a little duck and so was thought to be ugly. Later the odd little duck grew up and was transformed into a beautiful swan.

The often poetic Paul once wrote:

That dark glass is a poetic way of saying a mirror. Someone who reads my blog commented on a remark that I have made more than once that I spent the middle of my life thus far as an atheist. She said she has a friend who is an agnostic and that she hopes he learns better before he dies. The atheist says “There is no God.” The believer says, “There is one true God, mine.” The agnostic says, “I’m not saying there is a God or not. I just don’t know.”

One of the latest additions to my daily mantra, my spoken intention, my prayer as it were, is the following:

“I go within, I mirror you, I admire you, I worship you.”

I was taught as a child to believe as a Christian. In the middle of my life I rejected those beliefs and for many years rejected the very idea of God. Some ten or so years ago I came back to a belief in the Divine, but not the small and angry God of the Bible but rather the God I call The Universe, the God who is to quote the Bible, “All in all”, the He/She/We God who is everywhere, in everyone, and in everything.

That poetic Paul who had his very narrow idea of God broadened on the road to Damascus in another place wrote, “I am become all things to all men that I might by any means save some.” I once believe it was my job to persuade or save people. I really believed that I was called to preach.

Saturday Night Live character Father Guido Sarducci once made a Public Service Announcement regarding employment in which he said a job even better that being a priest or a minister is getting to be an artist because they get to sleep till noon. I used to joke that the best job would be getting to be a test pilot at a mattress factory on the third shift. Jokes aside, I believe the best job and highest calling for any of God’s children is to be an artist, like their father beholding and mirroring beauty. What do you think, Beautiful? That is a rhetorical question and just an excuse to call ‘em the way I see ‘em. You do have your mother’s eyes, Beautiful.

Your friend and fellow traveler,

David White

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1QvtU4EePnAZlZDDVjdgFgZJ8fR_uOKBF/view?usp=drivesdk

Ugly Duckling

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1odEewEZo1bpoztoKQQ2_se6-BPGQyVAM/view?usp=drivesdk

You’re Beautiful