Morning Star this Winter (and the blood red moon!)

Venus appears outside my window these clear winter mornings.  These photos are on different days at approximately 6:00 to 6:30 AM

This first image from Dec 5, 2018 includes a sliver of the moon  off to the east at the position of 7 o'clock with Venus, so to speak, at the center of a clock face

Later in early January, the sixth,  now Jupiter joins Venus, Jupiter here the slight dot at the position of 7 o'clock with Venus at the center of the clock face.

Earlier in the dawn of January 22 Jupiter's position changes to 5 o'clock on the clock face;   Jupiter now rises earlier than before and appears to be outracing Venus across our sky.

And finally you can see it on the morning of February 6.   Jupiter shows itself at 3 o'clock on the clock face:

 I don't think these pictures would have helped Kepler discover the laws of planetary motion.  On the other hand these relative positions in the sky of these two planets certainly caused the ancients to wonder about their power over human events.

And Finally: the sky wonder of the month, the blood red of the full eclipse of the Moon on January 20.     My phone foto makes it look like a tennis ball suspended in space and glowing softly red.   But this is how it looked overhead here at Wernersville at about 11:45 PM.   See some more exciting pictures on the Internet!

MIchael Atiyah, Reknown Mathematician

Michael Atiyah  (1929-2019),  Reknown Mathematician

Having floundered in my own studies of physics when I came upon the mysteries of differential equations, I enjoyed reading the obituary of this famous mathematician.   He is said to have “heavily influenced the whole contemporary development of how math and physics have interacted.”  

I found intriguing the final paragraphs of the New York Times obituary (1/12/2019):

“In 2013 he told an online interviewer: ‘I believe in new ideas, in progress.  It’s faith.  I’ve recently been thinking about faith.  If you’re a religious person, which I’m not, you believe God created the universe.   That’s why it works…  Scientists, outside of religion, have their own faith.  They believe the universe is rational.  They’re trying to find the laws of nature.  But why are there laws?   That’s the article of faith for scientists.  It’s not rational.  It’s useful.  It’s practical.  There is evidence in its favor: the sun does rise every day.  But nevertheless, at the end of the day, it’s an article of faith.’”

In “Athens Dialogues, E Journal”  Atiyah wrote about his faith in the universe as rational in an essay “The Spirit of Mathematics.”  The essay helps us fill in the online interview:

“What we can say is that scientists of all types believe in the existence and reality of such laws (of nature). They believe that the natural world is indeed built on coherent principles, and that it is the task of the scientist to discover these laws. In the end we scientists believe in a rational world as an article of faith. For some it is evidence of divine creation. For others it remains a mystery, but such faith appears to have been justified. The success of science is difficult to deny, though one may continue to speculate on the ‘ultimate reality.’”

Atiyah doesn’t comment here on some of the laws of the mysteries of human love that also are useful and practical.   But his concern in this essay for the ethical uses of scientific understanding surely opened a window in this direction.  It is my hope that such windows are now open for Michael to the source of these mysteries.

2018 another tough year for our Church.

2018: one of the difficult years for us 

Catholic Priests and our Church.

For us priests and church leaders the celebration of Christmas and the New Year this year is greatly muted.   We are embarrassed and ashamed by how our clerical culture allowed some of our own brothers grievously to wound so many of our children and youth.   

No matter the number of offenders from among our ranks, all of us priests, or at least some of us bear some of the blame.   We did not take good care of some brothers among us.    Clearly as a simple example, we should have dealt more resolutely with those with drinking problems.   But more to the point if we knew thirty and forty years ago what we know now we would have questioned certain other social behavior in which our brother priests engaged.    For example, we observed priests spending an unusual amount of time with minors.    Such behavior then seemed to us who observed it to be if not a kindness at least innocent. We should have known better.   Such behavior was clearly unsuitable for men who would have been blessed to find their social health among their brothers.

DAWN  2019

"I bring all this to our attention in this season of hope in a new year because I want you to know that we in my religious order are taking steps to restore our community’s health: first of all a commitment to total transparency;  in addition, over the past ten or fifteen years we are taking much more seriously our day to day care of one another.  We meet frequently to discuss the standards we set for ourselves.

"I believe we know now what to do.   We ask God’s help in carrying it out.  We practice, too, the Marian devotions that can sustain us.   We priests are sustained, too, by witnessing especially in this season the devoted love of so many in our congregations for their family members, and for others, the sick and the poor.   We priests need to grow in this way, too.

"God will stand by all of us.   The darkness in the Church dims our spirits.  And the darkness will trouble us for years to come.   But may the celebration of Joseph, Mary and their Child open our hearts to new ways of finding God’s love."