The smoke ring above is called “Hoag’s Object.” Click it to be taken to Wired Magazine’s wonderful page of pictures from space. It is actually a galaxy!

As I am currently on sabbatical (ten weeks only [sniff!]), I have obviously been ranging far afield in my reading, although veteran Gentle Readers know I love to post such pictures from time to time. I continue my adventure in the Bible Challenge, however.

What I have been doing is trying to learn how to use Logic Pro to compose music (like Photoshop for music), as well as attempt to revive my ancient technique to be able to play Charles Tournemire’s Deux Fresques Symphoniques Sacrées one more time. These are the unjustly-neglected French genius’ last works, published posthumously, and he pushes his language to an extreme, music that seems to flow like a dream — like life itself, “a dream that is a little more coherent than most.” (Pascal) Listen to a performance of the second Fresque here.

I think the point of a sabbatical is either to learn how to do something completely new, like learning how to fly an airplane, to reviving old competences. I have three degrees in music, but it became clear I was not called to a life as a church musician or composer. That change brought upon serious grieving for a while.

But that was in the 80s. Earlier, in the 70s, I had to give up on physics. And for the same reason as music later on — it didn’t fill the hole in my soul. I have never lost interest in either, however... Check out this article for instance.

But I strongly believe that the Holy Spirit will use every experience in our lives for the purposes of God’s mission in the world, nay, in the Universe. I wonder what life will be like when I resume my work as Bishop. (Truth be told, it doesn’t leave me alone, but I am not going into the office, nor traveling like a outside saleman for corporate jets, for now.)

So, Gentle Reader, let me commend to you some reflection on your life, and that you then offer to God all of it, including the sin, as fodder for your role in God’s mission. Trust me, it will all get used, and it will be immeasurably enhanced as well, as time goes on and God shapes you into the creature you are meant to be: “O brave new Creation, that has such creatures in it” — like you.