John O’Donohue, the Irish poet, theologian, philosopher, insisted on beauty as a human calling. Celtic spirituality weaves the beauty of the created order with the quotidian patterns of human frailty. This beauty and frailty, O’Donohue notes, have surrounded us since long before we developed the language in which to witness them, even before there was a “we” to do the witnessing – they are the very fabric of the universe, the eternal backdrop to the cosmic blink of human life. Here is a quote from his book Beauty: The Invisible Embrace:
We live between the act of awakening and the act of surrender. Each morning we awaken to the light and the invitation to a new day in the world of time; each night we surrender to the dark to be taken to play in the world of dreams where time is no more. At birth we were awakened and emerged to become visible in the world. At death we will surrender again to the dark to become invisible. Awakening and surrender: they frame each day and each life; between them the journey where anything can happen, the beauty and the frailty.