Q U I C K S C A N

What’s So Important About a Moment?
Time and Space in Our Universe
A Moment’s True Significance

Readers reflect on Friar Jack’s musings

by Friar Jim Van Vurst, O.F.M.

What’s So Important About a Moment?

As you begin to read this month’s column, let me ask you a question. Why are you reading it? Oh, I’m happy you are reading of course, but why? Well, some time ago, you were on our Web site and clicked your mouse to sign up for Friar Jack’s E-spirations. And just now, you clicked to get this month’s column. But if you take this present moment and begin to trace it back further in time, you will almost certainly find yourself running out of gas, so to speak. Your journey backwards in time becomes too complicated for your mind to handle. There are simply too many factors or preceding moments to comprehend. This moment is a result of an almost infinite number of preceding moments in your life. To complicate things even more, those moments in time have been influenced by the unknown numbers of people, like myself, who are dealing with their own moments in time, deciding to write on this topic.

When you think about a moment in time—oops, this one is gone already—maybe the best image we can give is that it’s like the blink of an eye, even less than a second in time. You can wonder, What’s so important about a single moment? The answer: Much more than we imagine.

Time and Space in Our Universe

One of the most mind-boggling aspects of God’s universe is its size and the speeds involved in describing it. It puts the idea of a moment in true perspective. The easiest place to start is with the speed of light. We know that light travels at 286,000 miles per second. But we don’t measure space in seconds but years, called light years. Figuring out the speed of light per minute, per hour and per day, we discover that light travels 5.88 trillion miles per year. That figure would be written out as 5,880,000,000,000. It might be easier to think of it as 5.88 million million miles per year. In any case, it seems to make a moment insignificant.

We know how fast light travels in a year, but that is just a beginning. What kind of time and distances are we talking about as we look through the Hubble telescope at God’s handiwork? Take our average-sized galaxy, the Milky Way. Astronomers tell us it is 1,000 light years thick and 100,000 light years in diameter. Our whole solar system occupies a very small space in our galaxy, and, in fact, our sun is just an average-size star. Given the speed of light in one year, this means that the Milky Way is a million billion miles thick and a trillion million miles in diameter. Ever wonder how many stars are in our galaxy? Between 200 and 500 billion. But then how many galaxies are there in the universe? Anywhere from 80 to 120 billion galaxies that we can see! Well then, what’s the point of a moment?

A Moment’s True Significance

We’ve all heard the phrase, “great moments in history.” Well, let me name a few. Mary spoke a single word, “Fiat” (Yes) when the archangel Gabriel asked her to become the mother of the Messiah. In the blink of an eye, the Word of God became flesh and started in earnest the whole story of salvation revealed in the New Testament. In the Garden of Olives, Jesus’ said “Yes” to his father and accepted being rejected by his own people, which in turn would lead to Jesus’ suffering and death on Calvary. There he said, “It is finished,” and died. In that moment, the whole race was redeemed.

But moments are also magnificent in our own lives, so much so that they reduce this whole universe to practically nothing. And why? God made us in his own image and likeness. We have God’s life within us. We are alive; the universe is not. It moves because of physical principles. For all of its size and speed, it is nothing by comparison.

You and I can do the things God does. The universe cannot. We can say to our creator, “Lord, I worship you.” I can say to another human being, “I love you.” And would you believe, we can say to another the very words God so often says to us: “I forgive you.”  That is more powerful than raising the dead or walking on water.

And so, as we remember again the coming of Jesus at Christmas, we may be able to reflect on some of the most important moments in our lives. The universe may be much bigger than we. But it is nothing compared to power a single act of love or forgiveness of our brother or sister. And that is what Jesus told us to do.

A blessed Christmas to you all.

Friar Jack’s Inbox

Friar Jim and I want to wish you a Merry Christmas and thank you for your support. Please be assured that you will be in our prayers during the Advent and Christmas seasons. Friar Jack

Send your feedback to friarjack@americancatholic.org

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