When you are filled with wonder at God's beauty, not only in nature, but in the amazing structure of your own body and mind, you are filled with gratitude. Thankfulness becomes an integral part of your daily living -- for the restoring benefit of sleep; for the dawning of yet another day; for the guidance you have received, and the opportunities of serving others, and for the strength to do this. Even if you are limited in your environment and your physical ability, you can still marvel. For you can enter your inner world, with its thoughts and memories, and reach out in prayer just where you are... To live without wonder is to wonder what living is all about.
Taking on the mystery is yielding to grace, letting go of all analyses, explanations, ideologies, self-images, images of God, agendas, and expectations. Taking on the mystery is undergoing the finitude of years, hallowing diminishments, and living into the solitude of our own integrity. Taking on the mystery is undergoing the pain of learning that there re no empires favored by the Holy One ... the grief of understanding that there are not theologies favored by the Holy One. Taking on the mystery is acknowledging that we cannot name the mystery, though we try, we cannot claim the mystery, though we do. The mystery names and claims us ...