Ashes and Snow: Finding our Song

I’ve been meditating on the mystical and beautiful images on the Ashes and Snow web site. They remind me of a novel I spent 13 years writing, Pio and Lilly. It is the story of a young woman raised from birth with the animals, and a Franciscan Monk who finds her and falls in love with her innocence, wildness and beauty. Within these astonishing Ashes and Snow images as well as in the Pio and Lilly story, what strikes me is the harmonic resonance that occurs in a more wide awake state of being, when one wakes up to the Divine dimensions of life governed by harmonic sound, by the original voice that brings one into the Light of the original face——both our own and God’s. This dimension is real, more real than real. Those who touch it know they have been kissed awake by a Great Love that is the primal source of existence.

This is God beyond all concepts of God, beyond all “ownership” by religions, beyond all traditions and cultures. This is the primal harmony that makes galaxies revolve. I believe it is this awareness of a sacredness, wonder and unity inherent in the structure of reality that alone can lead us forward into a new era of peace where wisdom and Love at last rule the heart of mankind.

But how can we come to this beautiful awareness on a widespread level? Is it through faith, prayer and meditation, art, social activism, science or church? That is the question we each must wrestle with for each of us must find an answer deeply relevant to our own soul. I believe this individual questioning has far more value to our growth than someone offering their opinion of the answer to us on a platter. As it says on the Ashes and Snow web site, “A whale sings not because it has answers but because it has a song.” Perhaps it is as each of us embraces our responsibility to find answers to the most important issues that lie before us that we will end up finding that song which is itself the answer: a song of Love given by the great God of Life to enlighten us and inspire others. And perhaps singing with awe and gratitude from our heart in harmony with the universal harmony is much more important than any answer we could ever articulate with our wondrous yet limited minds.