Looking For Miracles in All the Wrong Places
I was thinking about stories I've read over the years that have to do with people seeing the face of Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary in inanimate objects. I remember one story involved a man seeing the face of Christ in a half-eaten, four-day-old bean burrito he left on the window sill.
Another story I recall had to do with a woman who claimed to see the Virgin Mary on a tree where sap dripped down the bark and created the impression of a face. There have been many stories like these over the years.
An impressive part of each story for me was the reactions of other people hearing the news. Many, after hearing of such a sighting, flocked in large numbers to see for themselves the miraculous and divine images.
To me, the gathering of large numbers of people to view the semblance of a face on a window pane or a bulging burrito speaks to a great sense of powerlessness. Feeling so small un curso de milagros helpless in a world of chaos, competition and aggression, we seek the miraculous, desperately hoping that it will bless us in some way and ease our suffering.
It occurs to me that perhaps there's a better way to go about this. Perhaps, instead of looking for the face of Jesus Christ or the Virgin Mary in inanimate objects, we should be looking for the face of Jesus Christ or the Virgin Mary in the face of every person who crosses our path.
If we were able to do this, perhaps we'd be less likely to be judgmental, resentful and angry towards others, in which case our lives might work more effectively.
In addition to attempting to see God in the face of everyone we meet, it might also help us to recognize the presence of God in everything we look upon, not just the faces of people or inanimate objects deformed by nature.
If we were able to recognize the presence of God in everything all around us – in animals, plants, insects, and objects – perhaps we'd treat them all with greater honor and respect, which would also likely lead to a life of greater harmony and balance.
Perhaps the miracle lies not in seeking God in odd and eccentric ways, but rather in seeking God in every moment and molecule all around us.