And they were sore afraid

Composted star guts learning the taste of joy

The Angel Appearing to the Shepherds by Rembrandt

Often, when I hear the Christmas story, it rings of comfort: a baby, wrapped in swaddling cloth, the savior of the world.

But right now, for me, the part of the Christmas story that resonates most isn’t a mother’s arms, or singing shepherds or even the smelly stable. No, right now, in this chaotic moment, the part that hits closest to home is this: each person told in an angelic encounter of the baby’s coming, was, in a word, terrified. “Sore afraid,” in the King James translation.

Consider our planet, the rock on which we stand, weighing in at a mean 6,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 kg. Seems stable – till you realize it’s hurtling through space at over 67,000 mph, on an orbital path that if even slightly deflected could end life on our planet as we know it. Seems solid – till you realize it would fit inside our vaporizing hot sun more than 1 million times.

And the angel said unto them, “do not be afraid.”

Do not be afraid. It’s apparently the most common command in the Bible, appearing hundreds of times.

But applied to us, it feels sometimes like a ridiculous command. I mean, look around! Who do I talk to right now who isn’t afraid? Left, right, center, newspapers clang of impending doom, doomsday clocks exhaust their clicks. Bombs shred bodies as I write, as atmospheric CO₂ climbs and life expectancy decines in a cacophony of cancers, viruses, and guns. Drums in the deep.

And I read: Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.

Earth’s atmosphere – all that stands between us and the instant death of empty space – is a mere thin film on the surface of our planet, fading to invisible less than a short day hike above our heads. The earth’s security blanket, NASA calls it. Aye, perhaps, but it’s threadbare. If the earth were human size, it’s blanket would be less than 2mm thick, the visible part the thinnest of threads, the rest so insubstantial it’s impossible to see.

Again I read: Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.

My local community has been rocked by rapid changes, including a major upheaval at my church, precipitating the loss of a pastor, and then another, and another. We collectively face the fear of an uncertain future: where will this ship turn? Will it stay afloat? This past Wednesday maybe 20 of us sat in a room to say goodbye to one of these leaders, a celebration of his time with us (how else can we face the sadness of parting but through tearful celebration of what has been good?). As we sat there together, our departing pastor shared with us what was on his heart, a command he’d been reading, again and again:

Do not be afraid.

The frequency distribution of civilization destroying astroids is statistical in nature. One every several million years, plus or minus several million. It’s been a while since the dinosaurs bit the dust, so we’re pretty much due, at least tomorrow, or in the next million or so years.

Astronomers think they’ve identified over 90% of potential asteroids that could mean our sudden extinction. However thanks to a daytime blindspot in the direction of the sun there are still a small percentage of giant asteroids potentially lurking undetected in even our sharpest gaze. The possibility remains of a civilization destroying rock discovered with so little notice we’d be helpless to respond.

Have no fear of sudden disaster, declare the Proverbs. When you lie down, you will not be afraid.

Giant space rocks are only one potential armageddon. Putting aside nuclear desolation, runaway climate change, and other disasters of our own making, local gamma ray bursts, supernova explosions, giant solar flares, and wandering stars are just a few additional threats that could torch our species with one last whimpering cry. All these against the inevitable backdrop of the eventual death of our sun, which will begin with its rapid expansion, its outer surface enveloping and cremating our planet. To dust you will most definitely return.

From six calamities he will rescue you; in seven no harm will touch you, Job’s friends tell him. You… need not fear when destruction comes.

Long term models of the universe present the following cheery picture: the expansion of the universe continues to push galaxies apart until all the stars eventually burn themselves out. The remaining stellar ash will find its way into black holes, which themselves finally disintegrate into a dark universe of frozen nothingness.

So then, banish anxiety from your heart and cast off the troubles of your body, for youth and vigour are meaningless.

But enough of future models, what of the present? Have you considered the size of our universe? Even our great sun, the source of our energy and life is but a blip in the greater silence. If our solar system – with its planetary orbits and vast Oort cloud beyond them – was shrunk down to a modest size classroom the sun would fit on a pen tip, no bigger than the dissected eye of a fly.

Do not be afraid.

And our solar system, that’s nothing. The most distant stars visible to my eyes at night — so far away it would take our fastest spacecrafts 10s of millions of years to reach them — those stars still would fit within a sphere that takes up less than 0.1% of the volume of our Milky Way galaxy; if the Milky Way was a giant pancake, they’d fit within a small blueberry.

Do not be afraid, you worm Jacob; little Israel, do not fear.

Our Milky Way is one of about 300 billion such galaxies in the known universe. 300 billion 8” pancakes would fill over 2 million semis, which, parked bumper to bumper, would fill a two lane highway from Chicago to Florida.

Do not be afraid.

The “observable” universe is an incomprehensible 93 billion lightyear sphere¹, and yet that unfathomable amount of space is simply the part of the universe we can see. Light from other parts of the universe hasn’t reached us yet. It may be, beyond that, there exists an infinite amount of space, going on and on and on: more and more night that we cannot and will not see.

You will not fear the terror of night.

Then again, no one know what’s beyond this cosmic horizon. A small problem made laughable only by our lack of knowledge of what lies within it. No one know what fills the recesses beyond the edges of our solar system, in fact, no one really knows exactly what constitutes the edge of our solar system, a region, like most of the universe, still shrouded in darkness. Not to mention the obscuring blindfold of cosmic dust through which we peer. Like billowing smoke it makes our eyes sting; we squint, and recoil at our blindness, our truth incomplete.

Do not tremble, do not be afraid.

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“Do note be afraid” – what are these biblical urgings in light of all this? Some might view these words as just a coping mechanism to deal with the meaningless chaos around us. A narrative story meant to medicate and appease in an attempt to survive. Doesn’t it stand to reason that only short lived fools would not fear the darkness in which we spin?

Yes, they may be right, these naysayers, those who proudly call out the nursery rhymes of Faith. But then again, there’s a chance – just a chance, but a chance nonetheless – that they are wrong.

Three observations:

1) Our species desires life. We choose to conquer fear because we feel the hunger, what Jeremiah calls “a burning fire shut up in my bones,” that keeps us up and going and knowing that somehow, contrary to reason, the universe and me and the flowers around me all got up and breathed today.

Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.

2) For all the cold-blooded, fiery acts of destruction we see both near and far, our scientific studies time and again surprise us: most destruction in our universe, in the end, turn out to be a prelude to renewal. Generations of exploding stars were necessary to create enough carbon and oxygen to form our planet, our bodies, and the bodies of every life form on our planet. Incinerated star guts become breathing star dust: compost that has learned the meaning of wonder, and the taste of joy.

Do not fear, for I have redeemed you. I have called you by name, you are mine.

3) For all the unknown corners of the universe, all the threats of the voids in our great surrounding night, we’ve been given over 10³² cubic light years of visible universe, by which I mean, over 10³² cubic light years of delight.

Look up and around. The Hubble Telescope sees glorious kaleidoscopic nebulae, the Keck Observatory grand design spiral galaxies. We are surrounded by majestic shooting stars, ringed planets, and moons with methane rain.

More, our universe, miraculously, breathes in repeated patterns that allow us – creatures of pattern – to tune our telescopes to detect these signals in the night. Patterns that, with enough reminding, just might allow us to put aside our fears and attune our souls to the great cosmic song sung before our very eyes, and — just maybe — to join in the signing.

But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people… Suddenly a great company of heavenly host appear with the angel, praising God and saying: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom His favor rests.”

Endnote: Bible passages (italics) taken from the following places: Luke 1, I Chronicles 22, II Chronicles 32, Joshua 1, Proverbs 3, Job 5, Ecclesiastes 11, Revelation 2, Isaiah 41, Acts 18, Psalm 91, Isaiah 44, Jeremiah 20, Luke 12, Isaiah 43, Luke 2.

1. Note that the “light travel time” distance to the edge of our universe is just over 13 billion light years, which would give a diameter of 26 billion light years. But due to the expansion of the universe, we actually can see a much bigger sphere than this.