Endings. . . Only?

End of Walk, the sign says. I'm looking at the sidewalk in front of a fairly new dwelling in the neighborhood. See that shadow on the concrete? It's from the sign that you see that back side of just to my left. Looking from the opposite direction, we see that the sign making the shadow says the same thing. Hmmmm...???

So now the question is this: If it was so vital to inform the pedestrian in front of the house where the walk ends, why is it not equally important that we state where the walk begins? Shouldn't there be a sign on the back sides of both signs stating "Beginning of Walk" or "Walk Begins"? Aren't the ends ovbious enough? One is obstructed by trees, the other by a wall and a fence.

The other day I read a newspaper column in which the writer struggled to see how faith in God could make more sense than his atheism and search for scientific explanations. He made a statement that I often hear similar variants of. Something like "Natural selection sort of rules out God." The flip side would be something like "God the Creator created. That sorta rules out natural selection."

Oh, really?

I'm married to an artist. She works in fabric and paint. She creates things. They don't just "appear" from nowhere when she speaks the words. She has to ceinceive them, struggle with them, execute them, develop them. Sometimes they get changed along the way. Things she started out with end up differently in the process.

Likewise, she doesn't simply throw things together at random with no picture whatsoever of what the result might be. It isn't random, entirely by chance. She and the paint and the fabric and the colors and the hardware and the sewing machine are intimately involved the whole way. Even though she is creating, there is a sort of natural selection process that goes on simultaneously. Fabric prints and colors present themselves mid-stream. Colors that work together wouldn't have without the addition of the previous thing. Everything is related to everything else. Just like creation.

And Jean continues to be involved and caring for the bags she makes even when they're done, even when they are sold, out of sight and effectively dead-and-gone to her. They are as close to eternal in her heart and mind as anything can be within a mortal human being.

Doesn't the level of the usual "creation vs. evolution" discussion--especially in churches and among people of faith--remind you of those two signs above?

They end so much by leaving out so much. And does walking really end beyond either sign?

Will our minds or our eyes ever be open enough to see what's outside the artificial limits we have set for ourselves?

If the God we proclaim is so infinite, why has our conversation about God become so finite?

Pax,

Roger