star stuff

I've mused a bit about the stars before. Stars, so far away, glittering in the night - massive, lovely giants lighting up other corners of the universe.


Have you ever thought about how much we share with them? How much star stuff is within us? 


I love Carl Sagan's words: "Some part of our being knows this is where we came from. We long to return, and we can, because the cosmos is also within us. We're made of star stuff..." 


Yes, Sagan was correct. We are, indeed, made of star stuff. All that talk of carbon-based life forms? Well... carbon (and hydrogen, too, and just about every element) is produced within stars - in a process known as stellar nucleosynthesis. So yeah, we're made of star stuff. 


This is not some kind of negation of the creative work of God... merely another facet of it - or if you prefer, another way to consider it. We, tiny humans, are made out of the same elements as the giant stars. And if the stars are so remarkable in all their giant greatness, giving off light and heat, and synthesizing elements - how much more remarkable are we tiny creatures who live and breathe and also participate in the creative work of God? 


As a side note, you may be aware that Carl Sagan was an atheist. Reading his prose, however, I think it's remarkable how close he really was to the mysteries of God and creation - perhaps without ever realizing it. 


After all, when we look at the stars and sense that longing that tells us "this is where we came from," is that longing not simply for the commonality we share with the stars, but also a longing for the eternal that we sense in the skies? "We long to return, and we can, because the cosmos is within us..." and so, too, the One who created the cosmos is also within us. Is it so much a longing to return to the cosmos, as it is a longing to return to the Creator - a longing to return to our origin? 






Creator of the stars of night, your people's everlasting light...