Sun Day (part 1)

Back in August, solar eclipse fever swept the country, especially those of us living in the arching band of totality. Schools and businesses closed, tourists poured into farms and small towns, a pair of cardboard glasses become a hot commodity. It seems silly and over-hyped, but it also seemed worth it. It was a fun, fantastical distraction, a natural occurrence we humans couldn’t control. For all our modernity and avoidance of nature, we still stopped to look at the sun.

In 1878, people rush west to see a solar eclipse. Eclipse fever got caught up in scientific advancement and Manifest Destiny of the time. Even back in New York, which only had a partial eclipse, the Herald reported: “Portly bankers about to start for home paused on their office steps and turned their eyes above the money making world; merchants stood in the doorways of their busy stores, alternately consulting the face of their watches and the face of the sky; clerks and messengers, hurrying along the crowded streets, ceased to knock and jostle one another and with upturned faces and a blissful forgetfulness of business stood gazing all in one direction, while shop girls, escaping from the toilsome factory, caught a [momentary] glimpse of the heavens above and stalwart policemen stood boldly by frightened French nurses and their infant charges.”

The eclipse started slow. Without glasses, one couldn’t see the small moon starting to cover the massive star. But it gradually grew darker, like a coming storm, or twilight in late summer, a grayish yellow tint, distorting the color palate. Sunset arrived, in 360°. The cicadas began their ritual. Sun snakes weaved across the pavement, light twisting and bending to make the eight minute journey to earth. In a moment before totality, a diamond ring appeared in the sky, the then band with a bulb of brilliant shimmer. For a few minutes, we were transfixed, looking into the sky (sans glasses at this point), at the wisps of the corona, at the unusual sight that indicated the usual routine of the movement of the spheres. And then the moment passed, and the sky lightened, and the birds began their morning songs, and the world moved on.

I rarely think about how life on this planet is sustained by a giant fireball millions of miles away. Throw on some spf and sunglasses and it’s rarely an issue. But watching 5% of it still light up the sky, seeing its luminous corona glimmer, feeling its heat retreat and return, reminded me just how powerful it is.

Our universe works to exacting precision. It demonstrates God’s massive power and attention to detail. We are so finite in scale, yet God’s love for us is immense. We were created to know him and marvel at his creation.

“For he gave me sound knowledge of what exists, that I might know the structure of the universe and the force of its elements, the beginning and the end and the midpoint of times, the changes in the sun’s course and the variations of the seasons, cycles of years, positions of stars, natures of living things, tempers of beasts, powers of the winds and thoughts of human beings, uses of plants and virtues of roots—Whatever is hidden or plain I learned, for Wisdom, the artisan of all, taught me” (Wis. 7:17-22).