In John O'Donohue's book Beauty: The Invisible Embrace, he describes the ocean in a way I have felt, but never been able to pin down into words. He writes, "Words like 'ocean' and 'sea' are too small for such wild divinity. The ocean is beyond language. Her flow is a beautiful dance. She is eternally restless and delights our eyes with the structured rhythm of waves... With sublime elegance, the ocean approaches and embraces the landscape and each wave has a unique grace... Water stirs something very deep and ancient in the human heart. Our eyes and hearts follow its rhythm as if the flow of water were the mirror where time becomes obliquely visible. The image of water can hold such longing."
I have felt that longing and stirring. The sense of awe, beauty and something else unnameable as I watch the constant dance of waves rolling toward shore. Just looking at the ocean is for me a form of prayer. I especially love O'Donohue describing the sea as "wild divinity" and "eternally restless." This wild restlessness resonates deep in me. So often in the Christian traditions, we imagine God as a place of stillness and light and clouds. But the mysterious movement, depth and dazzling darkness of the ocean speaks intimately of the Divine. I look at that fathomless deep, and I think that God must be something like those stirring waters, and I want nothing more than to be drenched.
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