On Stargazing, Parenthood and the Two Kings

This week’s article is from Corynne Staresinic. Be sure to check out her work at The Catholic Woman as well as her newly released book A Place to Belong - a stunning, inspiring anthology of twenty-five deeply personal letters from Catholic women. Let us know if you would like to join us in contributing to knowHis.love in writing, audio, or video.

When I was a kid, our suburban Ohio home was just far enough away from the imposing lights of nearby shopping centers, so that, on a clear evening, the star-smattered sky would become visible, glowing dimly above us. On the nights where I’d take out the trash, I’d pause and look up, pick a star and stare. Relaxing my mind, I would try to imagine the distance between myself and the star. And eventually, that dazzling knowledge would descend and I would understand - just a little bit - how far we were from one another. I would stand in awe of the grandness of the universe and its Creator, and my smallness before it all, on the edge of the universe, on the edge of my driveway in that sleepless, commercialized land where I once dwelt. 

Many years later, and just a few nights ago, I was laying in our bed with my husband asleep to my right, a crucifix hanging on the wall above my phone to my left, and my son, Ezra, falling asleep after his midnight bottle in my arms. His eyes were closed as he smiled and snuggled and burrowed into my chest. I held him close, one hand on his head caressing his feathery hair, and the other on the small of his back. I listened to him breathe while rejecting the inclination to grab my phone and scroll. 

As I laid there, I tried to imagine a constellation of persons. I thought of as many faces as I could to create the crowd. And then, I imagined Ezra as one among them - one in a hundred, one in one billion, one of a kind - attempting to wrap my mind around his smallness, uniqueness and unrepeatability.

And just as it did with the stars, the moment of understanding arrived swiftly, the moment where I knew - just a little bit - that he is the only one of him to have ever existed, the only one of him God had ever created. In that ordinary moment, I was filled with a heavenly reverence at the life wiggling in my arms and his Creator. But once again, the knowledge is fleeting, and it slipped away like a bar of soap out of the hands of a child at bath time. In frustration, I thought about taking a photo of Ezra on my phone to mark the moment and maybe one day share on social media, but it was too dark to capture. Ezra was now asleep heavily on my breast, breathing deeply. 

The Tension

It is in these sorts of moments of contemplation that I feel most at home. When I am able to ignore that ever clamoring call to consume, create and compete, I think I start to grasp the nature of humanity. We are creatures made to love, to wonder, and to receive Someone who is far greater than the distance between Ohio and the stars, and yet Someone who is as close as a mother is to her infant. Someone whose sacred image is present in each of us. 

But I struggle to get there - to relax into that receptive disposition that is most proper to our humanity. The tension is present. I’m much more predisposed to focus on obtaining all that is not made for me, instead of receiving the one right in front of me. I find often that my life is being conformed to the ruthless demands of our sleepless capitalist society, rather than the loving will of our Creator. 

And perhaps, in a sense, this is where many of our problems stem from: our dispositions toward God and his children. Do we see the small space we’ve been given on Earth’s lawn as a gift? Do we live our lives with open arms to one another, recognizing the uniqueness and unrepeatability in every person we encounter? Do we look around and feel the tug of responsibility to the other who bears God’s image? 

Or do we close ourselves off to those moments of humble creaturely wonder and love, and keep our heads down, earning our keep for ourselves, only seeing the other as a distant threat?

Herod and a Hedonistic Heaven

Author André Daigneault describes this tension in his book The Way of Imperfection as the Herod-Jesus dichotomy. He writes:

“The two kings, Herod and Jesus, cross paths with each other but are totally opposite. King Herod represents the search for power at whatever price: ‘Climb, control, serve yourself and be powerful.’ Jesus, God of Love incarnate, descends - lowers himself, kneels near the poor, lets himself be dispossessed, and dies abandoned, nailed to a cross - rather than accept a power that could have made him king. He is the King of Love. 

Herod is a tyrant; Jesus is a servant. One manipulates the weak and the poor; the other serves, heals, empathizes, and loves with total self-denial. We should not forget that these two kings always battle within ourselves. It is the fight between pride and humility.”

We spend much of our lives living in the tension between these two kings. In my own life, my inclinations and desires tend to look more like those of Herod’s, than of my crucified Creator. It’s easy for me to ignore my smallness and construct a vision of myself that is more god-like. It can be easy to believe that I am earning my spot in heaven, a space I’ve always imagined would look like an infinite outdoor shopping mall. In this vision of heaven, upon entrance, I’d receive that all-access card I spent my whole life doing “great things” to obtain. Within the most beautifully designed township center, there would be endless streets with stores of every kind, with all sorts of products you could buy for yourself. There was even a coffee shop where God spent his days conducting his business and meeting with the angels. You could sometimes schedule one-on-one meetings with Him there. You had “earned” it after all - that holy hedonism. Heaven would feel something like this, I had thought.

Returning Home

Over the past few years, I’ve started to understand that heaven likely looks a bit different than what I had once thought it to be. When I gaze at the stars, when I contemplate my son’s existence, when I surrender my pride to the humble King of Love, my images of heaven change shape. My old ideas about who we are and the heaven we are destined for are overturned like tables.  

Now I think that perhaps one day, after the terror of that final breath, we’ll find each of ourselves in some eternal space far beyond the stars, or nestled safely somewhere in the fabric that lies between them. Blinking slowly and stirring softly, we’ll each open our eyes to a dark, cosmic room, lit dimly by strange, heavenly constellations that swirl just outside its windows. We’ll raise our heavy heads from that long, groggy slumber, and find an assuring hand caressing each of our heads and another on the small of our backs, holding us tight to the warm breast of the One who has always held us. 

Can a mother forget her infant,

be without tenderness for the child of her womb?

Even should she forget,

I will never forget you.

Isaiah 49:15