{"id":1892,"date":"2025-09-16T13:05:52","date_gmt":"2025-09-16T18:05:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/?p=1892"},"modified":"2025-09-16T13:05:52","modified_gmt":"2025-09-16T18:05:52","slug":"wondering-about-angels-spirits-life-after-death-miracles-prayer-even-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/?p=1892","title":{"rendered":"Wondering about Angels, Spirits, Life after Death, Miracles, Prayer, even God"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Kay Augustine<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

While there are many, many folks who are convinced there is a Supreme Divine Being\/Creator God who intervenes in human affairs either by His plan (and to most He is gendered\u2014that gender) or in response to prayer; and while the Roman Catholic Church has a very long list of people they declare to be saints only after certain miracles are verified to have been done by God in response to their prayer to Him; nevertheless, I have never been fully convinced of either of those beliefs\u2014either that we live inside a Divine Plan or that God is gendered and answers prayer, either directly or through saints. Let me say clearly this does not mean I think I\u2019m right and those who do believe this are wrong; it may well be just the reverse. It is simply what I, at the ripe old age of 90, have come to believe: that the Divine is a mystery. I like what a friend who worked among the Dine, aka Navaho people told me: Their name for God is Ultimate Mystery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have come, however, at this stage in my life, to wonder more and more about angels. Since childhood I\u2019ve loved the song I learned from WHA radio in the only elementary school music instruction we had, \u201cEvening Prayer\u201d from Humperdinck\u2019s opera Hansel and Gretel<\/em>, asong about the fourteen guardian angels who keep watch while we sleep. I\u2019ll be concluding this short piece with a poem called \u201cWondering about Angels.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Additionally, as more and more of my contemporaries die, I find myself reconsidering the phrase \u201cpassed on,\u201d a phrase I\u2019ve long disliked hearing used as a euphemism for \u201cdied\u201d:  Maybe they really have \u201cpassed on\u201d \u2014 to some sort of spirit world, a world inhabited by what we humans have long called angels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So. Lately I find myself, in quiet moments, \u201ctuning in\u201d to those I have lost from this life, sometimes asking for their help or Light for myself or others. I can\u2019t say I can point to any resulting miracles, but it is comforting to recall being in their living presence, comforting to invite that presence back into my life in this way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One experience, in particular, explains why, as long as several years ago, I found myself<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wondering about Angels<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Memoriam: LeRoy Augustine<\/em>
     11\/21\/1934 \u2013 11\/08\/2019

Annie Dillard, in \u201cA Field of Silence\u201d\t\t\t
saw them \u201cwhirling\u2026their beauty\t\t\t\t
unspeakable.\u201d\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

May Sarton called them \u201cThe\t\t\t\t
Beautiful Pauses,\u201d said \u201cSurprised by\t\t\t
angels, we are free for once\t\t\t\t
to move and rest in the sacred dance.\u201d\t\t\t
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
In the Bible they appear in human form\t\t\t
with messages, and come in bands to\t\t\t
carry the departed home,
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
So this morning, as my guttering candle 
sends beams through the head of my
glass singing angel, I\u2019m wond\u2019ring\t\t\t\t
about them. Remembering\u2026

The morning of your memorial service, I
pick up your loose-leaf Memory Book, am 
startled to hear briefly\u2013so briefly\u2013Snoopy\u2019s
theme. You had loved Charlie Brown and
especially Snoopy, so in that notebook of
photos, mementos, birthday and Father\u2019s Day
cards was one I had sent, a musical Snoopy, 
dancing, playing his tune when the card was
opened; but it hadn\u2019t been opened, and the
batt\u2019ry had died months ago, so I wondered\u2026

And seven days later, feeling almost pretty 
in my red New York jacket, black Kango hat,
I lug my suitcase onto the bus, sit facing front.
Halfway downtown someone behind me
taps my shoulder, leans over to say, \u201cI\u2019m dyin\u2019
to tell you, you wear that hat very well. I should
get one that stylish.\u201d Startled again, I thank him,
impulsively take out my phone to record his
exact words.

At Water Street this courteous stranger
sees me struggling, takes my suitcase off the bus.
I thank him again, he heads south, and I turn
north to see the Green Line barreling toward the
stop. I hail it, clamber on, and take a side seat
facing East. A few blocks later a tall young man
across the aisle speaks up, pays me a compliment.

\u201cThat\u2019s amazing,\u201d I say. \u201cYou\u2019re the second man
today to tell me I look nice.\u201d

\u201cThat was me before,\u201d he says.

I\u2019m stunned. \u201cBut\u2026the other one was older, wore
tweed\u2026\u201d

\u201cI helped you off with your suitcase,\u201d he says.

The young man sitting next to him is amused at
my embarrassment. My face must match my jacket. 
Confused, I smile, lower my eyes, do not see the
tall young man get off the bus. But I wonder:
He\u2019d had to have walked two long blocks
faster than the bus to board it again.

So this morning I\u2019m wondering\u2026
about angels.
<\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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