Epiphany (noun):
(1) a usually sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something
(2) an intuitive grasp of reality through something (such as an event) usually simple and striking
(3) an illuminating discovery, realization, or disclosure
(4) a revealing scene or moment
I'm fascinated by the incongruity of the utter obscurity, the hiddenness of the arrival of Jesus compared to the celestial and terrestrial hoopla that accompanied it.
In an unremarkable and insignificant outhouse for animals behind a pub, somewhere in a small, insignificant village in a troubled country, Mary gives birth - in, by any standards, pretty traumatic circumstances.
Meanwhile, in the hills outside that small insignificant village, a routine night for the shepherds is interrupted by a phalanx of noisy celestial beings showing up, partying in the sky. Then the lavishly adorned and laden sages turn up like an itinerant fancy-dress party having schlepped halfway across the known world.
What's a girl to make of it all? Poor Mary! And Joseph.
It seems to me more and more that it's as we loose ourselves from the grip of the mania of diversion, busyness, distraction and the demands of life that we open ourselves to the possibility of epiphany. Maybe not always - or even often - radical or life-changing; perhaps a moment of deepening awareness, of quiet resolution, of certainty in the midst of doubt or questioning. We're just doing the best we can do and something arrives quietly, as simply as our next breath or as a given, like the cup of tea steaming beside us. And subtly the flow of life is changed.
And of course we can never engineer an epiphany. If we could, I guess we'd all be encountering them a lot more often than we do. I think we can only ever put ourselves in a posture of being available for what may come. "Be it unto me....". To be available and responsive is, I think, our best bet. Along with living in gratitude for the moments of revelation - or wonder - when they come along. And when we're surrounded by noise and busyness and too much to do and all the rest, not to beat ourselves up but to drop back, when we can, into that state of readiness, of possibility, of expectancy.
I love the writings of the 20th century Polish-American rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. One of the hallmarks of his life - along with prolific writing - was wonder. He seemed to find a way to live in that state of receptivity to which I've pointed, so I'll leave the last word to him:
"Our goal should be to live life in radical amazement [....] to get up in the morning and look at the world in a way that takes nothing for granted. Everything is phenomenal; everything is incredible; never treat life casually. To be spiritual is to be amazed.”
Gus MacLeod