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Brian’s Reflection: Monday, October 31, 2011

John Keats, poet; he was born on this date,
1795, at London. (He died in Rome, age 26);
from his poem “A Thing of Beauty”

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Of course. There could not possibly be “beauty” that every human being thought so to be. But, if you put all of us together, might that encompass all beauty?

The picture is of John Keats’ house where he died, in Rome, to the right of the Spanish Steps. Dennis and I gazed on it early on a sunny Roman June morning, and pondered the young man dying of consumption, faithfully tended by the poet Percy Shelley. In the sadness there was, is, a tenderness and a poignancy about the fleetingness of human life which spoke of its own beauty.

On the eve of All Saints, I always think of those, friends, and those to whom I ministered, who died of AIDS. So so different! Some so edgy and difficult, some so winsome and attractive! Most both. One of the greatest things they all taught me was how beautiful every single one of us human beings is. They opened my mind and heart to my own richer humanity as well.

You. I. Everyone. “A thing of beauty and a joy forever.” It’s a revelation that changes everything. God dies every moment to be born a thing of beauty in every human soul.

Posted by Brian Harker Orrock Angell McHugh at 8:50 PM Brian Harker Orrock Angell McHugh
