“God of all power, Ruler of the Universe, you are worthy of glory and praise.

“Glory to you for ever and ever.

“At your command all things came to be: the vast expanse of interstellar space, galaxies, suns, the planets in their courses, and this fragile earth, our island home.

“By your will they were created and have their being.“

So begins this form of the Eucharistic prayer. It was often called the form most like the way St. Francis reverenced creation.

Bob and I recently watched a PBS special entitled NOVA The Universe Revealed Big Bang. You might be able to see it on your local PBS station. I am no scholar in astrophysics, astronomy or planetary studies. I am not versed in dating events in the universe or our galaxy. I am convinced we have an amazing Creator!

The program shared theories from various experts and images collected by the Hubble telescope along with NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the European Space Agency’s (ESA) XMM-Newton space observatory. It all made my heart go directly to the Eucharistic Prayer C. The creation is beyond my comprehension and evidently also beyond my wildest imaginations!

The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words, whose voice is not heard. Their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In them he has set a tent for the sun, which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber, and, like a strong man, runs its course with joy.

Psalm 19:1-6 ESV

I rarely think of things like death of stars, yet above is an image of that happening.

You are the Lord, you alone. You have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them; and you preserve all of them; and the host of heaven worships you.

Nehemiah 9:6 ESV

Here is an image from January 21, 2022. “The spiral arms of the galaxy NGC 3318 are lazily draped across this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. This spiral galaxy lies in the constellation Vela and is roughly 115 million light-years away from Earth. Vela was originally part of a far larger constellation, known as Argo Navis after the fabled ship Argo from Greek mythology, but this unwieldy constellation proved to be impractically large. Argo Navis was split into three separate parts called Carina, Puppis, and Vela – each named after part of the Argo. As befits a galaxy in a nautically inspired constellation, the outer edges of NGC 3318 almost resemble a ship’s sails billowing in a gentle breeze.”

You can access this image and many. many more for yourself at https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/multimedia/index.html

Have fun exploring with the outer space explorers at the site below. If you put in NASA Hubble images, then instead of clicking on All just click on Images you can enjoy the view of amazing things they have found!

And more news is coming! “On Monday, Jan. 24, engineers plan to instruct NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to complete a final correction burn that will place it into its desired orbit, nearly 1 million miles away from the Earth at what is called the second Sun-Earth Lagrange point, or “L2” for short.”

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?

Psalm 8:3-4 ESV