Creative Uncertainty

Religion has been high-jacked by true believers. But Spirituality is nurtured in Uncertainty.

Because we uncritically value our beliefs, we give our uncertainties a negative connotation. Yet Uncertainty is the seed of creation.

According to the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, the whole universe arises from the field of quantum uncertainty, where a particle's momentum (mass multiplied by speed) and its location cannot be simultaneously known. The "particle" may just as well be defined as a non-localized wave of pure mathematical probability. Can we find any more positive way to honor the creative power of bewilderment?

Emily Dickinson wrote, "I dwell in possibility." The field of infinite possibility is the groundless Uncertain, the unfathomable space between our thoughts. Beliefs are not nearly so full of Truth as the silence between them.

Medieval Christian mystics honored this space as the deepest prayer, and called it "the cloud of unknowing." Meister Eckhart wrote, "I need to be silent for awhile: worlds are forming in my heart." How do we know but that a new creation doesn't arise each moment from the boundless silence at our core? Here is our first vocation: to awaken the space of unknowing.

We need courage to linger where nothing is final, nothing is certain, and all is possible. We need courage to rest without clinging to any belief at all. Jesus said, "With God all things are possible." (Mat 19:26) If the Creator doesn't need to be certain, why should we?

(Photo: 'Space Between the Atoms' by Timothy Vincent at deviantart.com )