For all of my theory, and for all of my knowledge, I have had very few glimpses – if not simple experiences – of the divine.  I don’t mean looking at a natural landscape and getting the sense of divinity simply from being there.  I mean actually getting glimpses of the divine itself, of a divinity that makes itself apparent.  Not through auspices or the like.

I have been on an archaeological dig in central Italy since July 1st. I’m just beyond mile marker 18 on the Via Appia, so I am close to Rome itself.  So I have not had much time to be able to sit down and think about blogging.  Between getting on the site at 8:00 in the morning and getting back to the hotel at 5, and the time it takes to write the necessary book work I have to for this excavation, I have little enough time.  But I had to share this.

Across the street from the site I am digging on is a mass of vines and trees in someone’s property.  The vines are dead, creating light and dark brown colors in front of the dark green of the trees.  Behind the trees and to the right is some kind of pole: either an antennae off in the distance or a closer flagpole or some other such object.  To the left of the trees is a flat, square, metallic object.  This is either a billboard or some kind of backing for something, or part of the industrial area that’s below us on the hills.

And just for a minute, while I was walking to the awning that they have installed to provide shade for the meeting tables, this mass resolved itself into the image of a woman standing, with her hair flowing behind her, and a spear in her right hand and shield in her left, looking at me.

I did a double-take and it was gone.

Now, my logical mind could see how I could perceive such a formation to align so perfectly.  But my intuitive side finds that it is something really…interesting.  If it is simply a coincidence, then it is a hell of a coincidence.

I’ll ruminate on the encounter a bit.  But I’ll ask:

How have you glimpsed the divine?  In what ways did they reveal themselves?  How, if at all, did you rectify it with a logical conclusion?

I ask these questions honestly, without rancor.  Share your ideas, please.

Thanks for reading.