MUSIC OF THE SPHERES

My attention was drawn to the hymn This Is My Father's World by remembering that it includes the words 'Music of the Spheres.' The concept is an ancient one, explored by Pythagoras and contradicted by Aristotle. The astronomer Kepler took it very seriously; he concluded that "the Solar System was composed of two basses (Saturn and Jupiter), a tenor (Mars), two altos (Venus and Earth), and a soprano (Mercury), which had sung in “perfect concord,” at the beginning of time, and could potentially arrange themselves to do so again."

The imaginations of contemporary musicians and scientists are stimulated by considering relationships among the vibrations of notes which produce music and the arrangement of planets in various solar systems.

This video lets us listen to music which would be produced by The Harmonic Series Played By Planets.

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An Astronomer who is also a musician has produced a Ted Talk on this subject. Matt Russo introduces a way to hear with our ears what we thought was only visible to our eyes.

What does the universe sound like? He gives a musical tour of what the universe sounds like.

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Since sound does not travel through a vacuum whatever sound our earth makes would not be audible from space. However our planet does emit electromagnetic waves which can be translated to audible sound wave just like radio waves become sound waves from our radios. This video lets us listen to waves Earth produces.

Electromagnetic waves as sound

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Returning to our original hymn, This Is My Father's World, we can listen to a recording which is arranged to emphasize that the world is the vehicle through which spiritual music is being played.

 This Is My Father's World

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ST. PATRICK

British Library

15th Century Image

Island of ‘St. Patrick’s Purgatory

Although we will not gather at the Meetinghouse for a St. Patrick's day dinner this year,  we can remember and we can anticipate the time when we will sit together at table, will laugh and sing and give thanks together. In the meantime we can read of the life and faith of St. Patrick, see his image, pray his prayer, and listen to the voices of those who love Ireland.  

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From TIME:

"The March 17 celebration started in 1631 when the Church established a Feast Day honoring St. Patrick. He had been Patron Saint of Ireland who had died around the fifth century.

'We know that he was a Roman citizen, because Britain was Roman then, and then he was enslaved and taken to Ireland, where he either escaped or was released,' Casey says. 'And then he became a priest and went back to Ireland, where he had a lot of luck converting the Druid culture into Christians.'”

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From WORLD HISTORY ENCYCLOPEDIA:

"When he arrived in Ireland he was hardly welcomed. He writes how, when he landed (probably at Wicklow) the people were so hostile to him he quickly moved on north. Patrick knew the language of the Irish from his years in captivity and, just as importantly, knew their beliefs. He seems to have been adept at sharing the Christian message in a way he knew the people would best understand and receive. There has been much written about the famous episode in which Patrick explains the Trinity using a shamrock, for instance, and historians, scholars, and theologians have debated whether the event actually happened. Whether that event ever took place is not as important as what the story says about Patrick's method of reaching the people. The concept of the triple deity, a supernatural being represented in three aspects, was well known in Ireland. The ancient goddesses Eriu, Fodla, and Banba, although not written about until the 11th/12th centuries CE, were known through oral tradition for centuries as the three sisters who gave their names to Ireland. They were, in effect, three aspects of the spirit of the land. The goddess Brigid, likewise, was represented as three sisters who embodied the life force through healing, creativity, and productivity. The story of St. Patrick and the shamrock would have reflected how St. Patrick drew upon the spiritual and physical world the Irish knew to explain the gospel in familiar terms."

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The Most Ancient Lives of Saint Patrick
by James O'Leary
The Confession of St. Patrick, by Saint Patrick

 

[Patrick wrote the following of his encounter with God which redirected his life toward serving the people of Ireland.]

"And on another night, whether in me or near me God knows, I heard eloquent words which I could not understand until the end of the speech, when it was said: "He who gave His life for thee is He who speaks in thee"; and so I awoke full of joy. And again, I saw one praying within me, and I was, as it were, within my body, and I heard, that is, above the inner man, and there he prayed earnestly with groans. And I was amazed at this, and marvelled, and considered who this could be who prayed in me. But at the end of the prayer it came to pass that it was a bishop, and I awoke and remembered that the apostle said: "Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmity, for we know not what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself asketh for us with unspeakable groanings." And again: "The Lord is our advocate, who also maketh intercession for us." [And when I was tried by some of my elders, who came and spoke of my sins as an objection to my laborious episcopate, I was on that day sometimes strongly driven to fall away here and for ever. But the Lord spared a proselyte and a stranger for His name's sake, and mercifully assisted me greatly in that affliction, because I was not entirely deserving of reproach. I pray God that they may not be found guilty of giving an occasion of sin; they found me after thirty years, and brought against me words that I had confessed before I was a deacon; from anxiety, with sorrow of mind, I told my dearest friend what I had done in my youth, in one day, nay, rather in one hour, because I was not then able to overcome. I know not, God knows, if I was then fifteen years of age, and from my childhood I did not believe in the living God, but remained in death and unbelief until I was severely chastised, and, in truth, I have been humbled by hunger and nakedness; and even now I did not come to Ireland of my own will until I was nearly worn out. But this proved a blessing to me, for I was thus corrected by the Lord, and he made me fit to be to-day that which was once far from my thoughts, so that I should care for the salvation of others, for at that time I had no thought even for myself."

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Hymn

Prayer

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BETTY ODUM

 

Information from Betty's obituary in the Gainesville Sun:

Elisabeth "Betty" Huntingdon Chase Odum

Sept 24, 1925 to Feb 18, 2021

Betty's death was unexpected since she was recovering from a mild bout with COVID-19.

"A New Englander by birth and stock, she and her young family moved to Gainesville, FL, in 1958, and she resided there for the rest of her life. She loved the wild nature that surrounded her and shared that love with hundreds of students, her children and her many grandchildren. A biologist, ecologist, educator, engaged citizen, and wicked-good card player, she made many contributions to her community and world during her 95 years.

Born in Hartford, CT on September 24th, 1925 to Eugene Parker Chase and Ann Francis Hastings Chase, Betty grew up in an academic family and passed on this heritage to four children, eleven grandchildren, and eight great-grandchildren.

When released from the academic year, her family would spend weeks each summer at a family cottage in Branford, CT. There she would swim, sail, read, and watch the tides. She ensured that her children and grandchildren enjoyed this Branford legacy as long as possible.

A frugal woman, her personal attire and possessions were humble and practical, and yet she spared no expense on education for her off-spring.

She grew up in the Episcopal Church, and discovered Quakerism as a teenager while volunteering at a Friend's work-camp in Washington, DC. There she worked for social justice and racial integration. She attended Swarthmore College, a historically Quaker institution, majoring in Zoology. She was an exceptional student and was admitted to Hahnemann Medical College at graduation in 1947. But love and tradition would take hold of her, and she forwent this opportunity in order to elope with her Swarthmore sweetheart, John Morris Trimmer, and they started a family.

While raising her four children, Betty returned to college and earned her M. Ed. in 1963 from the University of Florida. She had volunteered and worked for the Southeastern Yearly Meeting, leading a variety of First-day programs for children and work-camp programs for youth. Betty delighted in her many years leading Girl Scout and Cub Scout Troops.

Betty joined the faculty of Santa Fe Junior College in 1969 as an instructor of Biology. She retired after thirty years and enjoyed the status of Professor Emeritus. During her tenure, she advocated for engaged learning and for equal opportunity for women to teach and become leaders at the college. She was a member of the National Organization for Women, the American Civil Liberties Union, the League of Women Voters, and the Democratic Party.

The family were active members in the Gainesville Friends Meeting. Both Betty and Morrie served as Clerks of the Meeting and were actively involved in social justice initiatives. In addition to camping trips across Florida and to Mexico, they took their family to DC marches for Civil Rights and to end the Vietnam War. The family enjoyed many Southeastern Yearly Meeting and Friends General Conference events. Betty and Morrie's marriage lasted nearly three decades.

In 1973 Betty married Howard T. Odum, Ph.D., a pioneer in the field of ecology. The two embarked on a partnership that took them to speak and lecture in many countries throughout the world. They co-authored several important publications, including two books, "Energy Basis for Man and Nature" (McGraw-Hill, 1976) and "The Prosperous Way Down," (University of Colorado Press, 2001).

Combining her passion for nature with her knowledge of biology and Quakerism, Betty was an advocate for conservation of natural resources, family and world peace. She unleashed a flock of environmental scientists and community builders among her grandchildren, and took great pride in their work and families. In the early 70's after selling the family home, she purchased 69 acres along the Santa Fe River in Alachua County and donated a majority of the land to a land trust to protect it for perpetuity.

Following H.T.'s death in 2002, she found herself living alone for the first time in her life and struggled to adjust to this new environment. At the age of 86, she found love again with a delightful boyfriend, Bob Klein, who was shortly taken from her by Alzheimer's. She found some contentment and companionship through a book group and playing bridge and billiards with friends at The Village in Gainesville. She continued her traveling ways, this time to visit her family. Together they had many adventures to St. Augustine, FL, and beyond, including China, Belize, Morocco, and France. In 2016, she checked off an item on her bucket list – riding a camel in the desert. 

Betty was predeceased by her parents; two husbands; her sister Kathleen Ann Chase Sibun; and her step-daughter Ann Odum.

She is survived by her four children and their spouses: Ruth Trimmer (Burton Smith), Alachua, FL; Peter Trimmer (Jane Doyle), Silver Spring, MD; Kathleen Trimmer (Dan Campbell), Wakefield, RI; S. Morris Trimmer (Amy DeHart), Lexington, VA; one step-daughter, Mary Logan, Gainesville; eleven grandchildren: Quilla Miralia; Luke Trimmer-Smith; Elliott Campbell; Eryn Trimmer; Anthony Campbell; Russell Trimmer; Tanya Trimmer; Kristina Campbell; Maya DeHart; Tolya Trimmer; and Olivia Trimmer; one step-granddaughter, Kelsey Logan Jeske; one step great-granddaughter; eight great grandchildren; and two nieces.

A celebration of her life will take place at the Gainesville Friends Meeting when the pandemic recedes. Her ashes will be interred in Hebron, CT, alongside her parents and sister."

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Comment by Robert Knight director of Howard T. Odum Florida Springs Institute on February 28, 2021.

 

"Betty served for years on the board of directors of the Howard T. Odum Florida Springs Institute. We remember her as a loving companion for Dr. Odum, as an excellent environmental educator at Santa Fe Community College, and as a dear friend of the natural world and Florida's springs. She will be sorely missed from the Earth but welcomed with loving arms in the eternal life ever after."

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This is a quote from A Prosperous Way Down by Howard T. Odum and Elizabeth C. Odum.

"After the period of coming down, a time of Earth restoration may follow. Before another cycle of growth, consumption, and a highly developed civilization can start, there has to be a restoration of the slowly renewable resources: the forests, the soils, the fisheries, and some of the wealth from geological processes. During this era the human economy has to operate on renewable resources: the sun, wind waves, tides, and geological processes, but in a restrained enough way for the biosphere to recover its natural capital and productivity. By this time the population should be small enough to maintain high standards of living, as evaluated in measures of real wealth."  Page 285

REMEMBERING TIM

Timothy Britt Ray

1939-2020

Tim decided to become a social worker, because he wanted to dedicate his life to helping others, and he will be remembered for doing just that. After one year working with Aid to Families with Dependent Children, he was convinced that this should be his life’s work. The next year he was enrolled in the master’s degree social work program at West Virginia University in Morgantown. His career was launched.

Tim was born in New Orleans on June 13, 1939 to Eliza Britt Ray and Dr. Archie Cole Ray, a Presbyterian minister. Eliza Ray was a Christian Educator, also with the Presbyterian Church.

Tim enjoyed and excelled at running. He ran on cross country racing teams during his high school years.

He studied Philosophy both at Davidson College (B.A., 1961) and at Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge (M.A., 1963). He started a Ph.D. program in Philosophy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, but dropped out after a year and a half to seek other opportunities.

Tim married Constance Helen Abbott on November 27, 1964 in the Chapel Hill Friends Meetinghouse. The couple had met during the summer of 1964 while working at Woodward State Hospital in Iowa on an American Friends Service Committee project.

After receiving his Masters of Social Work degree from WVU in 1968, Tim was recruited by the state of California where he became a Licensed Clinical Social Worker. He worked first at Sonoma State Hospital and then Mendocino State Hospital where he directed drug abuse and alcoholism treatment programs.

Tim enrolled in the University of Santa Clara School of Law and received his Juris Doctor degree in 1976. While in law school, he was the Director of the East Oakland Drug Abuse Clinic, where he led a treatment team composed of physicians, nurses and social workers. He served as Field Instructor for the San Jose State University School of Social Work. He also taught a management class for paraprofessional counselors (Business 17, Merritt College). An article he wrote, “The Client Oriented Service Delivery System Within the Methadone Maintenance Treatment Program,” was published in Contemporary Drug Problems (Vol. IV, No. 4 Winter 1975), a law quarterly published by Federal Legal Publications, Inc.

Tim became Executive Director of the Toledo Legal Aid Society in 1977 and worked there until 1982. He developed the new Senior Legal Service Program for the elderly, securing grants, appointing staff, and presenting the program plan for the approval of the board of trustees and the Area Agency on Aging. He passed the Ohio bar examination and was registered as an attorney in 1981.

Tim moved to Florida in 1982 to become director of a drug abuse program in Miami. In 1985 he became Executive Director of the Alachua County Older Americans Council. He initiated the recruitment of lawyers to assist elderly people to file their income taxes.

He was instrumental in getting interested people together to form a food bank in Alachua County when it became known that the county had been identified as one of the most food insecure counties in the nation. He became the founding Board President of The Bread of the Mighty Food Bank in 1987, and served until 1990.

In the last years of his social work career, Tim worked for Hospice of Marion County in Florida. His biography appeared in Who’s Who in America, for the years 2000-2004, for demonstrating “outstanding achievement” and contributing “significantly to the betterment of contemporary society” (Randy Mysel, publisher). Tim retired in 2006.

Tim was passionate about writing. Besides the article published in Contemporary Drug Problems, he had several articles published in The Tar Heel, The Gainesville Sun and The Ocala Star-Banner.

Tim was an elder in the First Presbyterian Church of Gainesville and served one term as Clerk of Session. He liked going to serve communion to people who were unable to attend church regularly. He enjoyed his Bible Study Class, and especially liked taking his turn leading it.

Later Tim joined the Gainesville Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, where Connie was already a member. He took on the responsibility of serving as Clerk of the meeting’s Peace and Social Concerns Committee.

He liked nothing better than participating in demonstrations for worthy causes. He liked feeling as if he was physically involved in making the world a better place. He joined the great March on Washington for Jobs and Equality in August 1963 in spite of his parents’ objections. To get a good look at Dr. King and the great performances and speakers, he climbed up the scaffolding built for a television camera crew. He returned to Washington in 1968 to participate in the Poor People’s Campaign. Throughout their married life, Tim and Connie participated in numerous national and local demonstrations for Civil Rights, Peace, and more recently, Gun Control.

Tim enjoyed beaches. He liked to go looking for perfect seashells and walking in the surf. He was happy to say that he had skinny dipped in the Atlantic, the Pacific, and the Gulf. Wherever life would lead him, Tim would find clothing optional beaches and nudist clubs. In Mendocino County he liked to find other young professionals who would come up from all over north of the Bay to camp out for the weekend and skinny dip in the Navarro and Russian Rivers.

His taste in music ran from serious (Mahler, Schoenberg) to jazz (Brubeck). He ready mostly non-fiction (philosophy, investigative reporting, news magazines and newspapers). He did enjoy The Castle by Kafka. Movies that Tim liked include: “The Trial,” “Babette,” “American President,” and “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.” When “All in the Family” became household conversation (1971), he broke down and bought a television. Besides that program, he liked to watch the news, “60 Minutes,” Bill Moyers, and “West Wing.”

Considering giving blood to be a civic duty, Tim became a “5 Galloneer” at the Civitan Life South Blood Bank in Gainesville.

Tim and Connie had two children. Tim loved being a dad: playing soccer in the backyard, helping make pinewood derby cars, teaching the basics of taking care of a car, and going with his daughter to Girl Scout “Me and My Dad” camp.

Gregory Ray lives with his wife, Ginger Marshall, and son Mack in Amish country near State College in the middle of Pennsylvania. Rebecca Ray lives with her husband, David Rosnick, in Boston. Tim’s brother, Richard Ray, lives with his wife, Lila Ray, in North Carolina.

Jim Notestein, Alachua County Commissioner from 1984 to 1988, said of Tim, “He’s a good person doing good things; a public citizen.” JoAnn Lordahl from Gainesville’s Friends Meeting said, “He is so sweet. You can just feel the sweetness coming from inside of him.” 

Gregory Ray

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Becky’s Note about her Dad

Tonight at 7pm, [April 25,2020]  my father Timothy Ray passed away from lymphoma and Alzheimer’s disease. He was 80 years old.

He was a man of rare vision and heart.

He loved the whole world, all of it. He saw the beauty in every flower and tree, and in every human being he met, no matter how unlovable.

He also saw the cruelty in the world with clear eyes. He felt every injustice in his bones, no matter small or insurmountable, even when others might be tempted to shrug and say, “We’ve always done it this way” or “There’s nothing we can do about it.” He spent his life working tirelessly to bring more compassion and justice to his world.

He taught me to pray and meditate, question authority (and my own too-easy answers) and speak truth to power. He was a man of deep spirituality, always reading and praying but never content to accept a creed handed to him. He glowed when he taught me about his heroes, Schweitzer, Romero, Tutu, Gandhi, and many others. He taught me to appreciate Rilke and Rumi, though he never succeeded in teaching me to appreciate existential philosophy.

He taught me to stay vulnerable, embrace the mysteries of life, speak up for myself, but NOT be arrogant enough to believe I could speak up for others. He taught me it was better to work alongside people than for them.

One particular moment captured this aspect of him particularly well. When I was mid-dissertation, I proudly told him about my fieldwork (listening to indigenous leaders in the Amazon) and how I got to take their stories to national government authorities and international companies. I thought he’d approve. Instead, he challenged me gently. “And what gives you the right to speak on their behalf?” he asked softly, eyes glistening but firm. I stopped in my tracks and appreciated the challenge. I clarified: I’m not speaking on anyone else’s behalf. I’m finding answers to research questions that governments and companies also care about. The stories I’ve heard inform my answers. I’m speaking on my own behalf, with my own insights and limitations. In retrospect, I think he was satisfied. He was certainly proud of his kids, every moment of every day, and he let us know this, constantly.

Two things he wanted for me that I will never do: learn to love Debussy and have children. (“But you and David would make such smart babies!” he once bemoaned sweetly.) Two promises I haven’t kept well but intend to: take better care of my car and take a self-defense class. (His “love language” was Rumi and oil changes.) Dad always worried about his ladies’ safety, even if his nerves were set at ease a bit when he saw me settle down a big, strong, gentle guy with an intimidating beard. On that note, I’m setting off on a road trip to my mom. I checked the oil first. Thanks, Dad.