The Stars at Night

12 Sultan 163 B.E. - Tuesday, January 30, 2007

It’s cloudy today. The clouds have covered most of the sky all day. The sun has shown through breaks in the clouds but not very often. This is what I’ve come to think of as a winter sky. In Las Vegas, there is no snow in the valley. In fact, the clouds haven’t even brought rain. It just cloudy and one would think dreary, but it’s not dreary.

The clouds are a blessing, the rain is a blessing and even the snow is a blessing. We don’t often think of snow as a blessing, especially when it causes difficulties, but a blessing doesn’t always mean that there won’t be difficulties.

I started out talking about the winter sky. Now I can stand the warm weather better than the cold weather, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t like winter. There are things about winter and its sky that I like. I especially like the winter constellations. OK, so I probably couldn’t name the constellations much less pick them out, but that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy looking at them.

One of the things I miss about Oklahoma is the winter night sky. I think it’s because I was born after sunset on December 24. According to my birth certificate, I was born far enough after sunset for the stars to be out. I don’t know if this is why I like looking at the winter stars or if it’s just that they sparkle so brightly.

There are cities in the world I would like to visit, just to see the stars at night. Even if they aren’t winter stars I’m looking at I still want to visit and see the stars at night. One of those cities is Bagdad. I’d like to visit that city between April 21 and May 2. That’s because Baha’u’llah declared His mission during those days in 1863 and I’d like to see the stars that looked down on the garden where He was staying there.

There are other cities I’d like to visit just to see the stars at night. Most of those cities have an association with either Baha’u’llah, the Bab, or ‘Abdu’l-Baha. I’d like to see the stars that looked down on those cities. The stars we look at today are the same stars that were seen by Baha’u’llah, the Bab and ‘Abdu’l-Baha.