The James Webb Space Telescope Took a Photo Us, Too

The Day We Saw Clearly our Shared Ache for Awe, Humbleness, and Hope

SMALL STORIES ABOUT BIG THINGS SPECIAL EDITION: I usually publish only on Fridays, but this week I wanted to offer one more. Enjoy!

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The first images back from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) are stunning, and that word is a deep disservice to just how profound a thing we are glimpsing.

And though I was never the kid to put sticky planets on my bedroom ceiling or even collect Stars Wars figures, just yesterday I googled “Tickets to the Houston Space Center,” as I readily plan to join the mass of people whose curiosity about all things space are is rapidly rising.

“Curiosity,” too, is a disservice to our collective reaction to these first photos. It’s far more than that.

I noticed within 48 hours of the published images, people all over social media were posting their reactions of awe.

Two of my Facebook friends changed their profile’s background image to the photo of the Carina Nebula.

(Carina Nebula)

And you know what? It would be difficult to find two people more diametrically opposed in just about every way. Age, work, geography, politics. Definitely politics.

And yet right now the image they want associated with their Facebook profile page is exactly the same.

And that’s when it struck me: yes, the JWST took photos of the deep recesses of time and space…but it also probed the deep recesses of humanity’s soul, and took a picture.

You know what it captured in that soul photo?

Our collective longing for awe, humbleness, and hope.

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Awe:

Consider how many of us from all walks of life quite literally sobbed upon seeing the photos? (how moving to see these scientists react to seeing the first images)

It was like the photos cut through our shared malaise of anxiety and declared,

“Just be amazed.”

“Just…Be…Amazed.”

Amazed at what the human mind given in a collective, shared, long-term effort can accomplish (JWST!). And amazed most especially at how much mystery, beauty, and depth lies so far beyond anything we could ever grasp or produce.

And like tasting vegetables fresh from the garden after years of processed potato chips, our soul awoke to a goodness we had forgotten about…and deeply needed. The tears were proof.

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Humility:

The corollary to awe, of course, is humility.

Consider how Nadia Bolz-Weber put it on her Twitter feed:

“I thought we could start a list of things that make no sense whatsoever in light of these images of our universe from 13 billion light years away...I'll start: NATIONALISM. Now, you go... #EarthlingsUnite @NASAWebb”¹

How funny and small the lines in the sand and land we make in light of how big it all is. To use a dated, not-nearly-serious-enough movie reference, the JWST photos make all-the-more clear that we live our days as the children in Honey I Shrunk the Kids who get shrunk and find that ants and blades of grass tower over them.

(Us under a blade of grass).

We’re small.
Super small.
And for the moment, we all know it again.

And honestly, there is something refreshing in the collective humbleness this invites.

It’s disarming. And we could use a lot more of that posture right now.

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Hope:

Consider how vibrant the light of those photos! In the deepest recesses of space and time (that we know of so far) we find not a deep darkness but stunning, complex, and dancing light radiating from billions of years.

(So, everything in the image above that does not have spikes coming off of it is a galaxy. Galaxy(!) There really are no words.)

In these times where despair comes all-too-easily, did not our souls take note that upon probing the depths of darkness we found light? A stunning abundance, actually.

And is it a coincidence that when trying to put words to the experience of seeing these photos, people from all walks of life discovered themselves reaching for a word we usually overuse in Pollyann-ish blindness to our times or never use because the cynicism is just too calcified?

The word was “hope.”

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Who knows what photos JWST will yet produce. I’m eager to find out! For the time being, though, I’ll continue marveling at the ones we have.

As well as at the one it took of all of us.

For that one makes clear our shared ache for
awe,
humbleness,
and hope…
…and what a gift it is when the soul is freshly fed upon those.

1. Bolz-Weber posted a few of the Twitter feed responses she received to her question: “Self-aggrandizement, Superiority, My concern with shaping my eyebrows, The "better than you" mentality, Having a nice lawn, If I disappoint my family, Covid weight, Obsession with which bathroom everyone is using, Racism, Obsessing over achieving the “perfect” body shape, and Using the word "awesome" to describe human-made things, acts.”