Touched by the better angels of our nature

Morning: Psalm 8, 148; Job 38:1-7; Hebrews 1:1-14

Evening: Psalm 104; 2 Kings 6:8-17; Revelation 5:1-14

Today is Michaelmas, the Church’s day to celebrate angels, whom tradition believes are spiritual messengers, or mystic spiritual forces, which act mostly for our good. Yet, one of the 7 archangels (along with Michael, Gabriel, Raphael and the rest) is Lucifer, or Venus, the morning star who got too full of himself and was cast down to the depths (Isaiah 14). When Abraham Lincoln hoped, at his inauguration, that Americans might be “touched by the better angels of (their) nature,” he implied our common spiritual battle. May Lincoln’s hope for America be our prayer for ourselves, and our real experience.