What A Beautiful World: Finding Hope in Our Time

There’s a difference between optimism and hope.

The following essay is adapted from a sermon given during Lent in 2021.

A few years ago when my husband Daniel and I were back in my native state of Michigan, we went to the Grand Rapids Public Museum which is in downtown Grand Rapids. They had this interesting exhibits about midcentury design in Michigan. We are both suckers for mid-century modern anything so we were in our element.

I can remember seeing some examples of furniture designed by Charles and Ray Eames for Herman Miller, pictures of the General Motors Design Center in Warren, Michigan which was built in 1958 and had this futuristic architecture that showed that the biggest manufacturer in the state was looking forward. In fact, that exhibit screamed optimism. There is this sense that the future is truly bright. In fact, this was the time of what was called the International Geophysical Year.

The IGY was a year-long event in 1957–58 and it was a time when the Communist East and the Democratic West participated in an international scientific exchange. That event launched many innovations that are still around today. Both the US and the USSR used the year to launch their first satellites into space. Plate tectonics was also discovered during this…