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CHICAGO STUDIES
LINK WITH THE PAST
In the middle ages in highly Christian cultures superstitious belief placed certain spaces and certain times outside of the ambit of this world. Churches could become places of refuge for criminals of all kinds, even murderers. Architectural design, light streaming through strained-glass windows as well as the mystic rites and symbols its walls enclosed created the impression among the people that the space a church occupied was truly sacral, a little bit of heaven on earth, not a part of this world at all. The hymns they sang in those days reflected the same notion : Alto ex Olympi vertice Summi Parentis Filius Ceu monte desectus lapis Terras in imas decidens, Domus supernae et infunae Utrumque iunxit angulum. Indeed many of the faithful felt that the time they spent at Mass or in other liturgical worship would not be ¡counted by God in the span of their earthly life. They could actually live longer by spending as much time as possible at sacred rites. Such ideas adumbrate in a primitive and undeveloped way the compenetration of worlds which today's consciousness can well embrace and purge of superstitious elements. Experience at times of the other world lying across the terminator of consciousness is a very potent factor in leading men even in today's sophisticated society to wonder and perhaps to affirm with Pierre Teilhard de Chardin that something significant is afoot in the universe. That significant thing can well be seen as a love that is unlimited and surpasses man's wildest imaginings. It is pushing, impelling, guiding and directing the scattered elements of the universe to seek one another, so that not only this world, but also the next may come into being.