That evening I was in the Abbey alone after the last service and I lit a candle in front of the wooden crucifix. The Abbey was dark apart from the flickering candles. There was an intensity of religious feeling yet I felt it was balanced by an equal rational belief that what was represented by this mere wooden image could not be the source of these billions of stars in a vast universe – Christ could not encompass the Universe, it was just too vast. I felt as if there were two beating opposing forces yet somehow this slim, inconsequential figure was winning the battle, that mere ideas could, if not defeat, go beyond material forces however vast.