Compared to a rock, a caterpillar is teeming with life. It can crawl, munch leaves, and watch the view from a shady apple tree branch. It has more legs than all the tables in my house combined and I have never heard one complain.
But its capacity for joy is limited. Although it would be hard to explain it to a caterpillar,
there are things even more pleasant than eating foliage and hiding from birds.
Butterflies take insecthood to a whole new level. Their beauty is stiff competition for a designer garment at any price. Considering how little they notice us I marvel at how calming it is to notice them. Last summer I attended an outdoor wedding, and the fluttering nymphs were like a visible manifestation of the prelude
music.
But back to the caterpillar.
What if someone declared that caterpillars were not worthy of life, and we should make more room for monarchs by exterminating their predecessors? That would be foolish. There would soon be no more monarchs. Caterpillars are the only way I know of to get butterflies.
Easter is a celebration of rebirth. The events of the week before are heavy with betrayal and death, and yet
what emerges from the shroud erases all that. The resurrection of Jesus Christ makes the ground shake, and the power of evil dissolve like angry words spoken into an abyss.
Which is the miracle of the most beautiful Monarch of all.
