Too powerful not to simply share with you —

In her essay “An Expedition to the Pole,”

Annie Dillard writes about explorers who didn’t make it.

When their skeletons were exhumed,

re­searchers learned a lot about their last days.

For instance, many of them tucked settings of silver into their coats.

When those adventurers braved

the frigid brutalities of the Ant­arctic,

they could not imagine leaving behind

those elegant and weighty trappings of luxury.  

They clutched their family crest etched into the polished metal

even when they didn’t have the sustenance to survive.

This image reminded Dillard of the church.

(by Carol Howard Merritt, sourced at http://www.christiancentury.org/article/2014-09/putting-away-silver)