Most of us spend a surprising amount of time trying to picture the world in our minds. It’s hard, because there are physical, mental, and spiritual realities to reconcile.
One handy visualizing tool: Remember the old long playing records? Picture one going around on the turntable. In very the center of the pin that holds the record in place, there is a place that doesn’t move.
Like the “point with no dimension” that is at the heart of Euclidian geometry, the unmoving place on the rotating record is an easy visualization of Aquinas’s concept of “unmoved mover”.
Now, picture the nano-sized soul of every single person on earth standing on the record as it goes around. Those closest to the “unmoved mover” are Roman Catholic saints. Then, there’s an area where the needle swings closer and away from the pin after the music has played. Most Catholics are in there, moving to and from the unmoved mover, but always close.
Beyond them is the innermost song on the record. That section is reserved for those who believe in The Trinity. Beyond them, there are various degrees of semi-Christian thought.
Beyond that, the music grows ever louder and more discordant as we get farther from the calm, unmoving center. People there are loud and discordant, too. As we move farther toward the rim, the speed picks up. Souls are flung off, into the flames below.
