I live and love in God's peculiar light.

Host: The sunset lay broken upon the surface of the Arno River, scattering shards of amber and gold across the ancient stones of Florence. The air smelled faintly of rain and oil paint, and the sky burned with that peculiar luminosity only artists seem to notice — the kind that doesn’t just illuminate, but reveals. Inside a small studio tucked between two worn cathedrals, Jack and Jeeny stood among canvases, chisels, and half-finished statues. Dust floated like tiny spirits in the light.

Jack leaned against a worktable, a glass of cheap red wine in his hand. His eyes, gray and tired, reflected the waning daylight. Jeeny sat on the edge of a wooden stool, her hands folded around a cup of black coffee, the steam rising like breath from the soul of the room.

Host: On the wall hung a small piece of parchment — Michelangelo’s words scribbled in calligraphic ink: “I live and love in God’s peculiar light.” It was the only thing not covered in dust.

Jeeny: “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Her voice was soft, almost reverent. “Michelangelo saw something divine in the act of creating — as if God’s light was not just around him, but inside the stone, inside the paint, inside the flesh of what he made.”

Jack: He smirked faintly, swirling his wine. “Or maybe he was just romanticizing his own obsession. ‘Peculiar light,’ Jeeny — that’s what madness looks like when you dress it in poetry.”

Host: A faint wind brushed through the window cracks, making the flame of a candle tremble between them.

Jeeny: “You call it madness. I call it faith. He worked for decades carving marble that no one else dared touch. He said he was only freeing the angel trapped inside the stone. Isn’t that living in a peculiar kind of light — one that sees beyond what’s visible?”

Jack: “Or one that refuses to see what’s real.” He set the glass down, the sound sharp against the table. “You think light always comes from heaven, but most of it comes from torches we build ourselves. Michelangelo wasn’t guided by God — he was guided by his own torment, his own ego, the need to be remembered.”

Host: The silence stretched, filled with the sound of distant bells from the cathedral. The room felt caught between sacred and profane — like a confessional carved out of stone and dusk.

Jeeny: “Do you really think that? That ego built the Sistine Chapel? That selfishness carved David?”

Jack: “I think human will did. Not divine inspiration. You want to believe God whispered in his ear, but I see a man who refused to be ordinary. That’s not holiness, Jeeny — that’s hunger.”

Jeeny: “But even hunger can be holy when it creates beauty. You think light and darkness are enemies, but sometimes they belong to each other. Don’t you remember Van Gogh? He painted the night sky as if it were alive — all swirls, all fire — even while he was losing his mind. He called it ‘a longing for the infinite.’ That’s God’s peculiar light too — not the kind that saves you, but the kind that burns you into understanding.”

Host: Jeeny’s eyes shone in the dim light, not from tears, but from that rare fervor born of conviction. Jack watched her, and for a moment, his defenses flickered — the way an old flame flickers before dying out.

Jack: “Understanding? Or delusion? Van Gogh didn’t find God in that light — he found madness, and it killed him.”

Jeeny: “And yet, through that madness, the world saw stars it had never seen before. His pain wasn’t wasted, Jack. Neither was Michelangelo’s. The peculiar light doesn’t promise comfort — it promises truth, even if it hurts.”

Host: The wind picked up, rattling the old windowpane. Dust stirred around them, like ash in a forgotten cathedral. Jack stood up, pacing slowly between the sculptures, his shadow sliding across marble faces frozen in ecstasy and suffering.

Jack: “Truth? You speak as if pain has purpose by default. But for every Michelangelo, for every Van Gogh, there are thousands who suffer in silence, unseen. You can’t romanticize suffering just because a few turned it into art. Most people live and die under that same peculiar light — and it burns them to nothing.”

Jeeny: “Maybe that’s because they stop looking at the light. Because they forget that love and creation are acts of rebellion against the darkness.”

Host: The room pulsed with the weight of her words. Jack turned, his jaw tightening, eyes glinting like cold steel.

Jack: “Love is not rebellion, Jeeny. It’s chemistry. Neurons firing, dopamine flooding the brain. And when it fades, what’s left? Dust. Just like this studio. You keep chasing God’s peculiar light, but all it does is blind you to the simplicity of being human.”

Jeeny: She rose, her voice trembling but steady. “And you keep hiding behind logic to avoid what you’re afraid to feel. You call it human — I call it cowardice.”

Host: The candle flame leaped as if startled by her words. For a moment, it painted Jack’s face with two halves — one in shadow, one in light.

Jack: “Cowardice? You think I don’t want to believe there’s something more? I’ve watched people pray over dying children, Jeeny. I’ve watched them whisper to the ceiling, asking for light — and the ceiling never whispered back. You tell me that’s God’s peculiar light? No. That’s the universe, silent and indifferent.”

Jeeny: “And yet, even in that silence, they pray. Isn’t that the miracle? That we still love, still hope, still create, even when the heavens are mute? Maybe God’s peculiar light isn’t something that saves us — maybe it’s the very courage to go on in spite of the silence.”

Host: Her words hung in the air like incense — fragrant, fading slowly, almost unbearable in its honesty. Jack’s shoulders dropped slightly, his breath visible in the cooling air. The city lights began to shimmer through the window, blending with the orange glow of dusk.

Jack: Quietly now. “You make it sound… almost beautiful. To live in that kind of uncertainty.”

Jeeny: “It is beautiful, Jack. Because it’s real. Because it’s human. Michelangelo wasn’t painting certainty — he was painting awe. That’s the light he meant — the strange glow that exists when faith and doubt hold hands.”

Host: Jack’s hand brushed against a marble torso, its surface cold but smooth. He looked at it for a long moment, as though searching for the angel Michelangelo once claimed was trapped within.

Jack: “Maybe… that’s why I keep coming back here. To this studio. To these faces. Maybe I’m still trying to find that light — just not in the same place you do.”

Jeeny: She smiled faintly, her voice softening. “Then maybe you’re closer to it than you think.”

Host: Outside, the last rays of the sun slipped beneath the horizon, leaving only the soft luminescence of the city — warm, uneven, alive. The candle flickered one last time, then steadied. The peculiar light filled the room again, not from above, but from within — reflecting off the faces of two people who, for a brief moment, had both found truth in each other’s shadow.

Host: And there, amid stone and silence, the peculiar light of God — or love, or art, or simply being — kept burning, quietly, impossibly, real.