Chronos was the personification of time and order. The chronology of days, governed by the carefully calculated sweep of the Earth around the sun. Seconds lead to minutes to hours to days to weeks to years to decades to centuries. Everything we do is marked by the steady march of time.
Kairos was the god of the fleeting moment, a moment that must be grasped otherwise the moment is gone and can not be re-captured. It is the "right time" or the "appointed season" and is not marked by the past, the present, or the future. Kairos time is more of a feeling. In contrary to how a clock measures
time, it has a variable duration; ten minutes in traffic is longer than ten minutes reading a good book.Chronos is quantitative; Kairos is qualitative. The scar from surgery to remove my appendix is a reminder of Chronos; the scars on my heart from lost loved ones are a reminder of Kairos. Kronos time is what we live with on a daily basis, what we schedule and make appointments in. Kairos time flows gently, allowing us to be in the moments that nurture our souls.
The clock is always running forward and we simply can not stop its crawl toward the next tick. We spend most of our lives gazing into the future, getting ready for things, making plans. We lose moments to the past, out of our reach, elusive and far away. When we are fortunate, we get to touch yesterdays.
The past can be elusive and far away, but on rare occasions we find it dead-center in front of us, Kairos overruling this finite world of Chronos, reminding us we are not alone, allowing us to feel the human connection with those who were here before us.
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