The eternal can be well worn, but never worn out. It is always experienced as an over-abundance, an aching paradox between the more-than-can-be-imagined and the never-enough. The eternal cannot be grasped, contained, or experienced at one time, and so Van Goghs are gazed at again and again, and I cannot outgrow Bach’s Cello Suites — I hear more of them in every hearing. Eternity demands repetition, a ritual of again-and-again played out by those seeking it. It seems to follow that if you are looking for Eternity, look where you find ritual. Ritual is repetition that seeks Eternity in the thing repeated.

Consider music. When a song containing a brushstroke of infinity is repeated over the course of a human life, it is neither used up nor worn out; when a song devoid of infinite yearning is repeated, it nauseates. Most pop music — despite making so much money and filling the silence in so many malls — crumbles under the divine test of repetition...