The migrating Monarch butterfly is the only butterfly among thousands of species that migrates.  This frail creature flies some three and a half thousand kilometres from Canada to Mexico every Fall.  Since they only live for about nine months, none is able to make the trip twice.

Monarchs can clock up to sixty-five kilometres a day, going twice as fast as a person can walk.  However, a more typical average, based on data collected from one swarm's trip from Ontario to central Mexico, is twenty-four kilometres a day.

Recent work at Queens University in Canada has thrown some light on the mystery of how Monarch's find their way.  Scientists built a flight simulator which was able to detect the Monarch's preferred direction of flight.  They concluded that Monarchs use what they called "a sun compass" which enables them to take account of the time of the day and then accurately orient themselves using the position of the sun.  They found that even on a cloudy day Monarchs are able to use polarized light to tell where the sun is and still get oriented.

By varying the time that the lights were turned on and off, scientist were able to shift the internal clock of the Monarchs, and change the setting of their sun compass so that they flew off course.

So next time you see the beautiful Monarch, respect its tenacity.  Flying through many hazards, it still returns to the place its parents visited the previous year.

Monarch butterflies are not the only creatures that can be made to fly off course.  Humans have a long history of veering off in the wrong direction, with some fatal flaw in their moral compass.

There is no shortage of evidence to prove this true.  Just open a newspaper, or turn on the TV, and one tragic story after another, parades before our eyes.  Domestic violence, arson, robbery, murder, all demonstrate that multitudes of people in our modern world no longer know the difference between right and wrong.  Or, if they do know the difference, they seem helpless to readjust their moral compass.  They consistently follow a path that is harmful to themselves, those around them, and society as a whole.

Perhaps, like the butterfly in the experiment, someone has tampered with their sense of direction.

Are we going in the right direction?  Maybe its time to check our inner compass. It may be in need of calibration.

Scientist used artificial lights to temporarily readjust the Monarch butterflies' sense of direction. Getting back under the light of the sun would surely get them back on course.  Remove the false light, and the true light would guide them back.

Could it be that we've lost our moral bearings because we've been following false lights?  Manmade lights? Finding the True Light is the only way of getting back on course.  After all, it was Jesus who said:  "I am the light of the world.  The person who follows me will never live in darkness.  He will have the light that gives light."