Coincidence

I used to tell my 13th-graders that coincidence in history are God’s fingerprints. Things happen that are obviously against the odds.

For example, if I might use a personal anecdote, I rented a room in London in 1973 while doing research which months later I realized was directly across an enclosed garden from someone to whom I was supposed to deliver a sealed pouch of papers on the Arundel family. Coincidence.

In teaching history for 46 years I warned my students against anecdotes, most of specially personal anecdotes. Having said that, history has too many anecdotes about coincidence. Things happen that are statistically improbable.

So, why? It seems to me that we are so limited in our perception of what occurs around us that some sort of universal sentience exists. A sort of galactic even universal sentience exists similar to the Gaia concept.

This would explain coincidence and even life on earth against the odds.
What many call God is the Universe.
Sentient on a scale we can scarcely conceive. So much easier to call it God.

In conclusion, God exists. Life after death obviously exists as atoms are recycled over billions of years between reboots of the Universe.
Our individual selves do not. Yet, it is intriguing to speculate on our soul, the ultimate anecdote, being part of that universal sentience.

Just coincidence?