Every snap of the fire startled the woman and me, but the padre paid no attention to it; he was completely involved in his task--an instrument of the Virgin, as he had said. He was speaking a strange language, and the words came forth at great speed. He was no longer moving his hands; they simply rested on the man's shoulders.
The ritual stopped as quickly as it had started. The padre turned and gave a conventional blessing, making the sign of the cross with his right hand. "May God be ever here in this house," he said.
And turning to me, he asked that we continue our walk.
"But you haven't had coffee," the woman said, as she saw that we were about to leave.
"If I have coffee now, I won't be able to sleep," the padre answered.
The woman laughed and murmured something like "It's still morning." But we were already on our way.
"Padre, the woman spoke of a young man who cured her husband. Was it he?"
"Yes, it was."
I began to feel uneasy. I remembered the day before, and Bilbao, and the conference in Madrid, and people speaking of miracles, and the presence that I had sensed as we embraced and prayed.
I was in love with a man who was capable of performing cures. A man who could help others, bring relief to suffering, give health to the sick and hope to their loved ones. Was I distracting him from his mission just because it was at odds with my image of a house with white curtains, cherished records, and favorite books?
"Don't blame yourself, my child," the padre said.
"You're reading my mind."
"Yes, I am," the padre said. "I have that gift too, and I try to be worthy of it. The Virgin taught me to penetrate the turmoil of human emotions in order to control them as well as possible."
"Do you perform miracles, too?"
"I am not able to cure. But I have one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit."
"So you can read my heart, Padre. And you know I love him, with a love that is growing every minute. We discovered the world together, and together we remain in it. He has been present every day of my life--whether I wanted him there or not."
What could I say to this priest who was walking beside me? He would never understand that I had had other men, that I had been in love, and that if I had married, I would be happy. Even as a child, I had found and forgotten love in the plaza of Soria.
But the way things looked now, I hadn't forgotten that first love very well. It had taken only three days for all of it to come rushing back.
"I have a right to be happy, Padre. I've recovered what was lost, and I don't want to lose it again. I'm going to fight for my happiness. If I give up the fight, I will also be renouncing my spiritual life. As you said, I would be putting God aside, along with my power and my strength as a woman. I'm going to fight for him, Padre."
I knew what that little man was doing here. He had come to convince me to leave him, because he had a more important mission to accomplish.
No, I couldn't believe that the padre walking at my side wanted us to marry and live in a house like the one in Saint-Savin. The priest had said that to trick me. He wanted me to lower my defenses and then--with a smile--he would convince me of the opposite.
He read my thoughts without saying a word. Or perhaps he was trying to fool me. Maybe he didn't know what others were thinking. The fog was dissipating rapidly, and I could now see the path, the mountain peak, the fields, and the snow-covered trees. My emotions were becoming clearer, as well.
Damn! If it's true that he can read someone's thoughts, then let him read mine and know everything! Let him know that yesterday he wanted to make love to me--that I refused and that now I regret it.
Yesterday I had thought that if he had to leave, I would still at least have the memory of my childhood friend. But that was nonsense. Even though he hadn't entered me, something even more profound had, and it had touched my heart.
"Padre, I love him," I repeated.
"So do I. And love always causes stupidity. In my case, it requires that I try to keep him from his destiny."
"That won't be easy, Padre. And it won't be easy in my case, either. Yesterday, during the prayers at the grotto, I discovered that I too can bring forth these gifts that you were talking about. And I'm going to use them to keep him with me."
"Good luck," said the padre, with a smile. "I hope you can."
He stopped and took a rosary from his pocket. Holding it, he looked into my eyes. "Jesus said that we should not take oaths, and I am not doing so. But I'm telling you, in the presence of all that is sacred to me, that I would not like him to adopt the conventional religious life. I would not like to see him ordained a priest. He can serve God in other ways--at your side."
It was hard for me to believe that he was telling me the truth. But he was.
"He's up there," the padre said.
I turned. I could see a car parked a bit further ahead--the same car we had driven from Spain.
"He always comes on foot," he said, smiling. "This time he wanted to give us the impression that he'd traveled a long way."
THE SNOW WAS SOAKING my sneakers. But the padre was wearing only open sandals with woolen socks. I decided not to complain--if he could stand it, so could I. We began to hike toward the top of the mountains.
"How long will it take us?"
"Half an hour at the most."
"Where are we going?"
"To meet with him. And others."
I could see that he didn't want to say any more. Maybe he needed all of his energy for climbing. We walked along in silence--the fog had by now disappeared almost completely, and the yellow disk of the sun was coming into view.
For the first time I had a view of the entire valley; there was a river running through it, some scattered villages, and Saint-Savin, looking as though it were pasted against the slope of the mountain. I could make out the tower of the church, a cemetery I had not noticed before, and the medieval houses looking down on the river.
A bit below us, at a point we had already passed, a shepherd was tending his flock of sheep.
"I'm tired," the padre said. "Let's stop for a while."
We brushed the snow from the top of a boulder and rested against it. He was perspiring--and his feet must have been frozen.
"May Santiago preserve my strength, because I still want to walk his path one more time," said the padre, turning to me.
I didn't understand his comment, so I decided to change the subject. "There are footsteps in the snow."
"Some are those of hunters. Others are of men and women who want to relive a tradition."
"Which tradition?"
"The same as that of Saint Savin. Retreat from the world, come to these mountains, and contemplate the glory of God."
"Padre, there's something I need to understand. Until yesterday, I was with a man who couldn't choose between the religious life and marriage. Today, I learn that this same man performs miracles."
"We all perform miracles," he said. "Jesus said, 'If our faith is the size of a mustard seed, we will say to the mountain, "Move!" And it will move.'"
"I don't want a lesson in religion, Padre. I'm in love with a man, and I want to know more about him, understand him, help him. I don't care what everyone else can do or can't do."
The padre took a deep breath. He hesitated for a moment and then said, "A scientist who studied monkeys on an island in Indonesia was able to teach a certain one to wash bananas in the river before eating them. Cleansed of sand and dirt, the food was more flavorful. The scientist--who did this only because he was studying the learning capacity of monkeys--did not imagine what would eventually happen. So he was surprised to see that the other monkeys on the island began to imitate the first one.
"And then, one day, when a certain number of monkeys had learned to wash their bananas, the monkeys on all of the other islands in the archipelago began to do the same thing. What was most surprising, though, was that the other monkeys learned to do so without having had any contact with the island wh
ere the experiment had been conducted."
He stopped. "Do you understand?"
"No," I answered.
"There are several similar scientific studies. The most common explanation is that when a certain number of people evolve, the entire human race begins to evolve. We don't know how many people are needed--but we know that's how it works."
"Like the story of the Immaculate Conception," I said. "The vision appeared for the wise men at the Vatican and for the simple farmer."
"The world itself has a soul, and at a certain moment, that soul acts on everyone and everything at the same time."
"A feminine soul."
He laughed, without saying just what he was laughing about.
"By the way, the dogma of the Immaculate Conception was not just a Vatican matter," he said. "Eight million people signed a petition to the pope, asking that it be recognized. The signatures came from all over the world."
"Is that the first step, Padre?"
"What do you mean?"
"The first step toward having Our Lady recognized as the incarnation of the feminine face of God? After all, we already accept the fact that Jesus was the incarnation of His masculine side."
"And so...?"
"How much time must pass before we accept a Holy Trinity that includes a woman? The Trinity of the Holy Spirit, the Mother, and the Son?"
"Let's move on. It's too cold for us to stand here," he said. "A little while ago, you noticed my sandals."
"Have you been reading my mind?" I asked.
"I'm going to tell you part of the story of the founding of our religious order," he said. "We are barefoot Carmelites, according to the rules established by Saint Teresa of Avila. The sandals are a part of the story, for if one can dominate the body, one can dominate the spirit.
"Teresa was a beautiful woman, placed by her father in a convent so that she would receive a pure education. One day, when she was walking along a corridor, she began to speak with Jesus. Her ecstasies were so strong and deep that she surrendered totally to them, and in a short time, her life had been completely changed. She felt that the Carmelite convents had become nothing more than marriage brokerages, and she decided to create an order that would once again follow the original teachings of Christ and the Carmelites.
"Saint Teresa had to conquer herself, and she had to confront the great powers of her day--the church and the state. But she was determined to press on, because she was convinced that she had a mission to perform.
"One day--just when Teresa felt her soul to be weakening--a woman in tattered clothing appeared at the house where she was staying. The woman wanted to speak with Teresa, no matter what. The owner of the house offered the woman some alms, but the woman refused them; she would not go away until she had spoken with Teresa.
"For three days, the woman waited outside the house, without eating or drinking. Finally Teresa, out of sympathy, bade the woman come in.
"'No,' said the owner of the house. 'The woman is mad.'
"'If I were to listen to everyone, I'd wind up thinking that I'm the crazy one,' Teresa answered. 'It may be that this woman has the same kind of madness as I: that of Christ on the cross.'"
"Saint Teresa spoke with Christ," I said.
"Yes," he answered. "But to get back to our story: the woman was brought to Teresa. She said that her name was Maria de Jesus Yepes and that she was from Granada. She was a Carmelite novice, and the Virgin had appeared and asked that she found a convent that followed the primitive rules of the order."
Like Saint Teresa, I thought.
"Maria de Jesus left the convent on the day of her vision and began walking barefoot to Rome. Her pilgrimage lasted two years--and for that entire period, she slept outdoors, in the heat and the cold, living on alms and the charity of others. It was a miracle that she made it. But it was an even greater miracle that she was received by Pope Pius IV. Because the pope, just like Maria de Jesus, Teresa, and many others, was thinking of the same thing," he finished.
Just as Bernadette had known nothing of the Vatican's decision and the monkeys from the other islands couldn't have known about the experiment that was being conducted, so Maria de Jesus and Teresa knew nothing of what the other was planning.
Something was beginning to make sense to me.
We were now walking through a forest. With the fog all but gone, the highest tree branches, covered with snow, were receiving the first rays of the sun.
"I think I know where you're going with this, Padre."
"Yes. The world is at a point when many people are receiving the same order: 'Follow your dreams, transform your life, take the path that leads to God. Perform your miracles. Cure. Make prophecies. Listen to your guardian angel. Transform yourself. Be a warrior, and be happy as you wage the good fight. Take risks.'"
Sunshine was everywhere. The snow was glistening, and the glare hurt my eyes. Yet at the same time, it seemed to support what the priest was saying.
"And what does all this have to do with him?"
"I've told you the heroic side of the story. But you don't know anything about the soul of these heroes."
He paused.
"The suffering," he picked up again. "At moments of transformation, martyrs are born. Before a person can follow his dream, others have to make sacrifices. They have to confront ridicule, persecution, and attempts to discredit what they are trying to do."
"It was the church that burned the witches at the stake, Padre."
"Right. And Rome threw the Christians to the lions. But those who died at the stake or in the sand of the arena rose quickly to eternal glory--they were better off.
"Nowadays, warriors of the light confront something worse than the honorable death of the martyrs. They are consumed, bit by bit, by shame and humiliation. That's how it was with Saint Teresa--who suffered for the rest of her life. That's how it was for Maria de Jesus, too. And for the happy children who saw Our Lady in Fatima, Portugal--well, Jacinta and Francisco died just a few months later; Lucia entered a convent from which she never emerged."
"But that's not how it was for Bernadette."
"Yes, it was. She had to live through prison, humiliation, and discredit. He must have described that to you. He must have told you the words of the visitation."
"Some of them."
"In the visitations at Lourdes, the phrases uttered by Our Lady wouldn't fill half a page of a notebook, but one of the things the Virgin said clearly to the girl was 'I do not promise you happiness in this world.' Why did she warn Bernadette? Because she knew the pain that awaited Bernadette if she accepted her mission."
I looked at the sun, the snow, and the bare branches of the trees.
"He is a revolutionary," he continued, sounding humble. "He has the power, and he converses with Our Lady. If he is able to concentrate his forces well, he can be one of the leaders in the spiritual transformation of the human race. This is a critical point in the history of the world.
"But if he chooses this path, he is going to go through a great deal of suffering. His revelations have come to him before their time. I know the human soul well enough to know what he can expect."
The padre turned to me and held me by the shoulders. "Please," he said. "Keep him from the suffering and tragedy that lie in store for him. He will not be able to survive them."
"I understand your love for him, Padre."
He shook his head. "No, no. You don't understand anything. You are still too young to know the evils of the world. At this point, you see yourself as a revolutionary too. You want to change the world with him, open new paths, see the story of your love for each other become legend--a story passed down through the generations. You still think that love can conquer all."
"Well, can't it?"
"Yes, it can. But it conquers at the right time--after the celestial battles have ended."
"But I love him. I don't have to wait for the celestial battles to end for my love to win out."
He gazed into the distance.
/> "On the banks of the rivers of Babylon, we sat down and wept," he said, as if talking to himself. "On the willows there, we hung up our harps."
"How sad," I answered.
"Those are the first lines of one of the psalms. It tells of exile and of those who want to return to the promised land but cannot. And that exile is still going to last for a long time. What can I do to try to prevent the suffering of someone who wants to return to paradise before it is time to do so?"
"Nothing, Padre. Absolutely nothing."
THERE HE IS," said the padre.
I saw him. He was about two hundred yards from me, kneeling in the snow. He was shirtless, and even from that distance, I could see that his skin was red with the cold.
His head was bowed and his hands joined in prayer. I don't know if I was influenced by the ritual I had attended the night before or by the woman who had been gathering hay, but I felt that I was looking at someone with an incredible spiritual force. Someone who was no longer of this world--who lived in communion with God and with the enlightened spirits of heaven. The brilliance of the snow seemed to strengthen this perception.
"At this moment, there are others like him," said the priest. "In constant adoration, communing with God and the Virgin. Hearing the angels, the saints, the prophecies and words of wisdom, and transmitting all of that to a small gathering of the faithful. As long as they continue in this way, there won't be a problem.
"But he is not going to remain here. He is going to travel the world, preaching the concept of the Great Mother. The church is not yet ready for that. And the world has stones at hand to hurl at those who first introduce the subject."
"And it has flowers to throw on those who come afterward."
"Yes. But that's not what will happen to him."
The priest began to approach him.
"Where are you going?"
"To bring him out of his trance. To tell him how much I like you. To say that I give my blessing to your union. I want to do that here, in this place, which for him is sacred."
I began to feel sick with an inexplicable fear.
"I have to think, Padre. I don't know if this is right."