The Hooded One

Dear God, how sinful I must have been in my past incarnation! I am sure that I have lived before and will live again tomorrow, there is no other explanation for the continued contrariness of my existence. God is Just and is Good, and He does not want the last of His sheep to go astray and, a spirit gets weary, like the weariness of my soul from having suffered so much.

What have I done in this world? Suffer! What about my poor mother, she either died giving birth to me, or someone killed her, or she was told to remain silent regarding my birth!

Who knows? A profound mystery has concealed the circumstances of my birth. Who gave me my first nourishment? This I do not know. I do not even remember any woman rocking my cradle. My first laughter made no one smile; the only thing that I remember about my early years was having men dressed in black [monks] around my bed when I woke up. Not one word of tenderness did my ears hear, nor one caress did I receive. The only thing I recall is being left alone in a spacious room with the parents (beautiful dogs from Terranova) of my faithful Sultan, they were my only companions.
During the afternoon in the summer time, the hour of siesta, my greatest pleasure was to lay my head on the body of Zoa [Sultan's mother] and that patient animal remained still and quiet the whole time that I rested.
These were the only pleasures of my childhood. No one ever punished me, but, no one ever told me, “I am pleased with you.” Only Zoa licked my hands, and only Lion [Sultan's father] pulled me by my habit and then started to run, as if saying, “Come run with me!”. I ran with both of them, and then, that is when I felt the pleasures of life!
When I left the confinement of the monastery, not one tear was shed for me. They only told me, "Fulfill your obligations." As a remembrance of my childhood, they gave me Sultan, then but a playful puppy. I then entered an era of my life that was less sad than my youth but still, was always sad.
Being a lover of justice, my honest ways upset my companions, who pointed their fingers at me as being contrary and bothersome. So they confined me to a parish where I spent more than half of my life. When calmness came over my mind, and a sweet melancholia left me submerged in mystical meditation, it is then that my soul enjoyed some hours of serene moral sleep.
Then, I would be called away to the neighboring city to bless a marriage, or receive a confession from some one dying, or render assistance to a criminal offender awaiting execution; always busy, never being able to carry out any plans of my own to conclusion, no matter how simple they might be. I have always been an inoffensive soul, loving children, consoling the grieved, and fulfilling faithfully the vows that I had taken. Why this dull struggle? Why do these conflicts continue? If my spirit has no right to be like other individuals in this existence, why has God (Who is all Love) made me live this terrible lonely way? Oh, my own torments tell me I have lived before! If I did not believe in a past life, I would have to negate God! And I cannot negate Life. But, oh, how I have suffered! Only one time was I able to do what I wanted, giving vent to my spiritual energy, and how happy I was!
Oh God, the forces of my soul cannot be made useless in one short plane of existence. I will live tomorrow; I will return to earth again and be a man of my own free will! I proclaim that I will not be living among men subordinate to rigid methods. I will proclaim Your glory in the academies and universities, and in all the temples of knowledge, and in all the laboratories of science! I will be one of your priests, one of your apostles, without any other promises but to follow the laws of Your Gospel!
I will love, because You have taught us to love. I will create a family because You said ‘Grow and multiply’. I'll dress the orphans, as You dress the flowers of the valley. I will give shelter to travelers, like You shelter birds in the branches of Your trees. I will spread the light of Your Truth, like You spread warmth and Life, with Your multiple suns in Your infinite universes. Oh yes, I will live again, because if I were not to live tomorrow, I would be denying Your Justice, dear God!
I cannot be but a simple instrument to carry out the will of others, because why have You given me knowledge and free will? If everything fulfills its job in the universe, then my initiative will fulfill its job as well. I have never been happy with man's laws! When, when, will I be permitted to live?
How many times dear Lord, have I gone to hear the confessions of accused felons awaiting execution? However, if I could have, I would have taken those poor men to my parish, and shared what little bread I had with them! How many suffering spirits have confided in me their secret thoughts? And many is the time that I've noted more ignorance, on their part, than criminality! Poor disadvantaged ones!
One night as I rested on my cot, with Sultan as usual at its foot, I was neither asleep nor awake, but all the time thinking of her, my adored deceased one, the pale girl with the black curls. When all of a sudden Sultan sprang up growling, and he put his paws on my pillow looking at me, as if saying with his intelligent stare,“Listen”, but I did not hear anything. I pulled on one of his ears and said, “You are dreaming my friend”, but he continued looking at me, when in the distance, I heard noise. Then, I heard the galloping of many horses which made the houses in the parish tremble.
I heard a hard knocking on the rectory door. Miguel, the caretaker, got up and hurriedly went to see who it was. He then came to me and said with some fright, “Sir, they are coming to apprehend us, there are many soldiers with their captain at the door, and he wants to see you!”
“Let them enter”, I answered.
Shortly, a captain with crude features, but honest-looking, came before me and said, “I am sorry to bother you Father at this inconvenient time disturbing your sleep, but a prisoner escaped from jail several days ago, he was to go to the town of Tolon to finish his sentence. We have been looking for him without any luck. So, we have come here to look for him at the foot of these mountains that are near your parish. We have been told that you own a dog that has a fine nose for scent, and that nothing can escape him. I am here to borrow your dog to see if he can find the prisoner. I also have been told that you love this dog very much, so I promise that he will come to no harm.”
I looked at Sultan and said to the captain, “No problem, we will wait till dawn, in the meantime rest the remaining two hours of the night here in my parish, and before the sun rises I will call you.”
“I have orders to waste not one minute in my search. And I will not do so!” said the captain.
I, who did not want them to find that poor soul, looked at Sultan attentively. He seemed to understand my thinking and he moved his head as if agreeing with my thoughts, then he got his collar made of leather with steel points on it, and he pushed his head into it. The captain, looking at what he had done said, ”What a wonderful animal!” Shortly after they left, I remained behind praying to our Supreme Being, so that on that one occasion, my faithful Sultan would not discover any trace of the prisoner.
The following day in the late afternoon, the captain in a bad mood came to me and said, “I bring bad news, I have not found the prisoner and lost your dog! In the one hour when we stopped to rest, he disappeared and that's something that I am really sorry for because he is a dog who is priceless. How intelligent he is! We could have been here hours ago, but we were looking for your dog.”
I asked the captain to have dinner with me, and he commenced to tell me about the task that lay ahead for him. During this time, not knowing why, I did not feel disturbed by the absence of Sultan. After awhile, we retired for the night. I left my door half open to my room and I laid down and started to read, when about nine in the evening Sultan presented himself. I took off his collar and he caressed me gently, afterwards he placed his head between my knees and started to growl softly, he pulled on my cassock and looked at me, as if saying, “Come with me!”
I thought of the escaped criminal, and said to myself, no matter what happens, I am going to follow Sultan and take some provisions with me. I took some bread, wine and a bottle of scented water, and a lantern which I hid under my cape. I left making the least noise possible.
Meanwhile, Miguel slept soundly.
When I found myself in the country, I felt my being overcome by extraordinary emotion. I stopped briefly, to give thanks to God for these moments in which He granted me complete liberty of action. I felt agile and my eyes could see farther than usual. It was a beautiful spring time evening, and the multiple stars in the sky, looked like an army of suns who were celebrating in the sky a ‘festival of lights’. They were so brilliant that their luminous rays came down to earth. It seemed as if Mother Nature was allying itself with me to do a good deed; everything seemed to be smiling and my soul did too. But Sultan was impatient, and he disturbed my moment of meditation by pulling on my cape with all his strength. I followed him and soon found myself in some deep woods close to our local cemetery. All the while Sultan had been guiding me, my lantern and I, seemed so insignificant compared to all that darkness.
I followed him into a dark large cave, and within its depths was a pile of dry branches in the shape of a pyramid. And behind that foliage, was a man, who seemed dead, he appeared so still. He looked awful, almost nude, rigid and frozen! The first thing that I did was to put the lantern down on the floor with the bread, the wine, and the water and, with great effort I tried to pull him from behind those branches. I succeeded in pulling him towards the center of the cave.
When I got him well situated with his head on a bunch of soft branches, Sultan had started to lick the chest of that poor creature. Then taking a cloth, I started to clean him, applying the scented water I had brought, to his face. I pressed my head to his chest and felt a weak heartbeat. Sultan in the meantime tried to do what he could to revive that poor man, licking him all over and rubbing against that sick one with his head. Finally, that almost dead creature opened his eyes, but closed them shortly thereafter, breathing with great anguish.
I then sat on the floor gently placing his head on my lap, and asked God for the resurrection of that poor creature. God heard me and the sick one opened his eyes, and feeling himself caressed looked at me with great astonishment. He also looked at Sultan who was warming his knees by laying on them. I placed by his mouth the gourd of wine I had brought and told him to drink. I did not have to ask again, he drank with eagerness, again he closed his eyes as if trying to organize his thoughts. He then tried to get up, and I helped him by holding him by his waist and placed his head on my shoulders. At the same time, I broke a piece of bread and presented it to him, telling him, “Make an effort to try and eat.” The sick one devoured the bread and drank feverishly.
Drinking again, he asked me, “Who are you?”
“A person that cares for you very much”, I said.
“Who likes me? How? No one has ever liked me.”
“I like you and I had prayed to God so that your pursuers would not find you because I believe you are the one who was to go to the prison in Tolon.”
The sick man was shocked and looking at me with firmness, told me with a hoarse voice filled with distrust, “Do not fool me because if you do, it will cost you dearly. I am a man of iron.”
And he wanted to get up but I held him down and told him, “Do not worry, I want to save you. Trust in me. Some day you will thank Providence for my help. But now, tell me how is it that you find yourself here?”
“Because I know these mountains well, and I told myself when I escaped from the jail, that I would hide out in one of its caves and live there for a while, but I did not count on hunger. Plus I don’t know what other sickness I may have, I have terrible headaches, like the pounding of hammers in my head. So I threw myself where you found me and covered myself with some branches that I found. After, I don’t remember anything and if it were not for you I would be dead.”
“Do you think that you have enough strength to walk?”
“Now yes, I do not know what has happened, since I have always been a man of steel.” And he briskly got up.
“Well hold on to me, and let’s get out of here. What is your name? ” I asked.
“John” he said.
“Well, look John, make believe that this night you have been born again, so that you will be forever grateful before the eyes of God.”
Guided by Sultan, we left the cave which had many twists and turns. We passed the gorge and arriving on even ground, I extended my hand to my companion and told him, ‘‘Look, John, look at that expanse before you and bless the greatness of God.”
“But... where are we going? he asked with suspicion.
“To my house. I will hide you in my private room where no one ever enters. There you will rest and later we will talk.”
John let himself be led, and soon we arrived at the entrance of my rectory just before dawn. I took him to my room and made a bed for him, and told him to lay down. While I took care of him, with much concern, for three days. He would look at me but he did not realize what was happening around him.
On the third night, while the inhabitants of my parish slept, John and I, accompanied by my inseparable dog Sultan, went to where a hermit had been living. The place was now abandoned because of his demise many years ago, and in front of the ruins of the altar, John and I sat on a rock, with Sultan by my feet. John, who was a disagreeable type with a fierce countenance, was bewildered and looked at me out of the corner of his eye. But at the same time, he appeared contented with the way I had proceeded so far, because there were moments when with his eyes he showed he was humbly grateful to me.
I tried to dominate him with my will, and told him, “Listen, John. I believe myself to be very happy being able to save you from a sure death, where you would have either died of hunger or, been turned over to the authorities where you would have daily died a thousand deaths in Tolon. So, tell me about your whole life, and tell me the truth.”
“There is little to relate about my life. My mother was a prostitute and my father a thief. In the gang that my father led, there was an Italian who was very smart, who taught me to read and write when I was at an early age because he said that I would be good at falsifying documents. It’s true, I am a very good at it and have falsified a good many.”
He continued, “About ten years ago, I got to know this woman and told her what I have already confessed to you, and she, who came from an honorable family, rejected me. I pleaded with her to reconsider and I promised to take her to America where I would change for the better but it was all in vain. She told me she hated me and would turn me in to the authorities if I kept bothering her. That's when I swore that I would kill her and a short time afterwards, I kept my promise. Vehement suspicions feel upon me, and for that crime and for other atrocities, I was condemned to hard labor for the rest of my life.”
“And has there ever been a time when you have thought of God?” I inquired.
“Yes, when I wanted Margarita. I prayed to God to soften that woman’s heart of stone. But, due to my crazy passion, nothing came of it but me becoming her murderer. Meanwhile, as I saw other men, sons of good families, get married, surrounded by their relatives, and respected by all, and while I, disdained by all, persecuted by the authorities, my mother died in prison and my father was killed trying to escape from prison, I've hated the world and God, Who caused me to be born in such a low social status.”
“And now, what do you intend to do?” I asked.
“I do not know,” he said.
“Do you wish to remain here? I will daily bring you food, clothes, books, a bed and whatever is necessary. I'll pass along the word that a nobleman, repenting of an immoral life, wishes to pass some time here doing penance. And under cover of the church’s authority, you can live a peaceful life. No one will disturb your repose. So that no one will recognize you, I'll get you some clothes with a cape and a mask with holes in it for your eyes, so you can use it in the day.
At night, when all is at rest, you may go about freely. You can elevate your prayers to God on top of this mountain, and lift your spirit with wings of faith.”
“If you abandon this haven of salvation you will find only a life of misfortune, and a violent death, but if you listen to my advice your soul will regenerate and your spirit will be enriched because it will be fortified by repentance. And when you become a real man, when all that remains from your past is sorrow and shame for having committed offenses, then I will supply other means for you to pass your life so that you will be useful to society, because here alone you can only benefit yourself, and when one loves God, it is also necessary to love your fellow man and serve them. I will now leave you, but I will return tomorrow, and then you can give me your decision.”
John did not reply, but he wanted to place himself at my feet. I brought him up into my arms, and held him close to my heart. That poor man! He and I remained embraced for a long while. Blessed tears came forth for the first time from those dry and menacing eyes. Then I said, “John, you have already baptized yourself this night with your tears, and, have lost the name of criminal. In your new life you will be known as the ‘Hooded One’.”
A most satisfactory ending to this situation crowned my greatest desires. When after only two months in seclusion, John now looked like a different man. Religious mysticism empowered him, which I encouraged when I could, because for certain spirits formality is needed. When inspiration is lacking, routine does wonders for some. Where there is no spontaneous faith, superstition can create it, the point is, to accustom the soul to live in awe of God; for those who cannot love God, it is indispensable to fear Him. This is so they can recognize His Power, whether one is content or in sorrow. The idea of knowing God must be awakened in humanity and according to the advancement of the spirit, different means must be used.
For John, isolation, gentleness, and repose, worked wonders for his unhealthy soul, so scorned by society and despised by a woman who had made him a murderer. Nevertheless, his attention to his unfortunate circumstances and its interpretation has conducted him to submit to God and to tremble humbly before His Grandeur.
In the afternoons, after my visits to the cemetery, I would go up to see him, and how happy was my soul, seeing him at peace in his solitude. In my mind, I imagined all the poor, desperate convicts, worn out with fatigue, cursing their existence without even remembering God, and I comparing them to him, that repentant criminal, who now daily blessed the mercy of the Creator.
When I felt that spirit was ready to place himself anew in contact with the world, I surrendered to him what limited savings I had in order to pay for his passage on a boat to the New World [America], also carrying thirty missionaries, and I recommended him to the head of that saintly expedition. I told John, as I gave him a departing embrace, “My son, work and raise a family, and fulfill your obligations in accordance with the Laws of God!”
I will never forget the look of gratefulness that John gave me as he left, because it has compensated me for all the bitterness I had gone through in my life.
Four years later, I received a letter from him, and after he related many interesting adventures, he said, “Father! My Father! I no longer live alone, a woman has joined her future to mine. I have a wife, a house, and soon we will have a child, if a boy, it will have your name. Oh, how much I owe you, Father Germain! If you would have turned me over to the authorities, I would have died cursing all who existed, but by you giving me time to repent, I now recognize the Omnipotence of God, and I've asked for His mercy. May you always be blessed, you who did not take away the inheritance of life that men are given by God. It is so important for man to make good use of the time he has been allotted here and use it for peace, not for accursed hours, in which the one who has been penalized, works under the whip of ferocious masters. There will always live within me the memory of the hermitage, home of the ‘Hooded One’, that name which you gave me that I will never forget. When my son arrives, I will teach him to bless your name, and bless God. I send love from my wife, myself and our coming child, your humble servant.” - ‘The Hooded One.’
This letter will be buried with me, a precious reminder of the only time in my life I was able to act, with total liberty.
How blessed You are dear God! You who conceded me those few instants to be able to be Your vicar in this world, because by loving and helping the needy, pardoning the delinquents, and instructing the ignorant, is how a priest fulfills his sacred mission here on earth.
Oh, how happy I am dear God ! You permitted me to give sight to a blind one, agility to a cripple, voice to one who was voiceless, and they have seen and known You, and they have said, “Forgive us, dear God”, and, You have pardoned them because You love very much the children and those who have repented.
How happy I am! In the woods of that New World, I can picture that family, when in the afternoon, they get on their knees and raise a prayer for the poor priest of this parish. Thank you, oh Lord, even though they are far from me, I still have been able to raise a family.

Father Germain

The Spring of Health

The past always appears better! As a general rule, lost yesterdays make our hearts mysteriously laugh, although misery had oppressed and tortured us; there seems to be a secret happiness in remembering the confused hours, in the shadows of the past.
Why is this, dear God? Ah, it's easy to guess, because the less years we must account for, the less responsibilities we will have had. That's why looking back at our time in the past, it appears better to us, because for each hour which transpired, wherein we may have committed a transgression or we initiated a crime, or, we lamented an abuse or deplored a punishable lie, it seems very true, the person who said; “a long life, much to account for.”
Dear Lord, my journal has been very long and I have seen so much...! I have sounded the depths of the human heart, and looked attentively on the flight of human intelligence, and if I had been around the world one hundred times, I would not have been able to see, such a variety of ideas and such confused feelings, as I've seen in the many years that I've passed, in this corner of my beloved village!
What eagerness men have, to appear that they've been good! Therefore, they do not sin through ignorance! They know right from wrong, they know what evil is, and what it is, to be evil. It’s like Adam when he tried to hide from God, after having sinned, embarrassed in his nakedness. It is the same with men who want to hide the nudity of their vices, with a cloak of hypocritical virtues, and there is nothing that does this better, in this deception of souls, than the traditional religions.
Religion is supposed to admit only the Truth, but religions are only a cloak that cover humanity’s misery; and I have accepted the fulfillment of being a priest, with the firm resolve of being a martyr, if necessary, but not a sinner. That's to say, we all sin, but there are improprieties which are premeditated, and faults that correspond to our moral and physical weaknesses. The obligation of man is to sin the least possible, being that absolute perfection is only possessed by God.
Much strength is needed in this world, to be tolerant with those who are hypocrites, because they make one a target of much hate; it being that they recognize my rectitude, and know that I do not condemn, because I remember what Jesus did with that sinful woman. It's known that He made concessions for sinners, but never with sin itself. I will pull to my arms, any who genuinely tells me, “Father, I am miserable and a sinner...!” But, I will reject, abominate, and cast out from my presence, anyone who comes acclaiming their love of God and detachment from material things, when I see them enjoined together with human vanities, like an oyster in its shell.
Why, then, do they pursue me, which places me in the position of uncovering their mask, and telling them face-to-face that which most offends man, which is to cite their defects? Dear God, have mercy on me, remember that I am weak.. I have feelings, I have loved, and I have struggled with myself, all of my life. Why then, do they demand virtues that I do not possess? Why is it that they want me to take part in another’s problems, when I am overwhelmed by the weight of my own?
Dear God, every day that passes I am more convinced that I must have lived before, and will live tomorrow, so that I will be able to realize the dreams in my mind. I know that my strength is now spent, and I have need to rest in a new existence. But in that new life, all will be forgotten, except the companion of my soul [the girl he loved], because without the love we have for one another, I could not comprehend the purpose of life.
Dear God, oh how I wish to finish my journal.... so full of oppositions, having to struggle openly, creating powerful enemies. Yes, I want to live in a little corner of the earth, with my hut surrounded with palm trees. I want to love a woman with pale cheeks and black curls. I want to embrace to my heart, beautiful children, who would call me father!
I want to bless God when the birds salute Him! I want to go into meditative ecstacy, when the sun caresses the earth. Finally, I wish to recover my strength, I want to acquire life! I want my spirit to smile! I wish that for a time, no one will come to me with the laments of men! I wish to ignore the history of mankind! Do not call me egotistical, dear God, because I carry many years of struggle. The career of a priest is one of the most painful, if he wants to fulfill his obligations. There's so much expected from a priest!
Without a doubt, I accepted being a priest as an expiation because, upon seeing so many infamies, so many secret crimes, my being is shaken. And I find myself so insignificant, when I have to keep within me, so many abuses. When I want to criticize someone, my superiors threaten me, and tell me that, ‘the end, justifies the means.’ Then, oh how I suffer, God! I do not believe in good endings without there being just means, and I tell their eminences, “Sirs, one either believes in God, or one does not. If we recognize a Supreme Intelligence, if we consider a gaze that's Infinite, which is fixed on us constantly from within Creation, then we should understand that, for those Eyes that are Eternal, there is no way we can deny what we feel. Therefore, false devotion serves nothing. What worth is it, if men accept something, that has no value to God? Are religions special conveniences for creating privileges in the world? No, religions should serve to bring men closer to God, because religions are the reins that restrain our runaway passions, and, if we are not able to intimately better ourselves, then we are as the atheist who believes in nothing, like one who builds a place of worship to cover a crime.
God, I confess, I lack the strength to struggle with men,....... so please take from me, my love of truth, so that I will be able to tolerate their hypocrisy. Or, give me more strength to be able, in those moments of supreme need, to overcome these struggles, so that my poor body can conserve its strength for when it’s needed, so that I will not be overcome, and will still have strength for my spirit. Right now I feel defeated, I've supported many cruel days, and when I am in contact with the world, I feel profoundly wretched. Oh humanity, how you poison everything!
Who would have told me that a tranquil spring of water (which the villagers called ‘The Spring of Health’) would give cause to me of such annoyance, bitter disappointments, and, at the same time help accomplish good deeds. I have saved a rose surrounded by spiny thorns!
Beloved manuscript, when I leave this earth, God only knows where you will end up. But whomsoever your new owner is, I wish that he will learn from these confessions of my soul, and he will reflect that if one goes astray in life, this leads us towards reckless and immoral passions. He should also see the hypocrisy and deceit which have almost always been the motives behind religious institutions.
At the foot of a mountain, between two boulders, there springs forth an abundance of crystal clear water, that quenches the thirst of the children of my parish. In those happy afternoons, where I did not know the miseries of the world, I enjoyed sitting near this rustic spring where I contemplated my youthful family who ran joyfully about. Upon finishing the frugal snack they had brought, they would drink happily from that nectar of Nature, so necessary for life.
One day, upon seeing so many happy faces, with their sparkling eyes and mouths full of the water, which they had drank with so much enthusiasm, I said to them, “Drink, drink, my children, this is a ‘Spring of Health!’
And, from then on, the inhabitants of my village called this humble spring, ‘The Spring of Health’!
In truth, the water was beneficial for the health of the innocent children, who joyfully followed me so that I'd let them play with Sultan and tell them ghost stories. For pure souls all water is good! Furthermore, when I first came to this village, I had noticed that lack of care in the cleanliness of the little ones, so I slowly started to instill in them that to be a good Christian, it was a duty to be clean. So that they would more fully obey me, I told the children, “If every day you wash your eyes twice, in the ‘Spring of Health,’ your eyes will never go bad..”
Those innocent ones, who loved me very much, religiously fulfilled the mandate of this priest, believing that the water had a miraculous quality to it, but this quality only consisted in the cleanliness of the children and their mothers, in a habit that was gradually acquired. This was how ‘The Spring of Health’ originated. Things almost always start from simple beginnings, and since there was no harm in it, I let them believe that the spring had some special quality which preserved their eyesight, provided that my faithful parishioners continued the good habit of personal hygiene.
One day, one of my superiors came to me, and he suggested that it would be convenient to see if possibly one could build, a small chapel next to ‘The Spring of Health,’ because when the women came to collect water, they could pray, as it was necessary for sinners to find small temples everywhere, in order to repent their sins. Meanwhile, the water could then become the property of the chapel, a small fee could be charged for it, so as to be able to build a new hermitage.
Looking at my superior with a fixed stare, I coldly told him, “I understand full well your good intentions but.....excuse me, I am not in agreement with them. There is no need for more temples, we have more than enough already. And putting a price on that water, we can’t do it, as that water does not have any special qualities, which chemically I have examined, and it has no special substances.”
“But they call it the ‘Spring of Health’,” he said.
“I gave it that name, so as to give more incentive to the parishioners in maintaining the habit of good personal hygiene. I did it for their own benefit. Cleanliness is health, and I wanted to give these poor beings what is most necessary, their health. They have had excellent health, and wisdom tells us that cleanliness invigorates and strengthens the body. Raise your chapel wherever you wish (which I believe is unnecessary anyway), but leave this ‘Spring of Health’ alone. I do not want financial speculations under the shadow of religion.”
“You are a terrible priest,” said my superior,“You do not know how to awaken religious faith.”
“Never... in the manner in which you wish to awaken it! I exclaimed. “If God is the Truth, then only the truth should be offered!”
“You may have to let it be,” he said, “Because a very rich family was attracted by this ‘Spring of Health’ and will soon be coming here. The first born of this noble family is very sick and her mother, a very devout woman, hopes her daughter will be cured here. And, she's made a promise that if her daughter recovers her health, she will pay to build a new chapel next to the blessed spring. So, I repeat, do not become an obstacle in the building of a new house of prayer.”
I was about to reply, but it seems I heard a voice say, “Be quiet and wait!”
So I said nothing. My superior, thinking he had convinced me with his reasoning, departed with much more fondness towards me than was his custom.
A few days later, the wealthy family he told me about, arrived in the parish. That's to say only part of them, because only the mother and her eldest daughter came, with some servants who after seeing to their needs left for the city, leaving only an elderly manservant and the girl’s nurse behind. I immediately went to pay my respects because that is what I had been ordered to do. Even if I had not been ordered, I would have gone because I had a feeling this family brought with them a mystery. Even though I would wish to flee from people when I have a presentiment that a crime is going to be committed, I conquer my feelings and do whatever is possible to prevent it, because I believe that my only obligation is: to prevent evil and practice goodness.
Indeed, as soon as I saw them, I knew that my feelings had not been mistaken. The mother was a woman with a good heart, very God-fearing, but conceited by her noble ancestry. She would have let herself die, one hundred times before admitting into her family a commoner. The daughter was just as proud as her mother. She was superstitious, and, absolutely dominated by religious fanaticism and by the pride of her noble birth. One could tell that she was sick by her
pale looks, and her face had the expression of a person with a grave illness; one noticed everything bothered her, starting even with herself.
For the first time in my life I was diplomatic, and let them talk. They said, that they had come with plans to pay for a new chapel near the ‘Fountain of Health’. But, the young woman who was named Clarisa, first had to be cured by its water, which they felt she would be. I looked at them and asked for the strength of will to keep myself silent. I understood that Clarisa was sick, but her sickness had a remedy. I tried to study that woman’s character, noting that she had a heart made of marble, and because of excessive pride, she had a vicious intellect. She had formed an idea of God, so absurd and so inadmissible, that one could not remain calm listening to her, due to her disdainful reasoning.
Every day she went to ‘The Spring of Health’ to drink the water, but her paleness got worse, her impatience grew, and her character became embittered. I tried to take charge of that soul which was so rebellious, by being sweet to her, but I soon learned that her spirit would only be made to obey through religious terror. Therefore, I became a strict priest, being very severe with her and continuously mentioning the word ‘Hell’ (which is something that I could never believe in).
Her mother, on the other hand, had better qualities, with a character which was sweeter. She became more friendly with me, until after a time she confessed the following, “Father, I have a weight on my conscience which oppresses me, it's something that I have resisted telling my husband. But, I did tell my confessor, and he approved of my plan. Now lately, since I have heard you speak, I do not know what is happening to me. I feel confused and bewildered. I lose myself in the thousands of ideas going around my head, and the situation is so grave, that I need a person with strong willpower, to help me come out of this dilemma.”
“For some time, I've known that you suffer,” I said.
“Oh Father, oh, so much! My daughter Clarisa, disgracefully, is going to become a mother in the worst way imaginable. It's enough for you to know that the child she carries is from an incestuous love. She and her brother (an illegitimate son of my husband’s), an unhappy bastard, have been victims of satanic temptation. The honor of the family above all, is at stake. I discovered this horrible madness but, it was too late to remedy the damage done. We have been forced to use violent and extreme methods to try and abort this being, so horribly conceived, but all has been in vain. We came here to try new remedies, but it has been useless. Therefore Father, I come to you for help at this critical moment.”
“How can I help you, madam? Speak, as I am at your service.”
“Thank you, Father, I expected no less from you, and I'm ready to pay you for your services. When the child of that crime...when the fruit of that incestuous passion, comes into the world, it will be necessary to drown its cries,” she said. She continued, saying, “In order to make amends to God, the Eternal, we will build, in the place which will serve as the forgotten one’s grave, a chapel which will take the name of that nearby spring. It will be called, ‘The Chapel of Health’! Then my daughter, rid of that sinful burden, will get better, and it will seem that she was cured by the waters from that blessed spring. The new sanctuary will be renowned, and with the
founding of this great work, the Church of God will be aggrandized. Although, the means through which this will happen, is not as commendable as I would like, the end result could not be better; the honor of a noble family will remain without blemish, and, by the building of this chapel, which in time will be famous, the faithful will come to implore the mercy of God.”
“And that, is what you will have need of, madam, the mercy of God, the Eternal, so that He will pardon you for infanticide,” I said.
“An infanticide, Father?...”
“There is no other name for the assassination of a child. You wish to build a chapel over a tomb! You want the blood of an innocent being, to serve as mortar to unite the rocks of a new church, to cover a crime! Do you think, poor sinner, that this house of prayer will be pleasing to the Divine Jehovah? Do not blaspheme anymore, madam, because woe unto to those who do. Do you think that those who have committed incest will be less guilty, so that after they commit a murder, they can place the first rocks to build a cathedral? No, madam, God does not want more temples, because He has formed them in multiples, in the conscience of each man,”I replied.
“Then how will we disarm His anger?” she asked.
“Do you believe that God gets angry like a weak mortal? Do you believe that the sad stories of this planet can reach His Sublime Throne? When has dark mud tarnished a rainbow?”
“What can I do, then, to perform something meritorious? I confess, Father, I'm afraid.”
“What to do? Listen to me, and woe unto you if you do not obey me! Your obligation is to secretly look for someone to take custody and care of that poor child, who is coming into this world, who I know, has a purpose in life. If you wish, I'll take care of everything. In addition, the amount that you were about to spend in building the new chapel, employ it more appropriately by leaving an inheritance for that poor orphan, whose misfortune was to be born without receiving a kiss from his mother, and, since family pride and fatality deprives it of the bread of the soul, do not take away from it the bread of the body, because your blood runs through it’s veins,” I said.
“Oh, Father, what you propose is too compromising, and dead men don’t talk!”
“Don’t talk? What are you saying? A dead person talks more than a whole generation! Do you know what it is, to be persecuted by the ghost of a victim? I know, but not from my own experience (thank God), many criminals have told me their misfortunes. I know that remorse is the carrier of torment, and it crushes men. I, in the name of God, and because of my love for my fellow man, positively prohibit you from carrying out this cynical plan. Let me have my way. I will find a family in a nearby town who will take care of that child, born out of insanity, you will then be fulfilling the law of God. Do this, or otherwise, you will see a priest become a relentless judge,” I told her.
I do not know what transformation comes over me, when I prevent someone from committing a catastrophe, but I feel myself grow. I'm no longer the timid pastor of souls who flees from danger, but a severe judge who would make a declaration to any of earth's sovereigns. I am not dazzled by the brilliance of their crowns, I feel so strong. I feel vested with such a special power, that if they did not obey my mandates, I would not respect the laws of society, and I would let the whole world know the truth, before consenting to a felony. I exercise, in those brief instants, such a power of subjugation upon those around me that, they obey me, either through moral ascendancy, or through force of will. When I see that the life of an innocent is in danger, I will use all means to save it.
It took me a month, to find a family who would take the child. I assured them that they would receive a substantial sum for his care, so that he would have a good future. Till the moment that Clarisa gave birth to that child, I was her shadow, preaching for her to have love for her fellow man. That young woman listened to me with a sort of profound amazement, and it appeared that her sentiments were becoming humanized. But, I did not have peace of mind until, I saw for myself that child, in the arms of it’s wet nurse, sleeping sweetly. It was a boy. Poor creature, you would have been condemned to die, before being born! I've saved you from certain death. I wonder what your mission here on earth will be? Only God knows!
When Clarisa was leaving to return to the king’s court, she came and shook my hand warmly saying, “Father, thank you. I came to you desperate, and thanks to you, I leave peacefully. Watch over him, Father. When he can pray, teach him to pray for his mother.”
Upon hearing these words, and knowing that I had been able to cut from her heart, the icy coldness it had, I felt an immense and pure satisfaction, a feeling so great that in that moment, it repaid me for all the bitterness I had been feeling. By the remembering of this good deed, I will acquire the strength to resist the abuse that awaits me. I know that my superiors will call on me, and question me, asking for a long explanation as to why the chapel will not be built by the ‘Spring of Health.’
I suffered much, my superiors cast grave charges upon me, but.... my conscience is at peace. God, I have saved an innocent child from a certain death and have assured his future well?being. Also, I did not take part in a holy fraud by converting natural water, into something miraculous, and evaded committing a lie. In addition, I prevented two souls from committing infanticide. Is this not better? Is this not more just, than building a chapel over the tomb of an innocent being? Who knows what that child might become some day!
Dear God, I feel I have strictly fulfilled my duty and I am calm, but at the same time, these unjust recriminations have fatigued me. They have taken the air out of my life, to the point where, I have found no place left to breathe.
Many call me a heretic, and a false minister of God. Dear Lord, give me the will power to remain silent, because I cannot reveal the secrets of the confessional. I love You very much, God! I believe, we should worship You by a doctrine of good deeds. It is not good to commit fraud in Your name. If in You, all is Truth, we should not worship You with hypocrisy.

Father Germain

Judging by Appearance

Dear God, when will the day arrive when I will be allowed to leave this valley of bitterness? I fear remaining upon the earth because the illusion of social experiences, conceal the perdition of criminals, and I may fail in my duties.
When an unknown being prostates himself before me and tells me his confession, I feel shivers within my soul, and I exclaim, “One more secret! Another new responsibility, on top of those that already burden me! Perchance, am I perfect? Am I more enlightened than others, for them to obligate me to serve as a guide to those that are blind of understanding? Why does there have to be a distinction? Yes, I have felt like them. Yes, I have had passions more or less compromised. Yes, I have seen myself flee from the temptations of the world so that my heart would stop beating with emotion. Why this insistence to have me, this fragile piece of clay, be as strong as a granite rock?
Towns, where ignorant people live, relinquishing their will to various wretched sinners! I do not know who is more worthy of compassion, them who are fooled by thinking themselves great, or, we that see ourselves small!
Dear God, why have I been born into this priestly order? Why have You obligated me to be a guide for poor sheep, my parishioners, if I cannot even guide myself? Sir, you must have other places in space, because here on this planet a soul who can think becomes asphyxiated, seeing so much misery and hypocrisy! I desire to follow the correct road but, along the pathway I see so many pitfalls!
Priests! A priest should be wise, prudent, observant, proper in his actions, compassionate with his justice, severe and merciful, and judge, all at the same time. But what are we, really? Fallible men, weak and small. My priestly companions have abandoned me because I will not proclaim that I am like them, faultless. They say that I am defrauding the interests of the Church. But by chance, does the Church have need of the good people of this world? Isn’t there a need for the Church of God to receive the miserable offerings from the sons of sin? In the Temple of Eternity there is no need for precious metals that will eventually corrode, because the incense from the many good deeds, from the greatest of souls, will immensely perfume the Basilica of Creation.
Dear God, inspire me! If I am going down the wrong path, have pity on me because my only desire is to adore You on this earth, by loving and protecting my fellow man. And, I want to continue loving You in other worlds, where the souls, because of their virtues, are much closer to You.
I am stunned by the general opinion that has been against me. There are only two souls that bless me on this occasion. Forgive me Sir, if I am to blame. But, what's there to doubt, if You are with me! You do not want temples of stone, because You have Your temple in the conscience of man! Due to me, they have not built a grand abbey where women would be praying by rote. And some of them have accused me of injustice because in Your name, they would sacrifice those young girls in that most beautiful of time, their youth!
Convents! You are but anterooms for tombs! Within your cloisters one lives without life! God created the earth for all His children! I remember my infancy; I can see in my mind the silent monks, who were like energized cadavers, unburied mummies, and I feel coldness in my soul! In a convent, if one lives by its laws as prescribed for monastic life, then one lives against the natural law of life. If one breaks those laws, why then fool the world by faulting a contract and breaking it? Man should never promise more than what he can rationally fulfill.
My head is burning, these ideas violently boiling in my mind seem to want to break open the narrow mold of my skull. I have need to see my thoughts on paper and you, my dear and faithful manuscript, will be my confidante. I will tell you why I suffer and I will relate to you how, that while in the retreat of my parish, I was persecuted by the struggles of life.
It was about twenty years later when they came looking for me to hear the confession of a young nobleman, the opulent Baron of ...., who was near death. When I entered the room of the dying man I noticed a richly dressed lady kneeling at the foot of his bed. Upon seeing me, the sick one said, with an imperial tone, “Leave us, Madam.”
When we were left alone, he unburdened his conscience to me, saying finally, “I cannot swear to it, but, I am almost sure that I am dying because I have been poisoned, and believe that my wife is the perpetrator of this crime. I leave a daughter who I am not sure is mine, but what's done is done. I do not want any scandal after my death, because in any case God will avenge me. I do not want to disinherit a poor creature who possibly might be united to me. One way or another, she is innocent in all this. May God have mercy on the victim and the assassins!”
Upon saying this, he expired in my arms. That poor creature, who died doubting, and without daring to condemn anyone.
His youthful widow demonstrated extreme grief at his demise and spent much on a luxurious funeral and several masses.
Some time afterwards, she remarried, but a mass was held yearly in the memory of her first husband.
She came frequently to hear the mass that I celebrated, when they say ‘Glorified is the Lord’, and afterwards she remained praying very devotedly. Particularly in the summer, she did not let a day pass without attending mass, as she lived close by, in a magnificent villa. Her eldest daughter received from my hands the bread of life, her first communion. And every time that I saw that girl, I remembered the confession of her father.
I felt sorry for that innocent one, named Rachel, because in her youthful confessions, she complained that her mother did not show her any affection. Rachel, offended, felt she could then not love her mother.
I, who had always been opposed to hearing anyone’s confessions, wanted to hear the story of Rachel’s mother, of the baroness G........ In my heart I felt a presentiment that there was something terrible about that woman.
To the world she was a model of virtue, and little by little she became so very devoted, that she passed many, many hours in the church of my village. Rachel grew up, and that poor girl lived completely alone. Unhappily, she still complained that her mother did not love her. At times when quarreling, her mother told her she hated her. Her siblings following the mother’s example and also treated her badly. Only the husband of her mother treated her well, but he was a weak person, dominated completely by his wife. The result was that Rachel was the victim of all of them.
But always, the sun must eventually shine, Rachel came one day and told me that she loved someone and he loved her. He was a young sculptor who had asked for her hand in marriage. She feared her mother would find out, knowing she was destined to be a nun, a bride of God! In addition, there were rumors that her mother was going to renovate an old convent. But she preferred death, rather than enter that place. She asked for my assistance, so that she would not be sacrificed, saying she would give up the dowry left to her by her father, and give it to her mother, as long as she would let her be united with her true love.
It is the obligation of the strong to protect the weak, so I promised God that I would save her from the trap that they were preparing for her. Her suspicions were not unfounded, soon all heard the voice of the devoted Baroness saying she would renovate an old abbey, and one of the first nuns to join that religious community would be her first born!
Upon hearing the news, I wrote to the Baroness and told her that I would like to meet with her in the rectory. She came at once to see what I wanted. For the first time, I looked at her as one would look at a woman, doing this so that I could look into her eyes, to try and read what was in her heart. I did not believe that her extreme piety was the result of religious fervor, and unfortunately, I was right.
When she arrived at the church, I asked her to my study and invited her to sit down. Seating myself in front of her, I said, “I've always tried to escape the hearing of confessions from anyone, but, the force of these circumstances obligate me to ask you, in the name of our religion, and in He Who was crucified, that you confess yourself to me.”
“I do not come prepared for such an act,” she answered, with certain confusion, “because I have not made an examination of my conscience.”
“That's not needed, Madam. There are pure and simple formulas for a sinner to say what they feel, they need only their good will. Everyone has enough of a memory to remember what they have done, regarding any transgressions committed during their life.”
The baroness paled, held her breath and did not answer me.
I continued, “I know that you plan to renovate the convent of Saint Isabel.”
“That is true,” she said, “I want the young to have new lodgings so they can flee from the temptations of this world.”
“And they tell me that your daughter Rachel will be one of the novices of the new community,” I said.
“Yes, because no where else will she be better off,” she stated.
“Have you consulted with her, regarding her desires?” I asked.
“Educated children have an obligation to do what their parents desire for them,” she responded.
“Provided that it does not go against their particular inclinations, and that they can adapt by their constitution and temperament, to the type of life which would be imposed on them. As for Rachel, she is a frail and unhealthy child. If you lock her up in a convent, she will swiftly give up her soul to the Creator!”
“Is this what you believe? I do not think that she is so delicate and I believe that she needs to be subjected to life in a convent,” she said.
“Well, my belief is that she is a sensitive and delicate child and because of this, I wanted to talk to you, because it is my sacred obligation to look out for her. You are the mother of her body, but I am the guide of her soul. I put onto her lips the bread of spiritual life and have talked to her about God. I am the confidante of her innermost angelical secrets and I know that the soul of that girl is not suited for a convent.”
“But I, it can be said,”stated the Baroness, with a contrary tone of voice, “that since she was born, I promised that she would not belong to the world, and a promise made should be kept.”
“But that promise is not valid Madam, you promised God a being that does not belong to you, and, you did not know what tomorrow would bring for her. Besides, God does not want his
children sacrificed, God wants only their happiness.”
“How much happier can they be, than to serve and love Him?” she asked.
“Can she not serve and love Him in all the places of this earth, without enslaving that poor young child, who needs like the flowers, the sun and air to live?” I asked.
“You do not act like a priest,” she replied with some anger.
“Why don’t I act like a priest? Because I do not wish to exploit your devotion and I oppose your renovating that abbey into a convent, and making Rachel a part of that community? Know this full well, I know her soul was not born to be in the emotionally desolate environment of a convent. She is a sweet and loving soul and she is a being that God has destined to be a model among mothers with families.”
“But I consecrate her to God, and only God will she serve!” asserted the Baroness.
At that moment, I do not know what happened to me. I felt myself grow and was conscious of being over taken by a special spiritual power. During those moments, I felt like I was a messenger from God. I do not know what angel inspired me, but a strange force, an unknown power transformed my being. In those brief instants, I was no longer the patient and suffering pastor who always laughed at seeing the escapades of the village children. I felt an unusual violence within my brows pulsating, it seemed as if a hand of fire rested itself upon my brow and in my ears I heard thousands of confused and incoherent words. I extended my right hand and got up, possessed by feelings of terror and an unexplainable fright. I seemed to see the ghosts of nuns fleeing in disorder before me. I got close to the Baroness and placed my hand on her shoulder, and with a dry voice that sounded like the echo from a tomb, I told her, “Listen to a minister of God, and woe unto to you if you attempt to lie!”
She looked at me and I do not know what she read in my eyes, but it made hers drop. Then in a shaken voice, she said, “What do you want from me? You frighten me....” And that poor sinner began to tremble.
“Do not be afraid,” I told her,“I only want what's good for you, but better said, I do not know who wants this for you, because someone is murmuring in my ears, that which I am going to tell you...Your devotion, your mysticism, and your religious fervor has a basis. Do you know what it is?”
“What?” she asked with a low voice.
“Remorse!” I said.
“What is it that you say?” she asked stammering.
And with a profound voice I said. “I will again repeat it. The cause of your religious fanaticism is due to, remorse.... It's been twenty years that I received the last confession of your dying husband. Listen to me well, Madam. Do not lose one word of what I am about to say, he confessed to me the name of his assassin. Do you understand me? He knew it all, down to the last detail!”
She looked at me and read in my eyes her name. She then fainted, my habit touched her face as she fell. I told her, with a strong tone in my voice (at that moment prophetic) “Awaken!” And, that poor woman opened her eyes with a fright, wanting to prostrate herself before my feet.
But I stopped her, saying, “Listen. I know your story and have followed step by step the thorny tracks of your life. You were later married with the accomplice of your crime. Rachel, the fruit of your first sin, has constantly reminded you, in part, of your misconduct. Your other children born legitimately in your present marriage have not caused you remorse. But, it's that poor girl who carries a different last name, who torments you without a doubt. Possibly, you see the spirit of your dead husband, who pursues you everywhere. Apparently, you think that by celebrating mass in his name you will placate him, and now you want to rebuild a convent with Rachel’s dowry which you would confiscate, and imprison her far from you, so that you will not constantly see the fruit of that first sin. And do you believe that God will pardon you with these false acts of devotion? No; you may fool the men of the earth with an illusion of saintliness, but God will not go for these religious comedies. Do not commit a new sacrilege, do not sacrifice Rachel. She loves and is loved, let her be the wife of a man. God does not need a wife, He has all of Creation!”
“Don’t deny it, it is useless, because I perceive your past life in your eyes. One only has to look at you to feel a profound compassion and although you may appear to be happy, one can see a premature spoiling of your looks, making you unattractive. Each time I've seen you kneeling in the church I have pitied you, because for one moment of error you have lead the life of a martyr. Daily, you desired to become more devoted, no doubt because you saw yourself as ever more guilty. Do what God orders; consent to Rachel’s marriage and allow her substantial fortune to be used to construct a hospital to assist hundreds of poor families. She will gladly give it up and, in that way, you will be doing two good deeds: investing in good works what is not yours and not sacrificing an innocent person, her only offense that she reminds you of your crimes.”
She looked at me not knowing what to say. She got up and then sat down, and started to cry, trying to drown out her anguish. I told her,“Cry poor woman, cry, because tears are like prayers for those who have forgotten the Commandments!”
She then started to cry freely. After letting her cry for a long while, I said, “Swear to me that you will do what I have asked of you!”
“Swear to me that you will pray for me,”she responded looking ashamed.
“Madam, your good deeds will be the best prayers. But speak, have no fear, you have been silent for twenty years and your silence has been your tormentor. Is it not true that you suffer? Is it not true that your prayers do not calm your heart?”
“Father, all that you have said is true about me. My deceased husband, I feel, still lives with me, and Rachel is killing me by just existing. When she was born, she reminded me of what I wanted to forget. When he used to caress her when she was a baby, and then doubting, suddenly leave her side, you do not know how much I suffered. Then when he looked at her with such tenderness, I would suffer that much more. It's true that the fallen woman only stands to fall again, and I fell... into an abyss of crime. Later, when the blessings of a priest united me with my new husband, I thought that I would find rest, but I've waited in vain. I'll be frank with you, I do not believe in anything because religion has not consoled me, and I feel lost in chaos and doubt.”
“And you have passed yourself off as being the most devoted woman of the district,” I said. “One cannot judge by appearance alone! I repeat, do not dismiss your evil acts with the sacrifice of an innocent being.”
“Think of it, Father, Rachel is a daughter of a sinner.”
“If that is true, then all of your other children are also, Madam! Do you think that your marriage is valid before God? You may have received the perfunctory ceremonial blessings of a man who is a priest upon your remarriage but, sacrilegious unions such as this one are never blessed by God.”
She then said,“I have read in the sacred books that the faults of the parents fall on the children, even into the fourth and fifth generation!”
“Common sense will tell you that an innocent person is free of the inheritance of a sinner. Let each of your children write their own future history, do not add to your faults by sacrificing Rachel.”
She promised to fulfill my request, and she did, with the condition that Rachel would give over her fortune to the poor, in case she did not want to become a nun. Rachel, advised by me, contentedly acceded to this. Smiling with happiness, she presented the love of her life to me, and said sweetly, “Bless us both, Father!”
I blessed them both with all of my faith and with all of my love. I pulled both of them close to my heart and held that youthful pair in my arms, as I thought that but for a miracle, I was able to save Rachel from certain misfortune.
The Baroness distributed the dowry of her daughter by rebuilding a small hospital which provided assistance to over one hundred families, this made her appear saintly in the eyes of the world. Everyone said she was a saint, and she passed long hours in the church more than in her own home.
And since gossip always spreads, they say that it was said, that it was I who had dissuaded her to give up on the plans to renovate the abbey, and that I championed the union of Rachel to the love of her heart, and that I had taken away from the church a house of salvation! If my companions hated me yesterday, now.......! If they could have done so with impunity, they would have sent me off on a trip to Eternity. There were many recriminations poured on me, they said I was a bad priest. They said I worry more about the things of this earth than heavenly things. They said I was a neglectful priest, misleading the parishioners in my care.
And me, God, there are moments that I doubt myself, but later on, I reflect and I say to myself: “What would have been better, rebuild the convent, and in it put that poor girl to die? To snatch her happiness violently away and entomb her in a convent where she would have died cursing the religion which made her a martyr? What was better, destroy a young girl’s faith or, to unite her with the man who adores her, so they can create a happy family?
There are more than enough houses for seclusion! Quite numerous are the victims of religious tyranny! I am happy if I have been able to snatch one martyr from that place of sacrifice!
I do not care that they point their fingers at me and say that my advice keeps the servants of God from the good path. If God is all Truth, then we are not obligated to offer Him false adoration.
Consecrate the penance of those souls who have been lacerated with suffering and verily need to go into seclusion to think of God. But for a young woman, one that loves and is loved, she forms the sacred altar of a family, and teaches her loving children to bless God.
Dear God, they say that I have taken away a house from Your church, but I think that I have added to Your Property because Your Grace has entered into the poor homes of the unhappy souls who have received substantial alms in Your Name. In the hospital that was built, the sick, weary travelers, and poor children overcome by anguish, upon arriving to this parish, can have compassionate hospitality in the sanctuary of charity for the abandoned. Is this not truly Your House? Your true house is where the sick and hungry can be nourished and cared for, where the destitute find shelter, where the afflicted find consolation, and where the misguided receive useful advice.
Wherever good is done for its own sake, there is no need to raise houses of prayer performed by rote. Prayer from the soul can be accomplished anywhere, man simply needs to raise his thoughts to God.
Forgive me, God! I know You can read my mind. All accuse me! In the tribunals of earth, I am judged a bad priest. But You, are the veritable Truth, and I wish for men to love You, in Spirit and in Truth!
Father Germain

Memories

Man is such a great mystery! It appears incredible that so many ideas can fit within the small cavity of the cranium and that there lodges so many memories that can remain silent for years and years, and then at times, the slightest incident awakens them.
Since I was young, I have always had a remarkable memory; yet without explanation, I have kept secret regarding the first years of my life. In this manuscript, the only inheritance that I leave to posterity, I have felt it appropriate to not mention who my mother was because of my compassion befitting a son who did not want to acknowledge the poor woman who I remember perfectly. But, impressed with such a scene that I have witnessed today, it’s as if blindfolds had been removed, so that now my eyes have contemplated new and expanded horizons. I have seen clearly, very clearly, and I believe that I must fulfill a duty by leaving recorded all the agitated memories within my mind.
There are many beggars that frequent this parish because they know that there never is a lack of generosity, and yesterday, among those who came, there arrived a man, a woman, and a child of about four years old. I don’t know why, but when I saw them I was drawn to them; the child especially, inspired within me profound compassion. He was very handsome and with his blue eyes, one could see a whole story written in them. Maria, so good and as compassionate as she always was, caressed that little one and she presented him to me saying, “Father Germain, what a shame that this innocent child should be walking the streets of the world!”
The mother of the child, upon hearing these words, exclaimed coldly, “If you like him so much, you can keep him if you want. As it is, I have to give him away, because he was not born to be poor. If he walks too much he tires easily, as if he is ill. Therefore, like his father says, ‘He’s a hindrance.’ God does wrong to give children to the poor, because sending one the likes of this one serves for nothing.”
Maria, full of joy, accepted the woman’s proposition, knowing that the boy had left hell to enter glory. Without shedding a tear, his parents (who had no hearts) started their journey without even a farewell to their child. It was not the same for that poor boy. He ran after them but his father turned around and lifted a large stick, which he had been leaning on, and went to hit him, but before he could complete this threatening act, the boy returned and received refuge within my arms, crying terribly. I did not admonish these inhuman parents as I normally would have. They had the same effect on me as venomous snakes, one does not even want to look at them, they cause such horror. They produce such repugnance that one wishes they would disappear, even so much as to want to see them killed. Those two beings hurt me so much, they had hurt me with an arrow so well-aimed, that the intensity of the pain left me without the strength to reprimand them and counsel them to change their ways. I let them go on their way without so much as one reproach.
Maria had been watching me with a somber look, which I had just noticed.
I then took a hold of the boy and asked,”Do you believe that those poor people were the parents of this innocent child, or do you think they stole him?”
“No, Sir,” responded Maria, “That poor child has the same face as the father, as if it was his picture, and the woman has told me things that left no doubt that she was the mother.”
“There are parents who after seeing their child and having received their first smiles, listened to their first words, felt the warmth of their kisses and their hugs, afterwards even lived with them in their own lives, abandon them...Oh, these are reasoning beings inferior to the beasts! To disown a baby at the moment of birth is cruel enough, but it is even more cruel to do so after they have seen their own child smile. If man of the earth was the last work of God, I would curse him. How cruel is mankind, Maria!” Then, for fear of revealing my secret, I left that noble woman and that innocent orphan on the pretext that I had some urgent business. I locked myself in my room because I needed to be alone; alone with my lost yesterdays, alone with my memories, alone with my pain!
I have been denied everything in my life, everything ...! I have been so poor that I did not even possess the affections of my mother, although she heard my first words, and saw my first steps...I am ashamed of myself! Even criminals are lucky to have mothers who cry when they go to the scaffolds, and if I had to go...my mother would not have cried. But why continue writing? It is better to keep silent. I am so old that no one remembers my childhood and my secret will die with me.
But, no. I have come to this earth to teach the pure truth. I have come to demonstrate what for centuries mankind has been late in comprehending, and that is, each being advances by the force of their own will. We are not saved through grace; no. Jesus did not come to save us, He came solely to remind us of our duties. He died to immortalize His memory, to leave engraved in the minds of humanity the laws of His Gospel. Such was the magic of His doctrine that generations who followed Him, proclaimed Him First Born of God, and they believed that in union with His Divine Father, they reigned over the destinies of the world. Men judged that redemption as the spilling of the blood of an innocent. The justice of mankind is blind, for they believe that the spilling of blood (unjustly) will save humanity and they will be assured of living in Paradise. But, no. No one is saved by the sacrifice of another. Each person must pay for his own emancipation by paying for it with good works, great sacrifices, the forgetting of offenses, and helping the weak. Each being creates his own inheritance of deeds, and no matter how inferior the class of person, when they want to advance they will become great, very great, if they generally confront their spiritual development and use all the force of their will. There is proof with me, God, for within me, I have seen Your Mercy shine brightly. Who is lower than me? Who has been more unfortunate than me? Nevertheless, the monarchs of the world have listened to my counsels and the Highest Pontiffs of the Church have said that I have a pact with Satan because I have discovered all their schemes, and more then once I have ruined their immoral plans. Me...poor me, when there have been more days when I have suffered with hunger, then gone to bed with my stomach full...!
To want, is to do. Life, the greatness of Life, is not a myth! What is needed is willpower. I have had that willpower and that is why I live freely, that is why I put myself above all the misfortunes and disappointments that have pursued me. And now...dominating any embarrassment, I want to tell humanity, those who tomorrow will read these pages, who I am. I want to make men see that a strong soul does not become downhearted because of ungratefulness nor does he do so at any price.
Before living with the monks with the black robes, I remember perfectly that when I was very small, I lived in a little village of few inhabitants and in a miserable old house, in the company of a young woman who scolded me frequently. I never called her mother (although she made it quite understood to me that I was her son) because I was never happy with her behavior towards me. One night a man entered where we lived, yelling and hitting the small amount of furniture we had. My mother presented me to him saying that I should embrace my father, but I resisted, and on his part, he physically separated himself roughly from me. He only stayed with us until the following day and then he left. Later, he returned and spoke a lot and very heatedly with my mother, and finally he said, “Look, the children of the poor have to earn their bread. He is already five years old, so look for a livelihood!” He, himself, pushed me, until I was out in the street. My mother wanted to stop him but he violently pushed her away, slamming the door so loudly that the noise made more of an impression on me then the villainous action of my father.
Although it may seem impossible, even at the tender age of five years old, I already could think and reflect, and I looked with pity upon the woman who carried me within her womb, when I would see her drunk, which was quite frequently.
So to see myself outside of that black, somber, and miserable house, where I had never received not one caress, on the contrary, only ill treatment and especially verbal abuse, I felt no sorrow whatsoever upon leaving. I felt tranquil as I left and went to my favorite place, by the sea shore, where I passed many hours there.
One day, I looked out at the ocean, which was very calm, and felt an unknown but good feeling. It appeared as if I examined my surroundings and was in contemplation in wanting to satisfy myself, because I remember sitting on the beach and was involved in my favorite pass time of building pyramids of sand. Upon nightfall, I inserted myself into one of the old logs that were on the beach, and slept tranquilly. Nearly two years, I lived on the seashore among the poor fishermen, who without me ever begging them for anything, would share with me their limited amount of black bread. My days, and likewise the remainder of my time, was spent in the abandonment of the town.
The fishermen called me the “little prophet” because I could predict when a storm was coming, and my predictions were never wrong. These things happened of which I had no idea how I did it.
One year after being alone by myself in the world, one hundred black penitents came to establish themselves in the old abbey that crowned the mountaintop, a gigantic watchtower whose massive tower was always enveloped with a blanket of fog. Sometimes, I would take a trip with the fishermen to the monastery, with the fish which were more acceptable for that community. I always felt a certain repulsion when I entered that building. Upon leaving, I always ran as if someone was pursuing me, even though the parents of my dog Sultan (who were two beautiful dogs from Terranova) would caress me every time I was there. But even with such powerful and appealing responses from them, more was my aversion of the men in black and I always ran from them.
Furthermore, one day (one I shall never forget) I made a mistake regarding taking the path out, and went down another corridor, and entered a grand salon surrounded with bookcases where there were many books, bundles of papers of yellowish parchments, and plenty of rolls of papyrus. Two monks were reading, and I, on seeing them read, as if for me this was a true revelation, I went up to the oldest one and I touched his robe, and without fear I said, “I want to read like you read. Do you want to teach me? I learn fast.”
The old monk looked at me, as his companion said, “This is the child abandoned by his parents of who I have spoken to you about more than once.”
“There are no abandoned ones in this world because the religion is the mother of us all,” replied the old monk. “Child,” he said, “God has Guided you to me without a doubt. The mother Church takes you into her bosom and from this day forward you will live in the Abbey.”
“Let me say good-bye to those who have been so kind to me,”I said.
“They have already gone,” he replied, and at that moment I lost my freewill.
My teachers were very content with me, although they never showed it; never were they affectionate with me nor did they ever punish me. My life was sad, very sad and an unsupportable monotony. There was a coldness within my soul, that felt I had died. My spirit was only uplifted when the Leon and Zoa leaned their intelligent heads over my knees. Noble animals! They were the only ones who caressed me and showed me affection and demonstrated happiness upon seeing me. The rest of the inhabitants of the monastery never directed one word of kindness towards me. More than once I remembered the poor fishermen, rough and hardworking, wanting me, and then listening to me as if I was an oracle. But I had a thirst for science and I wanted to be a great wise man. When I was young, men only had two roads to follow in order to better themselves: to become a soldier, or, within the Church, as then the arts were dead. Soon though, would come better times and in them, men could choose what they pleased. Before that, knowledge was to be found only in the convents and I wanted to be knowledgeable at all costs, so I put behind me my lonely infancy and the austerity of my youthful years. My only desire was to read, always read, and as many books as there were in the library of the convent, all of them I committed to memory. Then I made a critical judgement of all of them, and at sixteen years of age I pronounced a formal argument refuting all of the theological premises and their conclusions. It got me a hard reprimand from my superiors, and, threats of horrible punishments if that was how I was going to rebel against the mother Church that had given me refuge within its bosom, when I never had anything other than bread given to me through charity.
That next year, in order to correct my learning experience, I had to articulate a whole new discourse which cost me a whole year of confinement, and the sole nourishment of bread and water for six months, and being temporarily forbidden to go to the sacred Cathedral.
A few days before celebrating for the first time the sacrifice of the mass, the old monk who I had asked as a child to teach me to read, called me to his cell, and he told me, “Germain, I care for you very much, although I have never expressed it, because the constraints and austerity of the Order of which we are a part of does not allow us to open up our hearts, and we must extinguish all our sentiments, and that is what I want you to do. You are a noble and generous soul lead astray by the pains of youth. Remember, if you do not restrain your character, fewer dawns will light up for you; on the other hand, if you serve the Church who has served you as mother, don’t forget that the Seat of St. Peter is reserved for you. Do not proclaim yourself free, because you are submissive to the mandates of the Church, and then all the rulers of the earth will prostrate themselves before.”
“I will be faithful to the Church without being a traitor to my conscience,” I replied.
“Keep in mind that if you do your work in that way, your life will head down the road towards Calvary, and your sacrifice will be for nothing,” he said.
“I am grateful for your counsels. I love the Church and because I love it, I want to remove it from the morass in which it finds itself.”
“You are a poor visionary and you inspire in me profound compassion. Who are you to reform an institution that has been respected throughout the centuries?”
“Who am I, you ask? I am a loving spirit of light, determined in advocating progress.”
“Try not to raise discord.”
“I will do nothing but preach the truth, and that is the essence of the Gospel.”
The old monk looked at me very attentively and told me in a very low voice, “Germain, my son, you are very close to the fire. Be careful you do not get burned.”
Other monks entered into the cell and I retired to mine to start my preparation. A few days afterwards, with unusual pomp, the temple of the Abbey was decorated, and the greatest of the noblemen and their wives from the Court answered the calling to hear my very first mass.
The chief of the Order, as I went up to the pulpit, upon giving me his benediction, said to me, “You go up on your feet, strive to come down in the same manner.” When I entered the sacred platform, I saw I was not alone. A monk, on his knees and with his hands crossed, appeared there in profound meditation. Upon seeing him, I froze. I now understood the instructions that I had received and I prostrated myself on the ground so the multitude in the audience would think that I was in prayer, but what I was truly doing was to measure the bottom of the abyss in which I had fallen.
I had pronounced all of my vows, I was separated from the great family of humanity, and consecrated to a church whose base was sinking below my feet, because the rocks of its foundation were in muddy water. I examined its creed and I saw that its vow of poverty was a falsehood and that its humility was a mask of hypocrisy. I got up, and looked behind me and contemplated the dazzling aspect of the temple; its torrents of light and clouds of aromatic incense! Men and women were decked out in their finest clothes and the highest dignitaries of the Church were all there, to hear from an anointed one of God. One, who had an assassin at his feet and had orders to injure me the moment in which I said something that did not conform with the instructions that had been given him by his superiors. That horrible mockery broke my heart, for I was given the theme, for my sermon, of describing the mission of a priest and the absolute necessity that society submit to their mandates, inasmuch as priests were the elected ones of God.
Upon looking at that packed in crowd, it appeared that flames of fire fell upon my head and a cold sweat numbed my body. Afterwards, a sudden reaction invigorated my being, and without even being aware of what I was doing I extended my right hand over the head of my mute companion. He then trembled, looked at me, and by his own weight, he let himself fall against the wall, closed his eyes, and appeared to lose consciousness. I then, was more tranquil and commenced my sermon which lasted more than three hours. What a day it was! I will never forget it! Hanging on every one of my words, the women of the Court got up from their tall seats of honor, the men spoke among themselves, and the monks sent me looks with all the threats of hell while I spoke; and I spoke without interruption, feeling strong and animated. It is the only time I have ever had at my feet all the classes of society. I was truly inspired! I spoke of the family, of the priesthood, of women, and lastly regarding what priests were. Oh, all the monks got up to threaten me, but I looked at them and extended my hands (which looked on fire) over them, because it appeared that from the points of my fingers came out luminous sparks, and they paused.
I then exclaimed in a thunderous voice, “All of humanity is in error. You believe that the priests are men different from the rest, that they are illuminated by the grace of God, well there is no such grace or predetermination. A priest is a man like any other, and many times with more vices then the average man. Do you know who I am? Do you know who you are listening to? I already know the myth that has been circulating about me, I already know that they say I have slept in a royal bed, and that the revelations of the Holy Spirit has fallen upon me, and I have abandoned my opulent royal palace to dress in the cassock of a penitent. I believed I was one of the elected...and now I want you to know the whole truth, the entire truth.”
“I was a beggar! I was abandoned at the age of five years old and found myself alone in this world, and lived for two years on charity! Later I saw books, and I saw the men reading them. I wanted to become a learned sage, that is why I entered the Church, thirsting for knowledge, not for saintliness, because saintliness does not exist. Saintliness is a myth in the way you comprehend it. Man always feels the temptations of the flesh, because your body is of flesh. As much as one may mortify it or try to ill treat this organism, there will always remain a fiber of reasoning which, given one moment, with all its aim, will try to repair it; and don’t fault it or recriminate against it. Nature has its laws, its immutable laws, and to oppose the execution of them is to oppose the regular course of life; and life is a river that empties always into the seas of eternity.”
“The body of a priest in this way finds himself constituted wherein he is not happy with himself, nor with doing the work for those who are awaiting for the saintly counsels of a priest, because he lives outside of the laws of nature; and above all the laws of men, are the laws of nature. Contemplate on all the species. What do they do? They unite; completing themselves within the embrace of another. And a priest, what does he do in the meanwhile? Cut off, and with their hair shirts and their aberrations of the inviolate law, or stirring up scandals by surrendering to the pleasures of the most wanton of sexual desires. For what does one pronounce vows that one cannot keep, but at the cost of great and difficult sacrifices? Why can’t a priest raise a family within the laws of morality? The Church, the Church! You want to be the Woman of the world but you surround yourself with slaves! You cannot be the wife of Jesus Christ because Jesus loved liberty and you want slavery! All those you have under you, live oppressed; some with scandalous violations of their vows, and others who have surrendered to humiliation, with some being docile instruments of degenerate ambitions. None of them are living free and enjoying liberty; a freedom which provides that tranquil calm which affords one a simple life within the strict accomplishment of duty.”
“Among you everything is violence. You dominate, but through violence of force! You are the owners of all the secrets. But, in what manner? Penetrating cautiously within the domestic home; catching an unwary credulous young girl, an unsuspecting young man, and a weak old one, with your questions. Oh! I dream of another priesthood. I am a priest, yes; but I don’t ask anyone for their secrets. I love the Church which extended me its arms and in honor of it educating me, I have remained faithful to its creed; however much the many concepts are absurd, due to the many additions and amendments that men have added. I agree that religion is necessary in life, as the air of which we breath, but it should be a logical religion, without mysteries and horrible sacrifices. I am one of the messengers of the new religion, because, do not doubt it, your Church will fall, it will fall...under the immense weight of your vices! See those little babies that now are asleep within the arms of their mothers? Well, those spirits bring within them the divine seed of freedom of conscience and I will be a priest for their generation who now are just beginning to smile. I want nothing of your pomp, keep your miters and your tiaras, your staffs of gold and your cardinal hats, and your purple robes. I will go teach the Gospel among the humble of heart. I would prefer to sit on a rock than to occupy the seat you ascribe to St. Peter. And now that my destiny has denied me a family, now that I have affiliated with an organization which denies its adepts the pleasure of uniting with another being within the bonds of matrimony and if I am to live an honorable life I must live alone, and since I want to have a clean and tranquil conscience, I will surround myself with children, because the children are who make one smile in this world. I have always said, as Jesus did, ‘Come to me the little children, who are the pure of heart!’”
Upon pronouncing these words, some children, who were in the arms of their mothers, sat up and came over to me. But there was one little girl of about three years old who attracted my attention the most, who had been resting in the arms of a lady of nobility, who extended her little arms towards me. I fell silent for a few moments, fascinated by the gesture of the girl, who with so much effort reached for me. She spoke with her mother and was very expressive, showing her mother the place where I was standing. In those instants, I forgot everything! Everything! Within that crowded multitude I did not see anything except a woman and a child. Life guards so many secrets! That very girl was the one who ten years ago asked me, before proceeding before her very first mass, “Father Germain, is it wrong to love?” It was that tender young girl, who in her innocence, wanted to rescue me from my calling as a priest. Then who, ten years later after that, she prostrated herself before my confessional, and the perfume of those white jasmines which crowned her temple upset for a moment, my reason. That angel who now extended her arms to me was the pale girl, the one with the black curls, and in whose heart, even from so young, my voice found the most sweet echo. How far away I would be in thinking that the tomb of that very young girl would one day become my only sanctuary.
That day upon seeing that the children responded to my calling, I felt an inexplicable pleasure, and I continued, saying,“See? See how the little ones already hear my voice? It is because they have a presentiment that I will be there for them and as an envoy of peace. Yes, yes, the children, the pure of heart; they will be the loves of my soul, and my love for them in this world will save my spirit.”
Religion, religion of the Crucifixion, religion of all times, you are true when you are not locked up in monasteries or in churches...! And I spoke much, so much, and with such intimate sentiments that I completely dominated my audience, and even the black penitents quit looking at me with bitterness.
When I finished speaking to that multitude, they applauded loudly and fervently, as I headed swiftly to the stairs down the pulpit. I felt, as if, I was an envoy of the Eternal One, because the voice of truth always resounds within men’s hearts.
And who was I? A poor child abandoned by his own parents...Who was more poor than me...? But in the midst of my extreme poverty, I was always rich, very rich, because I have never been tortured by remorse. I cannot remember being embarrassed by committing a single wrong action for I have looked within myself and I have seen that I have not been guilty.
Thank you, Lord! My earthly parents abandoned me, but there are truly no orphans because you never abandon any of Your children. It is them who forget about You, and live with their own errors.
.....Poor child! You have brought to my memory, remembrances of my first years in this world and have made me consign to this manuscript events which I have tried to apart from my mind for many years. And today, upon thinking of you, and seeing that another being has entered this world through the same unfortunate path as I have, I felt much stronger and I said,“It was not only I who was accursed by my parents, this beautiful boy, whose eyes radiated love, and whose face reflected intelligence, has also been denied maternal love. Now I know, I have not been alone. Then why should I hide these first episodes of my existence when enclosed within them are useful lessons? For within them, it is demonstrated that man can only be great through his own efforts. I have been able to sit in the first seat of honor in the world, yet at five years old I found myself alone on the earth and in a manner quite sad, because of the ingratitude of those who gave birth to me. But like me, in the midst of my abandonment, on thinking, I recognized that within me there was a spark of divine light. When I saw how men became sages, I aspired to be one; and I reflected... if I possessed nothing, through my own reason, I can acquire wisdom...”.
I wanted to live and I have lived. I wanted to be free and I have done so, because my passions have not dominated me. I have always believed that happiness is not a dream, and I am certain that it is not. No one has had less resources than I to be happy, and nevertheless I have been happy. By the side of a tomb, I have found happiness; man is not happy because all he sees is his time in the present, but he who truly believes that time has no end with no such measurements called past or future and who has a presentiment regarding the existence of the infinity of life, for him there does not exist unhappiness or darkness. That is why these do not exist for me because always I have waited for a day without end, because I have always heard distant voices, very distant...who have told me...,“Life never ends, never! You will live...because all lives within Creation!” And before the certainty of an eternity, all my sad memories are erased from my mind and I can see the light of tomorrow... the shadows of the past disappear, before the splendid sun of the future.
Father Germain

Water for the Body and Water for the Soul

Women, you, who have the blessings of fertility, and men, who have been most fortunate to be able to see yourselves reborn in your children, never force your young ones to be priests! Never say to them, “Consecrate yourself to the Church,” because the church is no mother, it's only a stepmother. A priest, who wants to fulfill his vows and duty, is profoundly unfortunate, for I know this firsthand.
A man or a woman that consecrates themselves to the Roman Catholic Church commits suicide. But, this is applauded by society because it is like a crowd on a day of revolution, who yell because they hear others yell, and demand things because others do. But, they do not know why they shout or what they are asking for. The same can be said when a woman enters a convent and people say, “How happy we are for her!” “She has left the hardships of this world!” Imbeciles! The hardships, the desires, the worries, are always carried inside your spirit; it is our human heritage. The spirit must live and it feels. It is the same whether it is among humanity or in the darkest corner of a monastery cell. There is no fast or penance or hair shirt which can use up or diminish the forces of the depths of the soul. It is always potent even while one is in full control of ones faculties.
If only the walls of the convents could speak...! If the death watch beetles of the stones in the monasteries, could gather to have their say all in one place to the multitudes, who gathered to listen to what the stones had told them, it would sound as if the horn of the Final Judgement had been sounded, and that the days of the Apocalypse had arrived! Everything would be confusion and terror! What horrible revelations! What pathetic and intriguing stories! What dramatic episodes and what tragic outcomes...!
A woman, is such a beautiful flower, one who blooms so fresh and full of life within the domestic household. A woman, born to nurse her young, to surround it with tender care, to counsel it in its youth, and to console it when it is older and mature... A being so useful and Created by God’s Will...and yet so useless when they are turned within the bosom of some religions...condemned to sterility; though they are the very ones who are the fountains of reproduction!
And a man...who carries within him the emanations of life, a being so strong and animated, who have crossed oceans and deserts, climbed mountains, who has dominated fire, and with his inventions and discoveries he has used all that nature offers. It is this being that says with legitimate pride, “God has made me in His image and likeness.” But what does he see when his power is so reduced, upon prostrating himself before an altar and putting his lips to the host, and drinking the wine which symbolizes the blood of God? What is this kind of man? He is a slave. He does not have free will; the last beggar upon the earth has more rights in being happy. The priest must look at a woman, who is the other half of his being, as an element of temptation. He must hear himself called “father,” but without being able to reach out to his own child with his heart, and say, “Look at him! How beautiful he is. He already knows me! When he hears my steps, he turns and lifts his head to look at me!” These supreme joys and divine pleasures are denied to priests. If he succumbs to the laws of nature, he must hide his children from society like a criminal. He leaves his children born with the disgrace of being illegitimate, because society has its laws and he that lives outside of them does so at his own risk. Illicit joy is no joy at all, it’s a manifestation of a fever of the soul, and that heat weakens and fatigues the spirit. The priest, who takes pleasure in these emotions of life, is a transgressor of the vow that he took, and this infraction will never be the basis for a true happiness. A noble felicity, one which is pure and saintly, one that aggrandizes the spirit, is one who has grown a legitimate family, which will then create a spiritual one in the afterlife.
Oh, the true priest is immensely unhappy! Dear Church, how terribly have you misunderstood your own interests! You have surrounded yourself with dry trees, your religious communities resemble forests devastated by fires, and whose hard roots do not have the vitality to nourish their revival.
You have infringed upon the natural law, you make martyrs of men, you have not allowed these spirits to grow, you, who call yourself the woman of the world... but your city does not allow for the sustenance of your ecclesiastic thrones. Your subjects divide themselves into two factions: the good ones are like automatons which have been converted into docile instruments, they are but “things,”and, the bad ones are imposters, hypocrites, like whitened tombs. Oh, why have I affiliated myself with you? Why was I so blind? It is because loneliness is such a bad counselor. And I have lived so alone . . . ! Abandoned by my mother, I looked within the Church for maternal affection, but this second mother also rejected me when I told it how I felt, and when I proclaimed myself a prophet of the truth. The church called me an illegitimate child, it said I qualified as an apostate, it threw me from its bosom like a prostitute throws away a child she considers a burden. In other existences, without a doubt, I must have been a bad son, because now I am condemned to live without a mother.
But, I do love the church. Yes, I love her, and because I do, I would like to see her get rid of all her riches and perishable trappings. I would not want to see its priests dressed up in purple and living in marble palaces. I would prefer that they inhabit humble homes and that they would be happy surrounded by a loving family, and these individuals could say before the world, “This is my father and she is my mother.” But, because I did tell my superiors my feelings, and because on the day of my first mass I presented to all the truth, on the following day of the ceremony, the leader of the black penitents told me, “Go... depart, because your words are inspired by the enemy of God! You receive inspirations from Satan and therefore you cannot be among the servants of the Almighty. But, so no one can say that the mother Church has abandoned you, you'll go to occupy a vacancy left by a curate in a small parish.”
Before going to that destined church, I suffered exile, hunger, and slander, and without knowing why, I felt a strange coldness. I arrived at the small village, which was situated in a valley surrounded by huge mountains, and one could not see but only a small piece of sky and it was always covered by a thick fog. There, nature did not talk to ones soul, nor did it have splendid scenes to uplift ones spirit, which would conduct it to contemplation of the infinite. But, on the other hand, there were very lovely women, preserved within their eyes the blue color that was missing from that sky.
They received me with palms and olives, and the young women of that valley began promptly to tell me their secrets. I noticed upon hearing them that they were dominated by fanaticism, telling a young man what they did not realize they would be ashamed to tell even their own mothers! There was profanation of the confessional (which permitted this practice to take place). I, yet so young, as the depository of such secrets, tried to disengage myself from such a delicate burden, realizing that I was just a man like all the rest, full of passion and desires, who trembled when surrounded by such beauty, all of them young and attractive, who were opening their hearts to me, telling me, “Listen to me!” When I thought of all the possible risks of these confidences, I said, “God, your law does not demand this! Impossible! You can’t ask a person to turn their heart to stone!”
Why God have You given me youth? Why have You given me feelings? Why have you made me so full of life to have condemned me to emotional death? This is insufferable...! This situation is too strong against the weaknesses of a man. It could be said that the devil had invented confession, if he existed. It is difficult to speak with a woman who without any restraint, reveals one by one all of her intimate thoughts, without hiding even her innermost desires, explaining the details of her life...and then...to stay celibate...or commit a crime by abusing their confidence and their ignorance, or pass the time dreaming and enjoying fantastic visions of pleasures.
I firmly believe that a religion, to be true, should proceed with all its acts in harmony with reason, and the act of confession is not in accordance with this. Especially, when it’s done between members of the opposite sex when they are so young, naive, and innocent!
In this confined environment, I felt smothered. The people’s customs left much to be desired, they worshiped a God of clay, and were blinded by fanaticism. I felt that I was not suited to be able to live among them. I feared I would succumb (doubting my will power). I felt I did not want to have to struggle constantly against temptation. I wanted to aggrandize my spirit, and I wanted to purify my soul, and for this I needed more solitude, and less continual temptations. Our being is always under trial but it is easier to dominate and conquer our desires and passion one at a time, and much harder when confronted with so many temptations all of the time! I did not want the solitary life of a hermit, because absolute isolation also keeps man from progressing, but neither did I want to struggle against enemies so numerous they might overcome me. In order to conserve with the utmost care the perfect equilibrium of ones feelings, it is necessary to dominate a situation, in order to not put oneself at risk. I asked my superiors to transfer me. The more I asked them, the more I was refused. Then, one day, as if someone said to me, “Go!” I decided to abandon that place where I daily struggled with all the commotion of its passions, ignorance, and youth.
When my flock found out that I was leaving, they employed all the means available that they could to express their affection to detain me. They loved me, especially some of the women, some who loved me too much. They called me their savior, their guardian angel. But, I could not live over there. I needed a place with more purity, simpler ways, more sky, more of the light, more air, much more life! Those mountains were too arid and the sun barely passed over the vegetation in those valleys, and in between those large intervals with no sun, there was weakness and sickness. So, I fled, because I was marking time there, and in that poor place I had found neither water for my body nor for my soul.
My assistant Miguel and my dog Sultan, both looked at me, with eyes which asked, “Where are we going?” and I told them, “Wherever I can find water, because here I’m dying of thirst.”
We walked for days and days, stopping in several villages, but in none of those places did I feel good. I told my companions, “Let’s go forward, because man has an obligation to live, and to live, I need air, space, and light.”
One morning, we climbed up a mountain, and upon reaching the summit, I let out a cry of admiration. On one side, below my feet, the ocean murmured eternal sighs of adoration and the sun covered the movable surface of the waves with what looked like a shower of dazzling diamonds. On the other side of the peak, there was a valley full of flowers, green banks, and many happy little streams winding their way through the hills. Gentle flocks grazed on their banks, and a multitude of small children, showing off their agility running with the goats, were laughing and playing with much enthusiasm and crying out with jubilation, as the birds in the trees seemed to answer them amidst the foliage.
That enchanting scene impressed me so profoundly, that for a long time I remained silent submerged in ecstatic meditation. Sultan sat by my feet, Miguel surrendered himself to repose, and all around us, we breathed peace and love. Finally, directing myself to God, I exclaimed,
“Dear Lord, if You permit it, I would like to stay in this place, for here is where I find that inexplicable something, which makes me feel alive.” Then, a faint voice seemed to say to me, “You will stay...!” Then, all excited, I told my companions, “Let's go. Let’s go traverse this land. In those little houses that I see far away, I believe, live virtuous souls.”
We commenced descending down the mountain; halfway down, we heard the agreeable sound produced by water coming from an abundant spring, which formed a beautiful cascade, and nothing is as artistic as Nature. We felt pleasantly surprised as we all eagerly drank the best liquid that is known in all the world; water. It sprang forth from a boulder crowned with ferns and moss. I sat down at the foot of that beautiful spring formed by the Hand of God, and said to Miguel, “Drink, this is the spring of health. Since I have been drinking it, I've felt better. Let's rest here.” In the meantime, Sultan explored the area.
I was engrossed in my thoughts for about a half an hour, when there suddenly arrived a poor elderly man dressed in rags, who leaned on a boy disfigured by the ravages which appeared to be caused by the disease of leprosy. When they got closer, I noticed that the man was blind. Poor things! What compassion they inspired within me! They arrived at the spring and drank eagerly, returning to begin their journey again. I followed them and started a conversation with the beggar who told me they were going to a nearby hamlet where they always received an abundance of alms, at times so much so, he had enough left over to give to other unfortunate companions. He told me that even the children there were also very charitable. Upon hearing such consoling words, I had to exclaim, “Blessed be this corner of the world! Here can be found water for the body and for the soul!” And, as if I had received a providential reply to my words, we found our path obstructed by a group of children. One of them, directing himself to the blind man, asked, “Why have you been so late, dear Tobias? We've been waiting for you for more than two hours. Drink, drink, for we have brought you many good things.”
The children all hurriedly put into a large bag that the beggar had, large breads, cheeses and fruits. What most moved me, was when the eldest of the children told the beggar in a tender voice, “I'll carry this load so you can rest, and lean on me so that your son will be free to play with my friends until we arrive at my house.” The small boy with leprosy did not have to be asked, he immediately parted from his father and started playing with the children, and Sultan, who soon made friends with all of them. Among this agreeable company, we entered the village where I've lived now for thirty-seven winters, and God only knows, how many more years I'll continue to be here.
When they saw me, the villagers spoke to me with great fondness, and, as if they had known me for a long time. One of the elders of the group told me,“Father, you've come at a most fortuitous moment! The priest of this village is dying and God only knows how many months or years would pass before this village could receive another one. We're so poor here, not one abbot would want to come. Jesus loved the humble, but His ministers do not want to follow in His footsteps.”
That very same night, the good priest of that place left this world. I received his very last confession, and they've been few beings that I've seen die with such serenity. There is nothing so comforting than the death of a just person! He left this earth with such tranquility and with a very sweet smile upon his face.
I thought a lot about that death because it seemed as if it had been a providential occurrence. I looked about me and I saw beings who were affectionate, caring, and sociable. They were not ignorant nor fanatical. It seemed impossible for me to have found such a place to live where I had found water for my body and water for my soul. I thought, and then asked, “God! I am being selfish if I stay here?”
But a faraway voice, very far, repeated in my ear, “No. No, you're not selfish. While you are on this good earth, here you will live in poverty. You will be so poor that when you die the town will bury you as a pauper. It’s not being egotistical to want to practice goodness and it is also prudent to avoid temptations, to avoid the abyss where there is a certainty of falling.”
Man should always try and live in an atmosphere where he does not feel asphyxiated, on the contrary, he should try and live in one which will bring him tranquil peace and happiness. Spirits do not come to earth to suffer, because God did not Create man for suffering. Mankind comes to test their strengths, and to progress, but not to support a fight demanded by absurd religions. Do good, and among goodness you will live. The earth is not a sterile desert. There are springs of pure crystalline water to satisfy ones thirst that the body craves and streams of virtue where one can quench the thirst the soul needs.
I have not the slightest doubt that the spirits of the Lord spoke to me, because I've always doubted myself, but always voices seeming faraway, very far but yet very perceptible, have fortified me, have counseled me, and have dissipated all of my doubts.
The only aspiration that I have had in this world, is to be good. I have renounced all the happiness that terrestrial passions have to offer, because my religion has denied me the raising of a family of my own. On the other hand, thank God, I have been able to live in a place where I've found water for my body and water for my soul.
I entered the world thirsting for love, and the love of unfortunate ones have calmed my thirst!

Father Germain

Soul Retrieval

Part of being human is to experience physical and emotional pain. As we experience it in a certain band of awareness, pain can be a challenge and also a friend and teacher. When its lessons are hard, the experience of it may leave our conscious awareness.
For thousands of years into history, our ancestors and the shamanic traditions have informed us that we are more than our bodies. All of our traditions and religions teach that there is more to us than meets the eye. Most of us don't need anything outside of our inner awareness to realize that truth, we already know we are more than we see in the bathroom mirror. As a society, we have reached an evolution of awareness given by empirical evidence from physics and the sciences that we are, indeed, much more than our bodies. Modern research has reached scientific conclusions that prove out what our ancestors have known for centuries. We are living in illusionary bodies that are actually interactive fields of electro-energy in communication with ourselves and also the electro-energy that surrounds us through a series of bio-chemical, bio-magnetic, and electrical events.
Our ancestors have known for centuries that the energy body can be cut or wounded in the same way the skin can be cut or wounded. Since they were aware of this, they developed ways and methods to heal not only damage to a cut finger but also damage in the energy body. As science brings us closer to understanding the human unified field, it has amplified the voice of our ancestors carried through time in the oral traditions. Science is helping us hear.
Wounds of the Energy Body
The healing drugs of western medicine stand on the ground of simple poultices made of natural substances applied by our ancestors to wounds on their bodies. We learned from their ancient roots, we explored and expanded what they knew as we developed healing prescription drugs used by western medicine. Also, the legacy left us by our ancestors offered ways and means to tend healing of our energy bodies. They gave us symptoms to know when it needs help to heal and they gave us methods to heal wounds and pain in the energy body. In their wake, they left simple truths that help us realize we have methods at our disposal to heal all the parts of us that might need a little help. When we find that help, all the parts of us heal faster and deeper and the forces of healing are better able to mend our physical body.
The body sends signals that allow the realization that we are hurt. The energy body also sends signals that allow us to realize it has been hurt. Many of us are living with damage to our energy bodies because we don't realize the symptoms it sends. These symptoms are real and can be easily remedied when we learn to identify them.
Here are some of the things we experience when there is damage to the energy body or unified field:
1. Depression that is not of short duration. We all experience things that make us sad that may depress us for a period of time. When the energy body is damaged, depression does not go away.
2. A feeling that something is missing. When we experience trauma, accident, illness or pain, we sometimes feel we have not fully recovered ourselves to the state we knew of ourselves before a traumatic or stressful event. We might say, "I don't feel like myself, something is missing."
3. A sense of detachment. A feeling that life is passing by, a sense of not being fully engaged in life, an inability to feel close to people in our lives. Emotions may feel somewhat numb.
4. Chronic illness, disease, or an inability of our immune system to resist common colds and viruses. Everyone gets a head cold now and then but when we seem to get every bug that passes by, it is often a symptom of damage in the energy body. When we get help, this situation alters and we often discover new possibilities for healing the physical body.
5. Inability to move on too long after loss or grief. We have all known the pain of a broken heart, a lover who has left, a divorce, or death of a loved one or pet. Times of grief after such events are normal. But when the pain and grief does not subside, when we can't seem to stop thinking about the past and move on, we have experienced damage to the energy body. If you experience such pain, you may feel a certain tug as you read these words. That is normal. Sometimes there is attachment to grief and something becomes alarmed at the thought of letting it go. But when we heal the pain in the energy body, we discover new power and new ways to release attachments to pain and grief and find ourselves even closer, in more healthy ways, to what we were clinging to that caused the pain. We reclaim joy and we find happy memories where grief lingered too long.
6. Memory loss of certain parts of our life. We all remember our lives and thing that happened throughout the years of our lives. When the energy body has been wounded, we will experience blocks of memory loss during months or years surrounding the event that caused the damage.
7. Addiction. Addiction to drugs, alcohol, individuals, food, thoughts, habits we don't want, or anything involved in a repetitive pattern that can't seem to stop indicates damage in the energy body.
8. An underlying feeling that "something is wrong." This feeling may include a sense of doom. This may come and go, more intense at some times than others. You may find yourself imagining or daydreaming about situations and outcomes of things you cannot know. All of us do this to an extent, but when our daydreaming takes us away from a happy involvement with our active life, it indicates damage to the energy body. This is particularly true when our thoughts drift and linger to a series of possible poor outcomes of any situation.
9. Obesity or inability to reach and maintain a desired weight. Most of us at some point need to lose a few pounds. We know how to do this: eat less, move more. When we are unable to affect such a simple solution, there is damage in the energy body that has effected the natural sense of our physical, emotional, and energetic borders.
10. Loss of self-esteem, confidence, or an underlying sense of shame and guilt.
11. Lack of purpose in our lives. When we live with damage in the energy body, we sometimes spend months or years wondering why we are alive. We can't seem to find the purpose of our life or paths and activities that help us know we are "on track."
12. Abuse or violence. When we experience physical, mental, or emotional abuse, the energy body, without exception, has experienced it with us. Whether this comes during childhood or adult years, the event or series of events affect us in ways that seem to never heal. Healing the energy body allows us to remove the root damage and in those places of repair, we are restored to lives of joy.
While few would be in agreement with every statement below, people that have experienced damage to their energy body, they often say things like:
1. I just don't feel like myself.
2. It used to be so natural to be happy and excited about my life.
3. I'm so tired of being sad, tired, and depressed. I've tried to get over it but nothing helps.
4. Ever since "that" day I have had this bad feeling in my tummy and my heart; I just hurt. I can't seem to get over it.
5. I just can't lose weight. I've tried everything and nothing works.
6. Something is missing. I can't tell what it is, I just know something is missing. Sometimes I feel like there is a hole in me. Sometimes I feel lost.
7. I feel like someone (boss, friend, family member, etc.) is controlling me.
8. My body used to heal me when I got sick. It seems like it forgot how to keep me well. I'm starting to feel like I don't trust my body like I used to.
9. Ever since my mate left me it seems like life isn't worth living. I hurt.
What is Soul Loss.
Life is good. You are living joyfully in your body and your beautiful energy field. You like your job, your children are thriving, you are enjoying fixing up your home and your relationship with your mate is solid and steady. You can count on them.
Over breakfast one morning, your mate tells you they no longer love you, they are leaving, and they are taking the kids. An enormous wave of energy moves through you as you hear the news. A sense of doom and pain enters every part of you. You may feel a horrible blow in your solar plexus, stomach, or heart. You have been wounded.
Energetically, it looks like a knife cut all the way through your energy body and into your body. While we can't see the knife or the wound, we can feel it and we know that the pain is very real. In a moment, you have experienced damage to your energy body. You can't see it, but you can feel it.
As the knife came through your energy body, it displaced energy that has always been there, a part of you. In shamanic traditions, the event of energy displacing from our energy body during such times as this wounding, is called "soul loss." It is a common event; most of us have some degree of soul loss. Soul loss means that some of the energy in the luminescent cocoon or energy body that surrounds us has been penetrated and displaced.
If this has happened, we will experience symptoms that let us know it has happened. Those symptoms will be one or more of the things included in the previous lists. The good news is that our ancestors left us simple, effective methods to heal the energy body, to reclaim and restore displaced energy or soul loss. They used these methods 40,000 years into history and today these same methods are used on every continent of the planet. The reason these time proven methods have stayed with us is very simple: they work! In many cases, these methods are so expedient that the pain from old wounds we cannot move past stops within a few hours and sometimes it stops immediately. The method used to restore soul loss is called "soul retrieval."
Soul retrieval is a simple, loving, and expedient means with which to heal the energy body. While it is swift and effective, many people also experience it as a sacred act, sometimes an act of magic that provides what they formerly thought impossible. Many people have lived with pain for stretches of years. When their pain lightens during soul retrieval they sometimes think of magic. However, what they actually have experienced is an exchange or movement of energy that has mended the wounds of their energy body and so the pain subsides. Whether or not a person is a skeptic or a 'believer' of such possibility does not seem to matter. The experience of realizing the pain has stopped is the best salve for skepticism.
While each person experiences different results, here are some things people have said during the days and weeks after soul retrieval:
1. I'm back! I feel like I've come back to myself from a very great distance.
2. My pain disappeared. Every since the day my heart broke, my body hurt and couldn't think about anything much beyond the pain. It was always there in the background. Now it's gone.
3. I have so much more energy. I am elated, I feel like I'm on cloud nine, I'm excited about life again. I'm having fun.
4. It doesn't seem like I'm doing anything different, but I'm losing weight.
5. For a long time I've been mad at someone. I thought the circumstances of my life happened because they hurt me. I thought I had to figure it all out and I just couldn't get past it. My anger, pain, guilt and shame are gone now. I'm over it!
6. I have been trying to get better from an illness. After my soul retrieval, my medical tests showed improvement. I used to be frightened by my illness, now I'm hearing what it is teaching me. I'm getting better. I'm so excited!
7. I'm in love with life again.
8. Something happened that seems like magic. I went for soul retrieval and all of a sudden my husband started falling in love with me all over again. It makes no sense to me, I'm just happy.

Why am I Still Sick???

Having worked as a healer for the last 20 or so years this is one of the questions that I have heard over and over again. The place of anguish it arises from breaks my heart. Pain, being the great motivator, has led me deeper and deeper into the physical causes of illness, psycho/spiritual issues and the world of spirit. What I have discovered can help explain “Why.”

A beautiful Sutra, the Lotus Sutra, can help explain.

The thoughts that are in the minds of living beings,
the different types of paths they follow,
their various desires and natures,
the good and bad deeds they have done in previous existences—
all these the Buddha takes cognizance of,
and then he employs causes, similes and parables,
words that embody the power of skillful means,
in order to gladden and please them all.

A skillful healer asks, “How is this person the same and yet different from all the others we have seen with this problem? What is the unique story of this person that opens the door to healing?”

Our current specialist way of assessing illness might be helped by a horizontal way of understanding the basic processes that underlie all disease. Tibetan medicine uses four categories to describe disease.
1. Disorders that are under the strong influence of actions in previous lifetimes. (karma)
2. Disorders of this lifetime—which have their causes in an early period of life and manifest in this same lifetime.
3. Disorders involving spirits
4. Superficial disorders, so called because by simply following proper diet and behavior patterns one can correct.
I teach my students that there are three circles of being. The first is the material. When one has a material illness one needs herbs, medicine, sometimes surgery or other material intervention. The next circle overlaps the first and holds diseases of a spiritual nature. In the space where spiritual overlaps physical we find therapies like healing touch, reiki and reflexology. These therapies use both physical and spiritual energy. In the spiritual circle we find our emotions and the fallout from life decisions. The therapies we find here are psycho therapy, shamanic healing and soul retrieval (see Soul Retrieval article this issue). As we near the overlap of the third circle we have karmic debt. The last circle is one I call ‘spirit’ as it deals with the debts we have accumulated throughout all of our lifetimes and all of the beings with whom we interacted. The therapy that deals with the spirits around us is called disobsession.

It is clear that healing is an art, that deep healing is a journey and that each soul experiences exactly what it needs to grow and flourish. Patience and a broad thoughtful approach to any disease predict the most favorable outcome.

The Punishment Depends on The Wrongdoing

Dear God, if it were possible for humanity to live many years without reproducing itself, without seeing ourselves reborn in our children, how sad this world would be! Yes, how sad it would be to live in this world without children, and not be able to look upon their little faces with their rosy cheeks, animated with brilliant eyes, their heads crowned with curls, and with faces illuminated with celestial smiles...!
We would be oblivious to the celestial harmony of the universe, if we did not hear the delightful voices of the children. Conversations with the little ones are so agreeable! Oh, how much they teach us! We are constantly put in a position of trying to answer them correctly because of their continual questioning, and at times, they make such insightful observations that we're obligated to be very deliberate before answering. We say, “This child, with his profound questions, seems more intelligent than us.” Our own self love dominates us such that we do not want it to be said, that a little child knows more than we, and we hasten to study the subject of his question, to continue serving as his teacher.
The children have always been a powerful incentive for me to study, and I owe to them my diligent and thorough research in the fields of: geology, mineralogy, astronomy, agriculture, horticulture, and floriculture, because of their incessant questions which have prodded me into questioning all of Nature.
How I've always loved, and still love children...! This love has a reason for existing since I've always lived so alone! The terrible memories of the first years of my life were so bitter...! Those memories have never been erased from my mind. I can still, even now, see myself sitting alongside the seashore looking at the water and the sky, without having an affectionate mother coming to look for me. It was I, who was the one, who went to look for the local fishermen and offer them my services, so in exchange they would give me a piece of their black bread.
How envious I looked upon the children all about me, those happy beings! It is for this reason that I've always tried to be like a loving father to all the youngsters who have been left orphans, or, to those who, because of the crudeness and ignorance of their families, have not been offered tenderness, that affection which brings happiness for those just beginning to live in this world.
I've never permitted any child to suffer that I’ve known of. That’s why I’ve always been surrounded by the children, and they have been, and always are my escorts. The inhabitants of the nearby villages, when they see a group of children together, smile and say to themselves, “Father Germain can’t be far behind”and, I'm not. As a matter of fact, the beggars and the children are my best friends. That's why when the children see an indigent person, they, accompanied by Sultan, run to look for me. Upon seeing all of them, I have no need to ask them what they want, I already know that it's most likely they have found a poor unfortunate one who needs my assistance, and I say to the children, “Guide me to them, my children.” How happy they are, when I let myself be guided by them! One takes me by the arm, another grabs my robe, and as if I did not know the terrain around my own parish, my guides tell me, “This way is shorter.” “That way is to long.” “Watch out, Father, there are some bad paths over there.” These youthful and affectionate precautions make me smile. It’s so wonderful to see oneself so loved, and especially loved by good souls! There are few very young children who truly have bad sentiments. The feelings of ambition and avarice are not yet manifested in those so very small, and the rest of the passions that belittle humans will not develop until later in their youth. A child is the symbol of purity, with the exception of rebellious spirits. Generally, the majority of children are like the beautiful flowers of life and the delicate aroma of their innocent souls purify the atmosphere, of this world so corrupted by the vices and the crimes of mankind.
The most tranquil hours of my existence I owe to the children, the tender confidence that they have given me, and, the courage to sacrifice myself in doing good for humanity. I would always say to myself; “If their eyes are always fixed upon me, it is necessary that I be a good example for them.” Therefore, I struggled to dominate my passions, and, upon conquering them, I could present myself to them very satisfied, because I then could infuse into their tender hearts the essential vitality of a life of truth. A life without any virtues is like a slow suicide, but on the other hand, when it's ennobled by the fulfillment of one’s duty and sanctified by universal love, it’s the most precious instrument that a spirit possesses for its continuing moral perfection.
Eight years had passed since my arrival at the parish, and during that time I've been able to build myself a large spiritual family: the elderly came to me for advice; the young people relayed their sorrows to me and confided in me the stories of their loves; and, the children were not content unless I was present during their games and their playing. Consequently, my most beautiful ideal had been realized, a solid base had been formed for the religion that I taught in my old church, which was an abode of love and hope.
One afternoon, I was studying when I saw Sultan enter my room, and as was his custom, he put his intelligent head over my knees. Afterwards, he looked at me, gave off a mournful howl, closing his eyes. Two children had come with him, and upon seeing him open and close his eyes a couple of times, they started laughing. The oldest one told me, “Father, don’t you understand what Sultan is telling you? He is saying that we've found a poor old blind woman. Come, Father, come! This one really needs you, because she is cursing. She is screaming and yelling that there is no God. She must really be a bad woman! Isn’t it true, Father, that she must be bad?”
Without understanding why, the accusations of that child hurt me inside, and I said, “Look, my son, no one has the right to judge another.”
“But, if she is saying there is no God . . . , “replied the child, “You’ll see. You’ll see, Father.”
I left with my young companions, and headed for the spring of health, where we found the following scene: ten or twelve youngsters surrounded a woman who was practically naked, with her hair loose, and with sunken eyes encircled with a violet color, almost purple, and they had a look of terror in them. In spite of being very thin (for she looked as if a skeleton), in the countenance of that poor unfortunate woman, one could see a beauty that had been lost, for her looks still preserved a shadow of a previous perfection. I looked at her attentively and it seemed that a voice murmured in my ear; "Look at her well! Do you remember? Look back into your past memories.” In my mind, I was recalling all the memories of my life, and the voice said, “Far back...! Look very far back!” And I went backwards in time, until I reached the memory of that poor old house where I had passed the very first years of my existence. “Here?” I asked, “Is it here where I need to look?” That mysterious voice did not answer me but, the quickening of the beats of my heart told me that between her and me, there was an intimate parentage; between that unhappy blasphemer and I (a father of souls) there existed a tie, the most powerful tie which unites two beings. I was the flesh of her flesh! That poor thing was my mother...!
There was no doubt that it was she! Yes, and if there had been any doubt remaining in me, she then commenced cursing so horribly that she made me tremble, as she did when I was but a very young child. A convulsive trembling over took my being that I was not able to control, and it was as if tears of fire streamed and cascaded down from my eyes, like lava heating my heart. I cried at the same time, out of pity and of embarrassment; for I was embarrassed that she was my own mother.
There are moments in life when one feels so many diverse emotions, and that it is an impossibility to recognize and determine what sentiment is the one that is most dominant within us. But the question of one child made me come to my senses. Among those who had accompanied me there, was one child of about four or five years old, who was very intelligent and who more than once had surprised me with his unexpected and thoughtful observations. He approached me, and looked at me carefully, and said, “Father, what would you do if your mother was like this woman?”
“Love her, my son, “ I responded. “The woman who has carried us within their womb must always be looked upon as a sacred being.”
“Even if she blasphemes like this one?”
“One must still love her in the same way, and even more so, because the sick are the ones who have most need of a doctor.”
The child, upon hearing my response, looked at me sweetly, and formed with his lips such a divine smile. I have always believed, that in that particular instance, the child served as an intermediary for a spirit from God, Who showing mercy for me in my quandary, had sent one of His angels to remind me of my duty.
I got closer to my mother, who shouted out terribly, and when I placed my hands on her head, that contact made her shudder. She wanted to flee, but she could not. Her legs gave out under her, and she almost fell but I supported her, and I helped her to sit on a rock.
“Who is touching me?” she asked angrily.
“A being who has pity for you and wants to assist you,”I said.
“Well, look,”she said, her voice calming down, “Take me to a desert where one can die of hunger and lack of water, because I want to die, and I have not been able to do so.”
“Why do you want to die?”
“So I'll not suffer, nor commit any more crimes.”
The words of my mother were as poisoned arrows which thrust themselves into my heart, and I did not want even the trees to hear what she had said. Therefore, I hurriedly asked her, “Do you have the strength to walk?”
“Why?”
“So I can take you to a place where you can rest,” I said.
“But, I do not want to rest, I want to die, because my children torment me,” she said.
“They torment you?”
“Yes, yes! Here they are, here...Take me, take me where I cannot see them!” The poor unfortunate woman got up alarmed, but weakness due to her not eating for such a long time, without a doubt, impeded her, as she was only able to take one step. I helped her as much as I could, sustaining her within my arms. I told the children to run back to the village and get some men to bring a litter so that we could carry the poor blind woman.
They all ran back, but since the spring of health was far from the village, they took a long time getting there. This wait provided time for me to torture my mind with the most horrible thoughts. My mother remained quiet and was submerged in a profound lethargy. I reclined her head on my knees and covered her with my cape, and I told myself, “Here are the consequences of a crime. If this woman had been good, if she had loved me, I would have loved her so very much. So much! My dear mother! I could have supported her with the labors of my work by learning a trade, becoming an official of some sort, or going into the arts. I could have had a family and my children would have provided her joy and relief in her old age. Instead, with her abandoning me, I was condemned to a life of death within this priesthood. And her...who knows how much she has suffered...? How much disgrace have you brought upon your head, causing you enormous debts? How true it is, that the punishment depends on the wrongdoing. I had been more forsaken than she, but nevertheless, the cost of my sacrifices has surrounded me with numerous families, I am minister of a religion, and I spread the morals of Christ. And her...! One does not have to ask how she has lived, because her sorrowful state clearly demonstrates it. Oh Dear Jesus, inspire me! I want to forgive like You did. I want to love this unfortunate woman so I can return good for evil, for that is the only way to practice Your Law!
The hour in the evening at dusk is so solemn! Nature seems to say to man, “Pray!”and even the most rebellious soul feels an inexplicable emotion, and if it does not think of God, it thinks of its own mortality and prays regarding its eternal rest in its future.
Finally, the children returned, accompanied by various men who transported her to a house in the parish that served as a lodging for beggars and a hospital for the sick, in particular for women. Space for the lodging of men was made in the rectory or in my quarters, as I never permitted women to stay there.
In fifteen days, my poor mother was unrecognizable; her body was completely clean, and well attired, her tangled hair was carefully combed and gathered within a hair net which was as white as the snow. She was well nourished and rested quietly, although intermittently she would become restless, and would say that she wanted to be taken to a desert to die of hunger and thirst.
The good women who took care of the sick, must have spoken very well of me, and they most likely advised her to unburden her conscience in a general confession, because one morning I saw her enter the church guided by a child. I went over to her and she asked me to listen to her.
I took her to my room, helped her sit in my armchair and said to her, “You may begin.”
“I'm afraid to speak.”
“Why?”
“Because I've been very bad, and when you know who I am, you will throw me out of here. Although, sometimes I want to die, I find myself feeling so content in my current situation...that now I fear losing this refuge. It has been such a long time since I have slept indoors...!”
Oh, how I suffered on hearing her words! But, I composed myself, and I told her, “Do not worry about losing the generous hospitality that you've found here. I, as priest, have a sacred obligation to assist the destitute, and there is no one more needy than the blind like you, especially if one unites blindness of the body and of the soul. I swear to you that from now on, not even one day will go by while you are upon this earth wherein you will be without food or water. Speak, then, without fear.”
Then my mother spoke...and her story was so terrible, which even as long ago as it was, it left me with such an horrific impression that I didn’t have the nerve to put it on paper. I will only say that I had ten brothers, and all were abandoned; some at birth, and the others when they could but barely walk. I was the more fortunate one of all of them. Upon learning that others had slept in that same maternal womb as I, I tried to see if I could find some of them, but it was useless because my mother did not remember their dates of birth or their whereabouts.
The only birth that she remembered was mine, as if Providence wanted to present me with all the proofs, so that I would not doubt that unfortunate woman was my mother. Upon speaking of me, she said, “Father, he had the same name as you, ‘Germain.’ I wonder what happened to him? He was very humble and suffered, for even though I knew he was hungry, he never asked me for bread. He was never full of rancor or vengeful, even though I tormented him so, because I did not love him. Father, why is it that I do not see him? Yet, I continuously see the other ten, who threaten me and turn themselves into serpents that seem to coil themselves around my body? Here they are...here!” And she began to cry with such distress, letting out wails and shrieks in such a way that my heart fell to pieces, and I was only able to bring her head to my chest, and cry with her. I would have told her, “Embrace me, for I'm your son!” But I was afraid of inciting in her too much violent emotion. Besides, I seemed to hear a faraway voice that said to me, “Wait, wait...!”, and so I waited.
What a horrible struggle I sustained during those months! I put my mother at the house of some villagers, where she was treated with great affection, and her, when she felt herself well and strong, commenced taking unfair advantage and acting immoderately, which caused a great scandal among the temperate inhabitants of my village. Daily, she became intoxicated. She committed all kinds of excesses, and tried perverting various youths. The elderly of the village came to me to tell me the stories of the various scandals; things that had never happened here before. I admonished my mother, but did not dare speak to her strongly, yet that spirit seemed like she needed to be whipped to obey. When I talked to her with tenderness, her immoral and vicious thoughts caused her to misinterpret my tolerance, regarding what I had said or done.
Upon seeing that soul who was so impure, I felt exasperated, and said to myself, “Accursed was the time, I slept within your womb!” But immediately, I said, “Forgive me, God! When you gave her to me as my mother, you imposed upon me an obligation of respecting her, protecting her, sheltering her, and to be affectionate and love her. She is my mother! I do not have the right to scold her.” Thereafter, I would give her advice with gentleness and great sweetness. She would listen to me, and at times, she was moved to great emotion and cried and spoke of her son Germain. I took advantage of her tenderness, and one day indicated to her that I knew something of her son, and invented a story, telling her that he was a friend of mine. I also told her he was a priest, and that if she promised to amend her conduct, she would be able to embrace him in her arms one day. Initially, this produced a favorable result from her for a time. Something spoke to her in her heart, and giving me a warm embrace, she promised not to get drunk anymore.
Nevertheless, since that spirit was dominated by the most gross instincts, she again fell anew into the most scandalous and shameful degradation, for even to the children she made indecent propositions. My unusual tolerance with her, profoundly surprised all who knew me because they were used to my rectitude and firmness. My poor mother made herself so odious by her immorality, that my parishioners started to look at me with suspicion, seeing how I acted with her, and possibly thinking that I had something to do with her that was impure.
How I struggled in those days! There were moments when I would decide to yell in a loud voice, “This is my mother! That's why I cannot treat her with such severity!” Immediately, I comprehended that all my good deeds at the parish in the past eight years were always being destroyed within seconds by her.
I then said to myself, “The case is, if the people are to continue to love and respect me, and taking into consideration this extreme tolerance I have had for my mother and her depravity, I am serving as a bad example for them. Although I can tolerate the abuses of my mother, I do not have the right to expect the rest of the parish to accept her scandals or modify their ways. A man owes and must serve his fellow man, but not at the expense regarding the exclusive affection of one person.”
The inhabitants of this small parish are my spiritual family and my duty is to watch over their tranquility. The Bible says, “if your right hand is a cause for scandal, one should cut it off,” because between the annoying satisfaction of one, compared to the tranquility of many, it is always preferable to choose the larger good. Man should never only think of himself but also the well-being of others.
I find myself weak in correcting my mother. When she comes and talks to me, my heart beats faster, but I become disheartened, because I know that she's capable of anything, even of wanting to commit incest, for she spoke inappropriately one day about her son to me, which hurt me deeply. What sorrows! Finally, I had no recourse but to write to a priest friend of mine, who was in charge of a religious infirmary, so that he could admit her for being sick, and submit her to a curative regimen, the only means of trying to dominate her vices.
When my mother realized that she had to leave the parish to go to a house for the sick, she became hysterical, but I was able to calm her down by talking about her son Germain. She left our community riding on top of a calm mare which was lead by a youthful and strong villager, and they were accompanied by six men. When they were leaving, I accompanied her as far as the spring of health. There I remained for a long time submerged in the most painful of meditations. All my life I had yearned to be with my mother but, when I found her, her vices and unbridled licentiousness kept her from being by my side. She had the most rebellious spirit that I have ever known. I've dominated men whose bloody instincts had taken them to the most terrible and inconceivable cruelties, and, depraved women have trembled before me, and I've been able to get true repentance from many of them. But, from my mother, the woman that I would have wanted to convert into a saint, I've had no influence over her.
Is it possibly a punishment? Did I believe, in a moment of presumption, that I had the same power of the good angels? If indeed I've had that pride, then justly and well deserved has been my humiliation. But what painful humiliation, my God! But no, this is not it. I have always known my insignificance because upon seeing my mother, I did not remember that at the age of five she had abandoned me and I forgot her ill treatments of me. I said, “This woman had given me my first breath, and when I started to smile, once in a while she most likely gave me a kiss and told me, ‘How handsome you are, my son!’” And upon thinking this... my eyes filled with tears, and I continued saying to myself, “The child should obey his parents.” If I could have, I would have served her on my knees. At times, when she was dominated by drunkenness (a vice of which I so much hated) and upon seeing her that way, I would give her a sedative trying to erase the signs of her weak and wrongful ways, and I would tell her with a supplicating tone, “Promise me that you'll not do this again...!”She did not comprehend that I was her son because she was blind; because if her gaze had crossed mine...oh, my denials would have been in vain because my eyes would have told her what my lips did not. What a struggle, God...what a trial!
Many days passed, and finally the six villagers who had accompanied my mother had returned. Upon seeing them, I knew that something unfortunate happened because they came to me very silent and serious. The eldest one told me, “Father, you already know us, and you know that your mandates are like saintly laws to us. Therefore, we attended that poor blind woman as if she had been one of our daughters. We had been gone ten days on the trip, and one afternoon we stopped to rest near some rocks, and a strange thing happened, the mare Corinda who always was very gentle, got nervous and she started jumping, broke her reigns and galloped away with the blind one and both went jumping over the rocks, crags, and into the precipice. The blind woman was hanging onto the horse and the saddle, and at the same time yelling for the mare to go on and on. We went after her, but we were convinced all was lost, because she disappeared from our sight faster then it took the time to tell you this. We spent four days among those valleys but, since it is impossible to descend into those deep abysses, we were unable to find her remains. You say that the devil does not exist, but it seems like it was his work that happened that day.”
I did not know how to answer regarding that story. The pain and remorse I felt made me silent and I took to my bed where I remained for many days as if between life and death. I would say to myself,“If she had only stayed here, she would still be alive. On the other hand, I saw that it was impossible, because the man who consecrates himself to being a priest has obligations to watch over the people of his parish under his protection and should avoid everything which presents a danger to his great spiritual family.”
What do parents do? Do not parents separate their children from bad companions? There are prostitutes that close up their daughters in a convent so that they will not be contaminated by the vices of their mother. There are bandits that hide their life of crime from their children so to allow them to live honorable lives within society. Then... I have fulfilled my sacred obligation by separating from the villagers that woman of scandal, who was perverting the youth and the children. But, that woman was my mother! I had never seen her smile, but I thought that once in a while, looking at me, she had smiled, and since the smile of a mother is like the smile of God...I dreamed of being the object of one of those smiles, and I cried without being able to describe my feelings.
I felt such a profound melancholy within me that not even the children were able to distract me. If there had not happened a great occurrence and turn of events which to me, gave life to new ideas, I do not know what would have happened to me.
A year and a half after the death of my mother, I came to know the pale girl with the black curls. She was the one who when she was very small, wanted to come to me when I would say,
“Come to me, children, which are the pure of heart!”
Oh! When she got older and asked me,“Father, is it a sin to love?”
I closed my eyes, and said to myself,“Why does not a thunderbolt come down and destroy us both?”Afterwards, I opened my eyes and looked at her, and thought of my parishioners in the village and reasoned in the following way,“They use me as an example, and I should fulfill my obligations and duty. I want to flee from faults, because in them lies the punishment. Thanks to God my universal family has not had to be ashamed of their father. I've suffered and I have struggled and I have broken my heart into pieces, but I have conquered dominating my passions, which is what man should try and do first.
If one is not the owner of oneself (of our will and actions) one cannot hope to have moral strength. This is acquired when one practices will power by dominating ones desires, because then one convinces the multitudes, not with vain words but with deeds, which have the eloquence of being mathematically demonstrated. Acts can be counted as within the exact sciences, their undeniable truths can convince even those incredulous by habit.

Father Germain

The Three Confessions

Beloved manuscript, faithful depository of the most ultimate secrets of my soul! After God, you are my confessor. The world does not know me, you do. To you, I present myself just as I am, with all my faults and regrets. Before you, I am a man. In the eyes of society, I am a priest.
Many believe that I am faultless. Dear God, why do they ask for the impossible? Why do they require from the anointed of God, the strength of a giant? Because I am but a pigmy, like the rest of the men on the earth!
Social laws, how absurd they are! I passed many years without knowing them, happy with my fortune; celebrating the mass, teaching the church doctrine to children, walking about with my faithful companion Sultan, delivering pious lectures, those were my only pleasures. Only when I had to fulfill one act of my sacred ministry, did I feel a cloud of sadness come over me. Oh, when I sat in the confessional! I looked with anguish at the faces of the penitents as they confessed their misfortunes, and at times terrible secrets, as I suffered a thousand deaths. When I would leave the confessional, I would flee to the countryside, running like a madman. There, I threw myself to the ground and asked God to take away from my memory what I had heard. At times, God heard my requests and a serene sleep would overpower my senses. Then my faithful Sultan would wake me up, pulling gently at my habit. I would then feel weak, as if I had just had a strong fever. Remembering vaguely the strange happenings, I then returned home, where my faithful companion Miguel, waited anxiously for me. [Miguel was the caretaker of the church and his assistant]
Never did I like the tumult of the great cities, I always preferred my quiet parish. Nevertheless, as if it were my expiation and even though I refused to live in the great city of N.........., it’s prominent inhabitants came to look for the priest in the parish, and women of noble birth and men of lordly social positions, would come to my humble church so that I would give them their nuptial blessings. As I would look at those joyful couples smiling with happiness, without knowing why, I felt pain in my forehead and in my heart. When they all would leave, and I remained alone in my temple, it appeared to me like a grave, and I, the cadaver buried in it.
I kept to myself these impressions, telling no one, because the common people and my envious companions [other clergymen], would have said that the devil was tempting me, although I knew that Satan did not exist.
Educated in the most austere and rigorous surroundings, without ever knowing my mother who had died giving birth to me; [he had been told this] I was a child of the ministry. I grew up in a religious community, which is like a flower without water, like a bird without wings. I was obligated to always obey, without any right to ask questions. Till one day they told me,“You will be a minister of God, and you will flee from women, because they serve Satan to tempt man.” I was filled with superstitious terror because I wanted to look worthy in the eyes of God.
I started reading. I read a lot and I discovered (albeit too late) that the sacrifice of Catholic priests is contrary to the laws of nature [celibacy], and everything that is against the laws of God is absurd. But, I remained silent. I admired the valor of the reformers [the Protestant movement was starting], but, I did not have the courage to follow them. So, I sacrificed myself to the institution I belonged in order to fulfill my delicate mission.
The day that I became thirty five years old, the children of my parish entered into my church marching like a troop, and persisted in delivering to me, flowers, fruit and milk, honey and butter. While I was happy among my adoptive family, one I could never have created, there arrived a document from the city of N......... from the director of a school for young ladies of nobility. It said that the next day he would be sending fifteen of his students so they could receive from me spiritual advice, be closer to God's table and so participate in the Eucharist. Without knowing why, my heart started beating fast, a warmth came over my cheeks, and even though I tried to control myself, that entire day a sadness overcame me.
The following morning, a line of coaches surrounded my humble church, and very pretty girls, from twelve to fourteen years of age, came forth like a flock of pigeons, flying to the cheerful nest of the Christian Church, where the simple altar had been adorned with pretty perfumed flowers. How appropriate it seemed to me, that like the wild flowers from the meadows, these girls were like white flowers in the garden of Life. Precious girls! Smiles of the world! Hope of mankind! Why, had they been sent to this poor parish?
I looked at all of them, but only noticed one. She was a pale girl with long black, curly hair. When she walked, she seem to bend easily like wilted lilies. When she prostrated herself by the confessional altar, the scent of the white jasmines that crowned her forehead reached my senses, and it upset me. The girl looked at me firmly, and said with a sad voice, “Father, when a person is confessing, is it proper to say what they think to their confessor?”
“If it's something bad, yes. If good, no.”
“To love, is bad?”she asked.
To this, I could not give a quick answer. I looked at her and I did not know what I was reading in her eyes. Then I placed my hands on my chest, to contain the palpitations that I felt,
and replied with a grave tone,“To love is good, but, at times it is not always good. One should love God, we should love our parents, we should love our fellow man, but, there are other passions in the world which you now do not understand and in these, to love is a transgression.”
“I love God, I love my parents, and my brothers, and .........a man,” she said.
“You are too young to love any man,” I told her.
“I have read that for the heart there is no age, and it's been a year that I've loved him,”she said.
Instead of answering, I remained silent. The name of that man, I did not want to know. But the girl continued, “It was a year ago when my sister Adela was married, and wishing to be blessed by a saint, she received her marriage vows from you!”
“From me....!”
“Yes, from you. You are famous for being honorable. I came with my sister and since that day.......”
“What?”
“Since that day I think of you, and how to get to see you, and be able to talk to you. I am the one who insisted in coming here, so that I could ask you, if it is a sin to think of you?”
What happened to me then, I do not know. I closed my eyes but it was useless, that witch of a girl, that enchanting youth, full of ingenuity and passion, had revealed a world of happiness impossible for me. Her voice caressed my soul, but I had enough firmness to dominate my sentiments, and I told the young girl, “You cannot love a priest, my child, because he is a man who does not belong to the world. Pray with fervor, so that God will apart from you that fatal illusion, and ask God to pardon you, as I do.”
Feeling blinded and overwhelmed by diverse and contrary emotions, I left the confessional. I asked God to rid me of sight, so that I would not suffer. But, I saw only her! The pale girl with the black curls stayed engraved in my mind and for a long time, this disturbed my sleep and my prayers, always reminded of her by the perfume of the jasmines which had crowned her brow.
Eight years later, a well dressed man arrived at my parish and asked to see me, and said, “Sir, come with me, my wife is dying, and she does not want any other confessor but you.”
I followed him and without knowing why, I thought of that girl with the black curls.
We came to a palace, where the young man accompanied me to an apartment covered with large purple curtains, and in the bed was a woman who cried weakly. They left me alone with the sick woman, and then she said, ”Look at me, do you not know me?”
My heart had already recognized her, and to be truthful, I had not forgotten her, but I
had the firmness of will to tell her,“The One who has to know you is God in His Kingdom, the men of the earth are nothing.”
She then said,“ I have not forgotten you. It's been eight years since I told you that I loved you. They say that I'm going to die, and I want to tell you that above all others upon this earth, I have loved you.”
I looked at her for a moment, looking into those eyes where passion still shined. I mentally blessed her, and I crossed myself, trying to put something between myself and her. Fleeing that place of pending death, I ran, but actually from myself. I returned to my parish where in silence, I pondered on that love which had been offered, and which I had no right to enjoy.
Two years later, a plague overcame that nearby city, and many families came to my parish in search of its healthy climate. But they brought the disease with them. The church bell pealed with melancholy, as if to say to the peasants, "Death is among us". Meanwhile, they continued coming.
Among them, one night, there arrived the coach of the Duke of ........, accompanied by his wife, and many servants. The following day, within a few hours the Duke died. When I arrived to give him the last rites, it was already too late. A Lady came out to me, crying silently. I retreated, stupefied. It was she, that young girl of the black curls and pale skin, who I had thought dead for the past two years.
She understood my astonishment and said with a sad voice,”God has been good to me, I feel that now, I will die following my husband. You, who received my first confession, now more than likely, will receive my last. I have had only one secret during my lifetime, and only committed one sin, if to love is a sin.”
I could see by the color of her complexion that the fever of the contagious disease was already within her, and I ran like a madman to ask science for the life of that woman who had loved me so much, and, whom I also had loved. But science (thank God), did not listen to my imprudent pleas and two days later, the young Duchess died. Before her death, she told me, “I
wish to be buried in the churchyard of this town. I wish to be by your side at least in death, since I was not able to be with you during life!”
What mysteries guard the human heart!
When I threw a fistful of dirt on her grave during her burial, I almost felt happy. How egotistical is man!
When that pale girl, crowned with white jasmines full of innocence and love, had offered me the cup of Life, I rejected that nectar of happiness, and I envied the man who would eventually take her to the altar.
When that noble woman, surrounded by her rich family, told me that she was going to die still loving me, I envied them. They were able to receive her last breath and were capable of giving her remains, a luxurious and splendid funeral.
But when that woman, alone, surrounded by strangers who were afraid of being contaminated by her, asked me for a place in the cemetery of my parish, when I saw that no one could take from me her ashes, because in her will, under her own signature, she had left written that her body not be taken from that humble grave that she requested, I received her last words with a magical ecstacy. Her first confession was to tell me she loved me, and her last confession was to tell me, she worshiped me all her life.
Not for an instant, did I part myself from her remains. The unfortunate inhabitants of my parish, decimated by the fever, frightened by the death toll, and since the gravedigger had also died, the few that remained alive did not want to touch the dead. Between Miguel and I, we deposited in a grave, the remains of the pale woman. After we were done, Miguel left me, while Sultan stayed and sat by my feet. It was then that I surrendered my heart to the happiness of love.
By loving a dead person, I did not break my sacred vows. I cried for my lost youth, my weakness in not protesting my vows and for not affiliating with the Lutheran church, uniting myself with the pale girl with the black curls in the bonds of matrimony. I would have created a family worthy in the eyes of God. Comprehending in a few hours, what I had not been able to in twenty years, I then breathed a tremendous sigh of relief.
I, who have known so many secrets! Who has seen so many women unmasked, when confiding to me their infidelities and straying! I, who has seen so much fickleness, can now appreciate with all its valor the immense love of that woman, who had only seen me four times in her life, and when she had learned to love, she had loved me!
I covered her grave, covered with flowers, with great pleasure! I took care of it with saintly delight! The heart of a man is always like child! Not a day, not one day, did I ever fail to go to the cemetery because there was the love of my life!
Many winters passed, the snow covered her tomb, and also left white my head, but my heart always stayed young. Always the warmth of that most pure sentiment, maintained within me, the saintly fire of that immense love. Mother, sister, wife, and children, she comprised all of them for me! It’s only just, that one should pay with interest, ones’ sacred debts of love.
If I have progressed somewhat in this world, I owe everything to her, to the girl with the pale cheeks, and black curls.
Sitting by the side of her tomb, I learned the worth of the Lutheran reform while under the shadow of a willow tree by her grave. I erased the shadows that covered my imagination. I recognized the insignificance of the church of man and, how great is the universal temple of God!
Love! Such a powerful sentiment and a creative force! You are the soul of Life, because you come from God. Priests without families are like dry trees! And God does not want sterile sacrifices, only progress and universal Love!

Ela 03.24.05

Outwardly we are different in appearance to you, sufficiently that you would know that we are not of the Earth. Yet, you would also see that we are very much in the human mold. We are at a level of development, or as you would say vibration, that is presently beyond yours. We do not need form like yours, because we are able to exist in the expression of Light, in our Light bodies. It is however, possible for us to transform our appearance to one that in your eyes will be familiar, pleasant and acceptable to you.

We can move into other dimensions, and over long distances simply through the power of thought. Space vehicles such as you are now familiar with, are used by us only when it is appropriate to do so. They have been seen about the Earth, when like many other visitors we follow up our interest in your development. The sheer magnitude of what you have achieved is astonishing, you have brought Light to your planet that has enabled you to speed up your evolution. You are now at a point where even if you are not yet sure of your success, we can tell you that you have achieved your goal. You are one step away from being fully prepared for your Ascension, and that is but the blink of an eye.



If you truly understood what a long journey it has been to reach this point, you would not be concerned at the short time which is remaining. Heavenly forces are amassed to ensure that you do not falter over the last few steps. At times you have naturally felt as though you were alone in your fight to overcome the dark. Truthfully, you have never been alone even at your lowest points, and you have been accompanied by a host of Light Beings.



It is no coincidence or accident that you are on Earth at such a momentous time. The Divine Plan has been in place ever since you first agreed to experience duality, and you have been protected and guided ever since. You are not some chance happening that has arisen from the original building blocks of Earth. You were selected for the experience which you accepted, and allowed to find your own feet as you descended into the lower vibrations. Freewill has been the foundation stone of your experiences, and you have learnt an immense amount about its application.



The critical factor for you has been the Law of Cause and Effect, which some of you still do not realise is what brings certain experiences into your life. An understanding of it means that you do not treat others differently to yourselves, but as you would wish to be treated. You cannot go through your life with impunity for others, as you are All One and your actions affect the whole. They also rebound on you if you are creating negativity, until you have learnt the lesson that your actions can teach you. Universal Law is exactly that, and it is designed to bring an understanding into being that will enable all to flow in balance and harmony.



At our level, we have long ago learnt the basic lessons of life. But, we have not ended our search for knowledge and wisdom, and the quest goes on in the never ending Kingdom of God. We have become a group consciousness and are One, yet we are also still units that express ourselves in accordance with our individual soul. In a manner of speaking you also experience group consciousness, but in a way over which you have little knowledge or control.



There is always an interchange of energy taking place, and strong thoughts get stronger as more of you give them your energy. Thoughts become so powerful, that they establish an energy and consciousness of their own. They may exist for centuries of your time, and it is the degree of negative thought forms that have travelled with you, that have perpetuated the chaos that you experience. This is why you hear a lot about the cleansing of your Earth, and it is not just the physical aspect, but the negative energies that permeate the whole planet. The transmutation of these energies is taking place, and presently the Light is the most powerful force upon Earth. Some acts of cleansing are performed through specific intention, whilst others result from the mere presence of Light.



The preparation of your Earth so that it is ready to ascend is already underway. But the task is formidable, and help is soon to arrive as your space friends, who are your real family, come openly into your lives. We will be part of that wonderful occasion, but take our place more in the background. We are great healers and we shall give of our abilities to those who are in need. Indeed, all of your needs have been ascertained and there will be no lack of attention to your complete requirements. There are many specialist groups waiting for the cleansing to commence, and it will be thorough and take place in short time.

I am Ela of Arcturus, and I see your victory and success. You are at the gateway of Ascension and nothing can now stop your progress and fulfillment. There is so much love involved in the process, and it is surely going to be the most beautiful time you will ever have experienced in this cycle of duality.

Thank you Ela


Medium
Mike Quinsey

The Collapsing Of Time

As we appraise the conditions on the earth we find that events are moving quickly as you are beginning to feel a difference in time. The mechanics of time are quickening to the point that you are starting to notice what appears to be a day with fewer hours. There is a complaint that there doesn’t seem to be enough hours in the day. This is part of the collapsing of time.

The past present and future are coalescing into the oneness where everything reaches the point of now. This is difficult for you to understand as you have been conditioned to live in linear time. On this side life is lived as a continuum where there is no past, present, or future, but an eternal now.

The state of the eternal now does not allow opposition forces to exist on the same energy band. By opposition we mean those who are diametrically opposed to the spiritual hierarchy; those who follow the edicts of the Source of all.

We wish to take a moment and explain two forces. All dark forces are not the same. There is a force we call dark as it is hidden and works in the shadow. Then there is a force that exists in its opposition to the forces of light as they implement Source.

Souls working on the path of enlightenment had two choices open before them. One path was to live for advancement of self and another was to express themselves by living and dedicating themselves to the welfare of others. Both factions believe that their motivations are in alignment with their God though the viewpoint is different. This description does not pertain to the dark forces that are in opposition to the Source.

There will come a time where the forces that live for self and those who live for others will come together and be reconciled. This was part of the game that was set up on earth at its creation. It was part of the guiding rules designed by the Game Makers. Both could find salvation in their roles. If you think of this state as a role that one followed, you could better understand the illustration.

Those opposed to the Source or the God Force are not working within the rules of this game but rather have an agenda all their own. They work off your planet, but can direct their activities through others upsetting conditions here. These forces have in their designs the complete and utter control of the planet and wish to be the lords of the planet controlling all.

We cannot contain them in the sense of destroying them, but must make a division between them and you. We make this division through vibration as it is the only way that we can protect you. We want to bring as many as possible through the levels of vibration until you are out of the way of the machinations of those who would act as lords of darkness.

After the earth changes, there will be two worlds here that are existing on different vibratory levels. We spoke earlier that love and compassion are the only two states that can sustain the higher vibrations that we described. The self touted lords of darkness have neither love nor compassion

Julius Caesar who has spoken through this source has described the tear in the etheric bands which is the beginning of the separation between these two vibratory levels. The tear has not split yet though as a rubber band that is being pulled to its capacity is ready to break.

We see possibility on our side and unless there is a quickening of vibration among most of the population many will be on the lower side of the vibratory tear. Your only defense is to move your bodies to a capacity that will accept the higher energy levels that we have been sending to earth.

Your master soul understands what you conscious reasoning mind does not understand. It has been prompting you to live in a manner that allows you to grow with these expanding energy bands. This year in particular the energy downloads have been especially intense and you have felt them in your bodies as physical ailments.

Those who have cleared the traumas from previous lifetimes will find this easier to implement. We urge you to read our directions as to how to clear the body in Chaos Before Creation. The agonies from past lifetimes have been caught in your energy body that surrounds your physical body. This must be cleared before you can integrate the new energies.

Where you will reside after the earth changes will determine your future for about the next 200,000 years of earth time. Moving to the next vibratory band will not be possible as the energies that come to earth that hasten ascension can only find their way here when your solar system is situated within a particular path and other celestial bodies are lined up in a certain fashion.

We have mentioned that the planetary systems appear to be a grand clock works acting as gears. If you picture clockworks and the movement of the cogs and gears as the opening and closing of locks that allow energy to move, that would be a good example of how the energy systems of ascension works.

These energies have been coming to Earth very slowly since the start in the 40’s and in earnest during the last two years. Edgar Cayce pinpointed the 40’s as the time when there was a shift within the core of Earth that eventually realigned the tectonic plate system.

At the very center of the mantle in the densest part of the molten rock there are windings that would seem like the windings of an electrical motor. These windings have a relationship to the windings of your solar sun. At the time that Edgar Cayce discussed the change in the earth’s core, the windings in your solar sun had changed and the earth as its partner in space had changed to harmonize with it.

This is the reason that the Russian scientists have found evidence of the planets in your solar system changing because they also work in tandem with the sun. This change shifted the entire planetary system. We discuss this event so you understand that we cannot reverse this process. Once begun, it cannot be altered.

We urge you to clear your emotional bodies and you must do this quickly. We will be back later to report of your progress.

I still hold myself as the Good Sheppard leading my flock and anything that affects your welfare, affects me.

Jesus
As told to Carolyn Evers