Children on the March
Reprinted
with kind permission from St. Joseph Publications
from the book She Went in Haste to the Mountain (Book 1)
NOTE: All excerpts from Conchita's Diary will
be in extra-bold type
|
* * *
It can be seen that during those
days, God was showing special attention to that old man (previous chapter,
Uncle Leoncio), who was then at death's door, as if attempting to assist
him in his great step toward eternity: facing the meeting he would have
with God.
How easily do men forget that we
do not end like irrational animals, but that all of us are heading inexorably
toward this great encounter, and that we cannot present ourselves there
anyway we please. J. Staudinger writes in the introduction to his book
The
Holy Priesthood:
"The encounter of the soul with
God starts eternity. In that hour, the person stands in total solitude.
As helpless as when he came from the Hands of the Creator, he now appears
before Him. The Creator and the creature meet for the first time in front
of each other, face to face: God alone and the soul alone . . .
The only thing accompanying the person there will be what
he has done during his life.
It will always be supreme wisdom to prepare for that hour
. . . This is the most holy task of the Church; her special mission toward
every human being is to prepare him for that final hour of encounter."
"Ecstatic marches"
Poor Uncle Leoncio, Jacinta's
grandfather, blind and in
extremis, stands in our story as a symbol
of the frail human being in his final helplessness, when there is nothing
to hope for from the world below, and only from the world above can help
and comfort come. Attending to the dying will always be the highest work
of Christian charity, a thing that the Church and those in the Church,
cannot in anyway forget.
And the girls, immersed in the
deep mystery of Garabandal, did not forget. The case of Uncle Leoncio was
not the only one m this regard. Nor was the episode of January 28th that
we have just seen, the only one with him.
We know, for example, that on
January 30th., Conchita and Loli were in ecstasy towards 7:20 in the evening,
and after having
«prayed in the Cuadro, they visited the houses
where the sick were, holding up the crucifix to be kissed and praying with
them.»
And on January 31st, after
the rosary ended in the church, Mari Cruz went into ecstasy and «she
walked through the village, visiting several houses where she gave the
cross to be kissed. And she also went to the house of Jacinla's grandfather,
where she was with him about a quarter of an hour, praying and holding
up the cross to be kissed . . . And a little later, Loli and Conchita did
the same, and they were with him for a period of an hour; and they came
back to the same place, and sat on the bed.»
The old man, semi-conscious,
did not respond to the girls' desire for him to kiss the crucifix, and
they asked him, «Why don't you kiss it? If you kiss it, the
Virgin can restore your sight.» To that, the old man replied,
«And
what would I want my sight for?»
The episode concerning Uncle
Leoncio ended a few days later with the end of his stay on earth. Among
Fr. Valentin's notes are found these, corresponding to February 8th:
«At 9 at night, Mari
Loli went out of her home in ecstasy. She went to the home of Leoncio,
who was laid out, and she held out the crucifix to be kissed by the persons
who were there (almost the whole village). She prayed a station before
the body and then left and went into other houses.»
