Chapter 13
THE MEETING BETWEEN LAZARO AND ALONZO
I would like you to listen to me. There is a gay
Saint - I've seen him before and I will see him again. If you think that all
gays live, love, desire, act and talk the same, think again! Take everything
away from a gay saint, and he will laugh to your face! Why? Because he has so
little to lose. He had already lost everything the moment he admitted to being
gay. And when he loses everything, he becomes a child again: Pure, innocent,
sincere, trusting, hopeful, uninhibited, curious, questioning; he forgets
himself; he suddenly looks at everyone as his father, his mother, his big
brother, his big sister. He starts believing that people are there to protect
him. He makes us start believing we know more than him. He is there...and you
won't even notice because his love for God prevents him from revealing
himself... ...because love for God is something shared privately, it's not
trumpeted about...and most of all... because he acquires the madness of Saints
(Lazaro's words over the phone)
"I was recollecting this tale about Alonzo the monk,
the priest in a black robe, as I put my steps inside the church. The air
inside zoomed in echoes carrying the songs of twittering birds jumping among
its balustrades and marble-stony saints. I was very much impressed by its
cleanliness. Not a single soul save me and the black robed priest were inside.
"I was about to ask who he was when this strange
sensation passed from the tip of my toes to the tip of my tongue - like a bolt
of lightning. Reminding myself this was all a dream I decided to zip my mouth.
I didn't have any control...
"Something akin to speech - quite sepulchral in tone
- penetrated my ears. The priest in black spoke to my mind without batting an
arm nor breathing air.
"You are inside a sacred place."
"Immediately, Moses of Ten Commandments came to my
mind... There was a scene where the voice of the burning bush instructed Moses
to take off his shoes because he was standing on a sacred ground. I bent
forward to untie the laces of my sneakers. The voice stopped me. "There is no
need to do that."
"I raised my head and curiously stretched out my neck
side to side to seek his identity, to no avail. He continued, " This is the
house of God. Your eyes should be fixated upon God and nothing else. Bear in
mind that monks like us are nobodies. We are mere spaces. Take the tapestry
off the missal table and cover your head with it. Bow your head and stare at
the ground. Think you're worth is like that of the ground you tread. Take away
your sense of being. Think of nothing. Empty your mind and be one with God.
"His words puzzled me...Us? We? Monks? Since when did
I become a monk? Again, I barricaded my lips. I stood and slowly gathered in
my hand the tapestry that was made of soft lace, white in color. I placed it
over my head. It covered me with the smell of the table's fresh varnish
coating. My downcast eyes stared at the floor that reflected my hooded face.
We remained seated silently for a long time. My mind was spinning. I was again
in the middle of something...I did not understand yet I understood... Slowly,
an image invaded my vision: I saw my companion, him, the man in a black robe,
astride a horse, descending the peak of a mountain against the background of a
moon the size of man, pulling out an arrow and shooting an acacia tree. It
struck. It was a solemn and symbolic act.
"He spoke: "I am returning because it is time. It is
the heavens that's crying out to my soul. I slept for 426 years and I'm
awakened to the cries of a boy from Lubao, the town I founded. This won't be
easy for both of us Lazaro. I am bringing you to a world full of pains and
sacrifice. Through a great purgation, you'll forget yourself, you'll empty
your mind. Through a spiritual ecstasy, tantamount to psychosis, you'll read
the mind of God. Before the night is over, your soul will undergo its deepest
darkness, after that, in three days, you will witness a great miracle of God.
"What was this stranger telling me? Was he...? I
could not complete my question.
"I started seeing the moon falling from the sky,
atomic explosions and meteors were hitting the earth, I saw the sun dying, I
saw the cosmos reaching its end. The thermodynamic principle of cosmic crunch
was invading my vision. In this vision, the arrow of time was reversing, life
was backtracking.
"I threw the veil from my head, I started sweating,
suffocated within the church. My palms were damp, to my eyes, the marble
saints moved, all ministering to me in a multitude of incomprehensible words.
"The priest in a black robe rose from his seat and
turned back, I still did not see his face.
""Are you sent by St. Augustine?" I asked
""No. I come to you in my own volition."
""Please Sir, kindly explain all these to me. Am I
crazy?"
""No."
""For goodness sakes, tell me what's going on!"
""Are you still the doubting Thomas after all the
things you saw?"
""Just answer this one question. Are you Alonzo the
monk?
""Yes I am.
"I clenched my fists and prepared to run out of the
church. But I...I turned into an immobile statue. He addressed me one more
time: "Let go Lazaro. Let go. You cannot fathom the depths of purgation, it
comes to anyone who considers God seriously. Let go of all your Jungian and
Freudian philosophy because there are things on earth that are beyond
explanation. Do not over-analyze your visions...do not try to suppress them.
It's up to you to believe them or not. God will not force-feed you. You will
never understand why I, after 426 years have returned. It is like explaining
the Law of Probability in Quantum Physics. God says He is light but light has
its own speed. The star that you see now may have released its light billions
of years ago. You won't ever know what's going on in that star this exact
instant. Or think of our sun, even if it collapses now it would still take a
full eight minutes before we would realize its demise. Time is relative Lazaro.
What happened in the past may be happening now, in a parallel world. Christ
maybe dead to you for two thousand years, yet somewhere, He is alive doing
what He did two thousand years ago. It goes without saying that there are
certain people like me who live forever. I live because I think I am alive. I
have returned Lazaro to fulfill my promise long time ago. I have returned many
times before but people failed to notice me. My reappearances had crossed ages
and world boundaries, searching for those who belonged to the ancient order of
the Desert Fathers. Who are we? We are called by God even before our births.
We seek solitude. We live alone. We escape from gatherings. We are unknowns.
We are the original contemplatives. Youth will make you explore the world,
partake even of its sins...but the time has come Lazaro, from within you, the
spirit of the Desert Fathers will bloom. You will not comprehend this at first
but as days turn into years and you mature, you will understand and seek our
company more and more. And you will find us in abandoned houses and jungles
and solitary islands. We come when called... Augustine opened the door of your
heart to allow the rest of the saints enter into your soul. We will let you
see the beauty of us - ignore the sights and sounds of Miami, block you
nostalgic Manila - these things are all temporal. What is permanent is the
memory of history. Your memory will reveal to you our past in the deserts of
Egypt and Arabia, in the oceans of Polynesia, in the tropical mountains of
Colombia, Amazon jungles of Brazil, in the rubbles of old Ireland. You will
see how we encountered death only to live again in another time and place,
with another name. Look deep inside you and you will find in the recesses of
your mind who I am. As a young boy you saw me. A garden was apple green and
flowers were fragrant and wide open under the sun...
The First Memory
"Upon hearing this, the backward arrow of time
brought me to my earliest memory as a child. I was a boy barely 5 years old
holding a ball. I remembered a place vividly, a garden where on its side stood
a marvelous beauty. How could I forget it? A large house, a most beautiful
house had a series of rooms, its walls were covered by creeping weeds, on its
hall I saw priests in black robes walking silently, in a line, singing a tune-
it was the most peaceful tune I've ever heard.
"One of the priests turned his head to me; he pulled off
his hood, looked like a foreigner with beard and fair complexion. His eyes
were blue. For a brief moment, he smiled at me and waved before resuming his
walk.
""Remember," Alonzo spoke again, "when your brother was
sick."
The Second Memory
"How will I forget that moment? I was seven years
old. I heard my mother praying. "Dear God, take care of my child. Don't let
him suffer like this." I didn't know what ailed him but I knew it was bad.
"My brother was lying on bed, his eyes were tightly
closed, his lips were tremulous. "Mother, help me," he cried. I watched with
fear. I realized then that dying was terrible. That sight alone made me decide
I'd work with the sick when I grew up. Unable to bear this torment, I uttered
a prayer, "God, heal my brother."
"I saw the priest in the black robe taking the place of
my brother, my brother turned into a man with beard and fair complexion. For a
brief second, I watched this priest suffer in place of my brother. When he
disappeared, my brother opened his eyes and smiled as if nothing had happened.
He immediately got up and started pacing the room. I knew since then that
miracles could happen.
"Alonzo stopped my recollection for the third time.
"Remember the vision you saw beside Manila Bay."
The Third Memory
""So...So it's you! You were the One I kept seeing
beside the Bay! You were the reason why I kept returning to Manila Bay while I
was in college. I thought I ran because I wanted to forget, to resume what I
put on hold, to recover my dying self -esteem. I thought its magical waters
preserved and re-charged me. I ran for you! Because I saw and felt you over
and over again, watching me, pushing me. It was you who I saw in a rare moment
of trance Alonzo, the man walking along the shore in an ancient time, when
Manila Bay was still a shore, bereft of skyline and seawall. In that shore you
envisioned a Catholic country...
The Final Revelation
"Alonzo turned to face me one last time...he slowly
pulled the dark hood off his head...and I saw the face of a Saint. He was
exactly the man I saw...
""I was with you even before you were born. In the
other life, we were the best of friends. I never left you though I..."
""Who was I in the other life?"
""Giovanni...Giovanni..."
"He gave me this final admonition on my way out of
the church: "Let the modern man give me a name; let them diagnose my mind. But
listen to what I'm going to say - When you fall in love with anything, whether
it's a mission, a woman, a friend, a man, a pet - love him/her as a whole, not
in parts. Love not a man because of his eyes, or his hair, or his physique or
his youth or age. Love him for everything he is, his history, his character,
his creed, his faults, his strengths and idiosyncrasies. Love his skin pore as
much as you love his skin.
"The church and Alonzo disappeared instantly."
So, my friends, I, the narrator, would continue the
events that transpired afterwards.
Lazaro found himself kneeling alone in Victoria Park in
Fort Lauderdale. He felt like waking up from a dream, and he was used to this
by now though his knees were hurting. Ants were running along his legs. Red
ants. His skin was covered with ecchymotic patches. He felt itchy and burning.
The picture of reality got clearer after a few
seconds. A jolt of shame passed through him. People were gathered around him -
what could he have been doing while in trance? For all he knew - he could have
been kneeling and crying and praying and talking to self in the middle of the
park - he must have been quite a spectacle for people to gather around him
like this. They carried an amused look. Good thing they haven't called a
police to lock him up in a mental ward. Yet.
He bowed his head and closed his eyes.
"What are you doing there, man?" one of the
spectators asked him.
Unable to find and impromptu alibi, he said, "I saw
something."
One geriatric woman quipped, "Looks like you saw the
Virgin there."
He stared at the woman for the longest time. Caught
and unable to find a way out, he said, "Yes."
To his surprise, the woman repeatedly made the sign
of the cross. "The Virgin! He saw the Virgin!" she was now addressing the
gathered crowd.
From sneer, the people beamed in wonderment, they
became suddenly serious.
Another old woman, obviously a tourist, started
taking pictures of Lazaro who covered his face as quickly. They closed in
around him, someone held him by the shoulders to prevent him from falling. His
knees were really painful. More so as he attempted to stand.
What remained of the church and Alonzo was a mound
which was nothing but a fallen tree covered with green moss. It was lying on
the dirty part of the park, that border that proceeds from well-manicured lawn
to a jungle, a natural forest. Embarrassment overwhelmed him.
"What did the Virgin say?" The woman inquired again.
Her face was solemn, she knelt beside him, raising her eyeglasses, staring at
the view in front of Lazaro, as if searching. This was getting worse. He lied
about seeing the Virgin and gullible people were now starting to get as crazy as
he was. He couldn't afford to be a hoax. There is a law against that. He
thought.
He stood up and ignoring his painful knees began
running away. Someone pulled him by the sleeve, but he managed to free
himself. He was full of adrenalin.
So he ran and ran and ran until reaching the shore of
Miami. He now considered himself certifiably confused. "God," he intoned, "If
you're kind enough, please bring me back to reality."
But the reality was far more painful than his knees.
And to be like this, alone in Miami was risky! Where in the world did he park
his car? He retreated farther, away from Miami skyline, northward. There were
night walkers along the shore but as he got closer to Hallandale, they were
reduced into trickle.
He probably needed help. But...no way Jose. He
won't let his record be smeared by something like...psychosis. He was taking
care of mentally deranged people himself to know what it was to be psychotic.
Or... what is the medical term? Altered Mental State.
He saw them in the Nursing Home. They were diagnosed
with Confusion, Depression, Alzheimer's, Dementia - they would start talking
by themselves, embracing and kissing the air. As if...someone was there in
front of them. Were they truly crazy? Which is real anyway - the reality you
create in your mind or the reality which people create for you?
When a terminally ill old woman says to you she'd
just been to Bloomingdale's of New York with her Papa and smiles like she had
just really been there, would you smash all that happiness by telling her the
reality? Would you tell her - No you are in a Nursing Home with cancer and are
surrounded by these people who are suffering? Which between the two of you is
telling the truth in the first place? What if what she's telling you is her
history, a fact that happened 50 years ago - would you call that fact an
illusion or hallucination? You would probably name it disorientation to
time...but still, it is reality. Would you lead her back to painful present
just to orient her to correct date?
Would you call it abnormal or unhealthy - when an old
person who, after sensing his impending death, turns into a most peaceful and
quiet person in his imaginary world? Why would you deprive him of that
imaginary world?
Imagine if you were one of these people - Who, after
nurturing kids are suddenly deprived of your home and properties and
imprisoned inside a barren room - Your house becomes a single bedroom with a
little closet and a little bathroom - And your only means of communication is
a call bell - Would you call yourself crazy if in this pit of pain, you revert
back to being a child? If you start thinking of me as your father, mother,
brother, sister?
Would you call a ninety year old demented woman crazy if
she wakes up one day thinking
that she has to cook dinner, her children are on their way back from school? Is
she crazy if she starts opening her drawers looking for her wedding band?
Most probably you will! You come to them and hit them
with what you perceive is reality and they turn combative and irritable. And
if some of them completely block you off their minds, you, after being trained
by an educational system that has a name for everything, would bombard their
medical charts with mental diagnoses as long as a mile.
Do they care? In one final moment they start laughing
again, telling you about their childhoods, about their old romances, about
their very young children. And...on the final hour, they tell you their father
bought them presents...how their mother took care of their bruises... Mama,
Papa, Mama, Papa they whisper...what do you do? You shrug them off as senile.
Lazaro once asked a Doctor how this is so...how in that
final moment a person starts roll-calling people he recognized as a child.
"Enkephalins," the Doctor said matter-of-factly. "He
starts releasing enkephalins and these give him hallucinations."
"Why?"
"Because...the reality is very painful...the body has
to find ways to relieve it of pain."
"So there is nothing out there? All this post-mortem
tunnel of light is brought by enkephalins?"
"The real question is...who put all those enkephalins
in one's brain?"
