The greatest miracle revealed to us, I observe more and more often, is the divinity's property of becoming a system of communicating vessels with the human.
What can be more overwhelming as a wonder than the spectacle of Christ's cascade into His saints, who are the first to offer themselves to empty themselves, so that they may then pour into us, the empty ones... And, sometimes, so that we may understand that God's greatest desire is to be one, the anonymous saints with anonymous deaths, infinitely in love with Christ, humble themselves so deeply that they decide to seal in anonymity even the eternity that followed their departure to heaven. Such are the hundreds, perhaps thousands, of modern and contemporary saints.
Their presence is recognized, felt; they could have had names, because, yes, their venerators, those who kneel before them, ask for it, implore it. Instead, they gather, become brethren in groups, show mercy, heal, appear as a group, serve in inspired partnerships with consecrated saints, still live with trembling, like mortals, the thrill of communion. They rarely want to tell us their names. Christ is playful. He is playful through them. Such are the saints of the prisons, as I first saw them in Aiud, where their overwhelming presence moves, even melts, the very glass that separates us from them.
After a first such meeting, a part (again, anonymous) of them nested delicately in my memory like sparrows, and I remained wounded, as by love, by a great respect for the martyrs. I am a humble person; I do not call them by their official titles and I do not name them in prayer... it's like a game where I don't know my partners. Instead, I was able to call upon them with the primary cry, the most readily available in the critical second of temptation; I was able to jokingly invent nicknames or pet names for them when I had time – and the most aristocratic encounter of my entire life happened when I could invite them into a space I had traveled through. Truly. In flesh and blood. In fact, in spirit and bones.
Chess
How did I get to the Zone I mention? Some dizzying hours, a marathon in which I trained every muscle, like in childhood stadium competitions, to get there.
It began with a chance early morning visit to the school where I work, with a secret hand-holding for a few words, with a tear from a frightened teacher, with the whispering of a shocking piece of news about the child loved by everyone. About the radiant beauty that always awaited me, right from the entrance to the hallway, embracing me every morning and setting my day in a permanent audience with angels like her.
Then, at home, the sea of powerlessness. I wrote, without strength, to someone dear, a letter-wound (prayer-call messages for critically ill patients bring us discomfort and sting us when read, for they are prayers of entreaty like blackberry bushes. The taste of the berries only comes after you wrap yourself in them and scratch your arms). Oh, and there was also the audacity to make a phone call. The fruit of the answer dropped unexpectedly, like a giant fruit, into my arms, which almost dropped it through alternating floors of fear and hope.
After that, adrenaline kicked in, and I started to run. The child's teacher had told me gently, upon parting, that she had called me too because she felt that, for a few hours now, God had wanted to play a fair, silent, and clever game with us, and that He had, therefore, laid out a giant chessboard on the earth. That she felt He had already aligned the black armies and was now choosing the white ones, especially from among those wearing white coats. That He had found knights too. And rooks. And bishops, those who cut reality diagonally when they absolutely need to get somewhere. That we could start moving. Come on, run, I told myself, it's your turn.
First, the phone call. Trembling fingers, a drumming heart. At first, I couldn't believe the voice on the receiver. The person I had called was urgently summoning me for an unexpected gift and, without warning, was investing me to be Christopher. This is a royal service, to carry God in your arms. Let me tell you.
I had only tried a sad word, like that, „... please, bring your lips to Saint Nectarios' ear, as he is closer to you than to me”, and he replied warmly: „The Saint, yes, but not the child; that one is closer to you. Come then and... take the Saint. Plus, you don't even know who else visits and who else I have here”. Amazement again. Everything is overwhelming for someone who lives outside the paradigm. To discover that holy relics are not locked only in the Holy Altar, that they can be touched by insignificant people, unqualified in the system, like me.
I arrived, breathless. It was as if I were a secret agent in a detective film I'd seen as a child; only my ample vintage skirt, which didn't suit the mission, bothered me. The man told me, seeing me frozen in surprise, to calm down, that it didn't matter that I was a woman, nor that I didn't serve in the guild at all. I also learned the stories of how the saints made their nest with him and not in the brick church across the street. It's all because this man who called me resembles a kind of stork, because he has wings and legs and received obedience to go out with the secret held (consisting of prisoners secretly buried sometime) into the path of the suffering and the dying around his heart, which the church walls, however glorious, could not do. You have to come to them.
I embraced them widely, even though my hands were burning (left unconfessed due to too much haste in getting there). He entrusted me with several small reliquaries, like train carriages secretly inhabited by moving treasurers. In total, five princes and one princess. I drove them around in a taxi, and although I held them tightly, as I usually hold my children in my arms in any car, I felt the saints pulling themselves out of the box to greet, one by one, from the window, sometimes with Saint Demetrius at the Patriarchate, sometimes with Saint Spyridon on the quay, sometimes with Saint Cyprian when we turned the corner at Victoriei, sometimes with Saint Anthimus further down the valley, and wherever we passed until home, they exchanged the kiss of peace. Around me, at all crossroads, cars curiously and repeatedly darted very close to us, screeching their tires. I held onto them with my eyes closed and waited to hear the slap of broken headlights. I don't know why we were so pursued. Maybe they wanted to see closer? I take taxis often, I haven't felt like I was in a detective film yet.
At home, I gathered my children, set them to read for the duration of my absence (their prayer works like an excavator, it's a system for clearing obstacles when you embark on a challenging journey, freeing your path), then I changed clothes and the car. God continued to move offensively.
He also sent me two delicate companions from school, moved by the treasure. I arrived at the institute, where only the first barrier at the gate lifts; the rest of the doors have codes and key cards. I ran a lot to get there at that evening hour, and compared to the roads that had to be traveled, it was indeed a victory. And yet, at the hospital entrance, one thing was written: that visits were possible exactly until that very hour, which was just striking.
Because the follow-up visit and the children's treatment were beginning. And everything was locking up. Only the on-call doctor could enter (what a coincidence, I saw on the notice board that she had my surname). „At this hour, I can only allow Mrs. Doctor to pass, to administer treatment,” the stern guardian convinced me. There was so much joy and playfulness upon arrival that I childishly continued to argue, carefully not to lie, that I was holding the princes of truth in my arms. „We are part of the treatment, sir”. „Yes, but these children are on chemotherapy!” „Certainly, Saint Nectarios present here is extremely cytostatic”. „And you are not Dr. Dragomir. Only she enters in the evening”. „You can believe that”, I started, enlightened by a new idea, „I am indeed Dr. Dragomir, I can prove it to you, I have an ID card here and another document at home that says I am a doctor.” „I understand,” he smiled superiorly, „only, in this hospital, being a doctor really means something!”.
Ohh. But at least we passed the card test. It let us in!
(to be continued)
Cosmina Dragomir
Photography by Noemia Prada
See the other episodes here: The beautiful skinny ones