In 2003, I went on my first pilgrimage. Johannes had died three years ago. My life had to all intents and purposes lost its direction and even its meaning. I still carried an awareness of something like tiredness within and without, much like an inescapably heavy, wet cloak.
I forget what prompted my desire to do the Camino de Santiago de Compostela. But I remember that the astonishing woman who is my wife not only agreed to send me away from home for a month while Gerrit was but a few months old, but actively encouraged me to undertake the pilgrimage.
The story of my Camino is a long one, but for present purposes only one morning matters. As in the present pilgrimage, eventually I let go of the ‘goal’ and learnt to concentrate on the present, to keep on walking – realising, or rather hoping, that this is where the meaning lies.
My days started early. We were normally out of the refugio at seven, then walked for about a two hours until the coffee shops opened. By that time I was hungry and my muscles no longer fresh. Café con leche and a croissant (or similar) normally constituted breakfast, along with a leasurely rest.
Thus it was this morning. I sat with a group of pilgrims in a little Spanish town, some chatting, others – like me – occupied with their thoughts. I got up before the rest and strode off, soon leaving the vineyards around the town behind. The pilgrimage was approaching the flat plains of the meseta and after an hour or so I was walking on my own through wheat fields which glowed like a presence. The sun was up and warm.
My soul had become very still and quiet. A movement caught my eye and caused me to look up. Suddenly the previously empty sky was alive with swallows flying low, wheeling and diving, swooping over me, each a moment of vivacity, an affirmation of the life that was God’s gift, through the life of Johannes, to me. I became unmistakeably aware of his presence, of His presence, of their love. It is a moment which changed my life.
This week began with a episcopal Liturgy with no less than five bishops. Some of you may remember the visit of Erina Gramakova to Cape Town. She is a professional choir director. She had to bring a book to me and I wanted to hear her choir. So we agreed that I would visit the Saints Peter & Paul Church in Lefortovo on Monday morning.
Her choir sang wonderfully. I know, because she allowed me to stand in the choir stand. Afterwards, I was invited to the festivities for the retired Metropolitan Yuvenaly, who turned 87 and was the Metropolitan for Moscow region in his day. Here I tasted vodka for the first time on my visit to Moscow and heard a lot of wonderful singing at table in honour of the Metropolitan, the best of which was by the tenor who sat next to me. He told me that he trained and performed professionally in Italy as tenor, but was dissatisfied with his life. Now he is a deacon who sings in church, ‘and now I am happy’.
On Tuesday, I forgot my 25th wedding anniversary.
On Tuesday evening, we were to have our usual Vigil Service. However, Father Konstantin, the American archpriest, had other ideas. I cannot recall whether I had previously written about him: an ex-Jesuit priest, who speaks 11 languages and was vice rector at the Pontifical Oriental Institute at the Vatican. Upon hearing, some weeks ago, that we were ‘training’ to do Vigil Services, his reaction was ‘but you don’t have the choirs to do that in Africa!’ I heartily agreed, of course. But at the time, nothing came of it.
Upon arriving at the Church, it appeared that he was not a happy camper. For he was called and asked to come the Church without being told what service he would do. Moreover, he was brought by taxi, and the driver refused to enter the monastery where he lived. This meant that he – who already walks with a cane and some difficulty – had to navigate the ice on the monastery’s grounds to the gate to catch the taxi, a distance of some 60 meters.
By the time he arrived, therefore, he demanded to know what he was called to do, and upon hearing that it was to be a Vigil service, he exploded. To make a long story short, we raced through the service in little more than an hour and I read faster than I had ever done before. An interesting experience, if not actually reverent.
On Wednesday, visited the Holy Trinity St Daniel monastery in Pereslavl-Zalessky, northeast of Moscow, for an early morning Liturgy and then a tour of the monastery. I don’t know why, but I keenly felt the presence of the saint in the little Church. He was a wonderful man who started his ministry burying and praying for the many people who would die unknown deaths on the road in the early years of the 16th century.
On the way back in the bus, I had a very interesting conversation about Russia, how Russians see it and its place in history; and how it sees the West. I reiterate: Russia is a very complex society.
On Wednesday and Thursday nights, we slept six in a dormitory room because it was the festival of the Sretenskiy monastery’s patron saint and guests had to occupy the room I normally slept in. Which guests occupied themselves with loud conversation and jokes until the small hours. By Friday, we were exhausted and no longer very amused.
And on Friday morning we celebrated an English Liturgy in honour of Archpriest Daniel of the St. Nicholas Church, which serves the American community in Moscow. After the service, one of my fellow Africans came to me like a swallow out of the blue and confided that I was to be ordained the next day. I was to hear the news officially only later in the afternoon. Suddenly the sky was full of swallows.
Thus started the moment in my life which reminded me most of the moment in Spain. We arrived at the Church of the African Exarchate fairly early, because an episcopal Liturgy requires a lot of preparation, especially if it is accompanied by two ordinations. On the main icon stand was still the icon of St. Spyridon, who is very close to my heart.
Very shortly after we arrived, the altar area was bustling with activity. I was taken to the Church area for what is called a ‘general confession’, which can be an elaborate, penetrating affair – I was told about a poor acolyte who was asked the name of Lot’s wife! – but in my case amounted to no more than an ordinary confession. Then I was taken to the holy table to read my oath of service as deacon and then sign it. Reading with a lawyer’s eye I spotted a few mistakes in the document, but thought the better of pointing it out just then!
After this I hovered for a while, trying to keep as much out of everyone’s busy way as possible, and meeting with about as much success as in Emilia’s kitchen!
Then the Metropolitan arrived, things sped up; and the rest are jumbled images. Holding a platter with the Metropolitan’s vestments for the service. Bowing down as snippets of my hair is cut, crosswise, for my ordination as a reader. (These hairs would later be presented to me by a seminarian, in an envelope. I have yet to discover what to do with it.) The Metropolitan’s finger indicating the passage in Philippians I should read and then, just when I start, indicating with his finger that I should first announce the book from which I am reading. Rookie’s mistake.
Standing in front of an icon of Christ, holding the tray on which stood the gold plated pot from which water was poured for the washing of the Metropolitan’s hands. Noticing the painting details of the beautiful icon. And the voices of the choir who are standing a few steps away from me – one of the most beautiful choirs I have heard in Russia and indeed in my life: subtle, supple but sure: sublime.
Three times prostrating myself in front of the Holy Table, then kissing the Metropolitan’s omophorion and his hand, and then being taken around the Holy Table, kissing each corner. Going down on one knee with my hands on the Holy Table, and the Metropolitan’s warm voice next to my ear ‘Now pray for yourself’ as he reads my prayers of ordination. I prayed for myself; I cried for myself.
And when I stood up, I knew as on that day in Spain, a mystery has been wrought. I stood between the Altar area and the rest of the Church as my orarion (a long piece of cloth worn over the left shoulder, symbolising the wing of an angel, which is a messenger from God) and my cuffs were put on me, and I knew that the chrysalis had been torn asunder. I felt a new butterfly sitting on a branch, its still wet wings quivering, its brief but beautiful life rising with the sun.
The remainder of the Divine Liturgy is best not spoken of, save to say to my Protestant family and friends that respecting the Eucharist for what it is, namely the very Body and Blood of Christ, makes all the difference to your experience of communion.
And a last moment before it was all over. When the service is over, it is the deacon’s task to finish all of the communion wine and bread in the chalice. The chalice at an episcopal service is a huge thing, containing a good half litre of wine and bread – a daunting task. I started valiantly, the head deacon standing next to me, watching that I do it correctly. And then there was a touch on my shoulder and one of the priests said ‘Let me do it’. I was confused, and the deacon protested. But the priest insisted and took over from me. Later I would thank him, and his response in broken English was ‘You are our guest. We cannot let you eat it all.’
Later on the same afternoon, I again went to the Pushkin museum, entered the same way I had done before, could not enter – and was told by the guard with some relish, ‘I don’t speak English’. And again, a voice by my shoulder: ‘Come wis me; I gelp you.’ It was a lady in her seventies, who took me outside, pointed me to the recently changed entrance, searched for information on a part of the museum I wanted to visit, and also gave me the names of five great Russian pianists to look out for.
For all my Russian readers who want to know what I think of Russians, I can add to what I have said, and that with utter sincerity, that these are but two of numberless kindnesses I have encountered here in Moscow – each in their own way like a swallow, swooping and then disappearing.
I look back on my ordination as deacon as I look forward to my ordination as a priest on Wednesday. These five holy days at the change of the year mark an end and a beginning, a sea change, a seismic shift. I am no longer the man you knew. I have died. I am being reborn. Henceforth I will be a vessel for something utterly different.
What does all this mean? How can I know now? Kierkegaard rightly said that we can understand life only backwards but have to live it forwards.
But sometimes God touches us like a swarm of swallows in a wheat field, and we know in an instant that He is undeniably present and that nothing can ever be the same again. And that the most appropriate response is, feebly, with Thomas: ‘My Lord and my God!’
Again a few photographs:
The Pushkin museum is not the Tretyakov by any measure. But there were some gems:
