Rafael C. García Serrano
(Conferencias de San Vicente de Paúl de Guadalajara)
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EN LA CAPILLA
Aquella mañana despertó intranquilo. Algo le estaba angustiando, y mucho. ¿Un mal sueño?, ¿un presentimiento incómodo?
No sabría decir qué. Decidió salir a que el fresco aire de la mañana despejase su ánimo, devolviese la normalidad a su reposada vida.
Calles tranquilas, con pocos ciudadanos camino de su trabajo y paso ligero. Él ya no tenía deberes laborales, podía sentirse un hombre libre, pero atado, y muy atado, a sus costumbres, a su invariable modo de vivir. Una vida monótona pero no desagradable, ni demasiado aburrida.
Pero aquella mañana era distinta. Algo no funcionaba en su cerebro, le pedía cambiar, hacer las cosas de otro modo, encontrar qué o quien le motivara, le indicara cómo cambiar esa rutina cómoda pero indiferente y poco solidaria.
Sus pasos le llevaron ante la fachada de una pequeña capilla que, con la puerta abierta, invitaba a echar una mirada a su interior. Transmitía una paz que empujaba a su interior donde el silencio era un imán poderoso, irresistible casi.
Hacía tiempo que no visitaba un templo. Se decidió a entrar.
La luz tibia y la solemnidad fueron una buena acogida para su ánimo quebrantado. Apenas había nadie y la piedad reinaba en aquel ambiente limpio, envolvente, que llamaba a la reflexión, invitaba al alma a una entrega que la elevaba a alguien superior, alguien por encima de la vida, más allá de cualquier sentimiento humano.
Se arrodilló y se entregó al silencio. Silencio que le abrigaba y le protegía. ¿Era el silencio de Dios que empezaba a hablarle? Pensó que había algo que olvidaba, algo más importante que la vida misma: ¡algo le llegaba con palabras tenues, pero con un fuego que ardía en su pecho y le iluminaba!
Llevaba un buen rato: era un tiempo de nadie, un tiempo sin horas: tiempo distinto de paz, de luz interior.
En aquella quietud sintió que alguien le miraba. Son esas miradas que uno presiente y no sabe quién y porqué le miran. Indagó curioso; no se había fijado y se encontró una imagen de la Virgen que, en su humilde trono, con ojos muy tristes, pero sonriendo, le estaba mirando.
Un dardo de acero atravesó su pecho y acertó en su alma. Algo iba directo a su corazón, algo le decía que hay otro camino, que estaba triste porque no encontraba lo que ya tenia, pero no lo usaba. ¡Es tu corazón que solo piensa en él dejando olvidado donde está el amor, donde tu prójimo, donde tu Dios que te está esperando!
María le hablaba. ¡Señora! ¡Señora!... Sus ojos, tan dulces, hablaban mirándole, le invitaban a pensar con calma.
Y empieza a recordar lo que había olvidado y en lo que ganaría siguiendo lo que Dios le pide y que ella le enseña con solo sus ojos en los suyos puestos. Siente que está ahí para él; quiere ayudarle a encontrar la senda perdida. Tranquilo su cuerpo, serena su mente, se encuentra dispuesto a no sabe qué, pero a seguir los pasos que le indica ella.
La paz de aquel templo ha ayudado al hombre a elevar su espíritu.
¡Bendita seas Señora!, ¡bendito el momento que entré en esta capilla! Te entrego mi vida, te entrego mis sueños, mi amor, mi esperanza. Yo no te buscaba, tú me has encontrado. Me abriste la puerta del pequeño templo donde solo habitan el Dios que nos ama y tú que nos llamas a estar a su lado.
Me entrego a tus brazos y a través de ellos a Jesús que me está esperando.
El hombre sale de nuevo a su vida, ¡pero algo ha cambiado! La luz de María lo ha iluminado.
Y rezan sus labios:
Tanto tiempo Madre en busca tuya
sin entender que estás siempre conmigo.
Gracias te doy, tú me has buscado,
has salido a mi encuentro en el camino.
He encontrado el amor que había perdido.
Rafael César García Serrano
Conferencia Nª Srª de la Antigua
Guadalajara, España
IN THE CHAPEL
That morning he woke up feeling restless. Something was troubling him, and very much so. A bad dream, an uncomfortable premonition?
He could not say what. He decided to go out to let the fresh morning air lighten his mood, bring normalcy back into his quiet life.
Quiet streets, with few citizens on their way to work at a brisk pace. He no longer had work duties; he could feel himself a free man, but attached, and very attached, to However, that morning was different. Something was not working in his brain, it was asking him to change, to do things differently, to find something or someone to motivate him, to show him how to change this comfortable but indifferent and unsupportive routine.
His steps led him to the entrance of a small chapel that, having the door open, invited him to take a look inside. It conveyed a peace that drew you inside, where silence was a powerful, almost irresistible magnet.
It had been a long time since he had visited a temple. He decided to step inside.
The dim light and the solemnity were a welcome to his broken spirit. There was hardly anyone there and piety reigned in that clean, surrounding atmosphere, which called to reflection, invited the soul to a surrender that raised it to someone higher, someone above life, beyond any human feeling.
He knelt down and surrendered to silence, a silence that sheltered and protected him. Was it the silence of God who began to speak to him? He thought there was something he was forgetting, something more important than life itself: something was coming to him in faint words, but with a fire that burned in his chest and lit him up.
He had been there for a while: it was a time of nobody, a time without hours: a different time of peace and inner light.
In that stillness, he felt that someone was looking at him. There are those gazes that one senses but does not know who and why they are looking at him. He looked around curiously; he had not noticed it and found an image of the Virgin Mary looking at him from her humble throne, with very sad but smiling eyes.
A steel dart pierced his chest and hit his soul. Something went straight to his heart, something told him that there was another way, that he was sad because he could not find what he already had but did not use. It is your heart that thinks only of itself and forgets where love is, where your neighbour is, where your God is waiting for you!
Mary was speaking to him, our Lady! Her eyes, so sweet, were looking at him, inviting him to think calmly.
And he begins to remember what he had forgotten and what he would gain by following what God asks of him and what she teaches him with only her eyes on him. He feels that she is there for him; she wants to help him find the lost path. Calm in his body, serene in his mind, he finds himself ready to do he knows not what, but to follow the steps she shows him.
The peace of that temple has helped this man to elevate his spirit.
Blessed be our Lady, blessed the moment I entered this chapel! I give you my life; I give you my dreams, my love, my hope. I was not looking for you, you found me. You opened the door of the little temple inhabited only by the God who loves us and by you who call us to be at his side.
I surrender myself into your arms and through them to Jesus who is waiting for me.
The man returns to his life, but something has changed! Mary's light has enlightened him.
Then, his lips pray:
Mother, so much time searching for you
Without understanding that you are always with me.
I thank you; you have looked for me,
You have come out to meet me on the road.
I have found the love I had lost.
Rafael César Garcia Serrano
Conference of Our Lady of Antigua
Guadalajara, Spain
