The symbolism of life as a journey, which goes from birth to death, has been used since time immemorial. Also the fact that the path is not traced and each person has to find their route. As Machado said, “a traveler there is no road, a road is made by walking.”
When reading Jorge Manrique, in the poems on the death of his father, I was struck by a phrase that speaks of our lives being rivers flowing into the sea, which is death. His route was fluvial and made me imagine this alternative that speaks of human life as if it were a river. Something similar is said by Lorca “Water, where are you going? I am going along the river, on the shores of the sea.” The difference with the path is abysmal, because the river has a marked route and we can only stop on the shore, until we resume the journey. There are no possible excuses, the river is us. With clear waters in the morning of our life, as we give to drink all the creatures that approach our shore.
With the passage of time, our waters become muddy and we stray from the course that God had designed for us to fertilize the fields and do harm.
The water that is born and ends up becoming a river is small and weak and can disappear. A very valuable metaphor for spiritual life. “Well do I know the source that flows and runs, even though it is at night,” St. John of the Cross tells us. We can imagine that from that source our life is born and grows, driven by other waters that add to its current. The water of parents, of friends, of school, of your spouse, of the Church… But, even though we have many people by our side in our boat, which we go down the current, we are alone and we have to think about the things we load onto it. They cannot weigh too much or be bulky. Today, a phone is essential.
I would recommend Mozart’s Requiem, the Taizé chants, and the chorus of the Hebrew Slaves from Nabucco to lovers of classical music. They bring peace, excite, and draw you closer to God.
We navigated our first spiritual journey full of religious fervor. Overflowing with happiness, we wanted nature to join us in this magical circle. But at other moments in our lives, currents appear that push us against the rocks and we are afraid of capsizing. Once the fear has passed, we enter calm and gentle waters, a good time to dedicate ourselves to contemplation. Without warning, the river began to grow, joining other torrents descending from the mountain and overflowing, destroying everything in its path. It was then that, before our eyes, poverty and the needs of many people appeared on the shore. Their vision obliges us to abandon our pleasant spiritual journey and put ourselves at the service of these needy brothers.
A huge task to which we contribute a simple drop of our water, but we can be many, and all the drops add up.
At a given moment in our lives, we can see the sea where our river will flow. The first sign of its proximity are the seagulls we see flying. We try to slow down the current gently and without haste, although we cannot be afraid of the sea. We are a manifestation of that primordial ocean that is God, a small wave that, in the final minute, will dissolve into an immense mass of water that will receive us with open arms like a mother. After all, the wave is the sea.
Isabel Gómez Acebo
Religion Digital
English version translated with AI