Note: Translator Pauline Bancroft Flach died in 1966, less than 70 years ago. Therefore, this work is protected by copyright, restricting your legal rights to reproduce it. However, you are welcome to view it on screen, as you do now. Read more about copyright.
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ONLY OF THIS WORLD 361
the holy child while he is still lying on his bed of
straw in the miserable hut!”
Margherita Cornado was filled with a new hope
when she heard him. She was the first to obey
Father Gondo’s summons. After her others joined
him also. Forty pilgrims marched with him through
the plateaus of the inland to Diamante.
They were all very poor and unhappy. But
Father Gondo made them march with song and
prayer. Soon their eyes began to shine as if the
star of Bethlehem had gone before them.
“Do you know,” said Father Gondo, “why God’s
son is greater than all the saints? Because he
gives the soul holiness; because he forgives sins;
because he grants to the spirit a blessed trust in
God; because his kingdom is not of this world.”
When his little army looked tired, he gave them
new life by telling them of the miracles the image
had performed. The legends of the blind singers
were like cooling drinks and cheering wine. The
poor wanderers in the barren lands of Sicily walked
with a lighter step, as if they were on their way to
Nazareth to see the carpenter’s son.
“He will take all our burdens from us,” said
Father Gondo. “When we come back our hearts
will be freed from every care.”
And during the wandering through the scorched,
glowing desert, where no trees gave cooling shade,
and where the water was bitter with salt and
sulphur, Margherita Cornado felt that her heart’s
torments were relieved. “ The little king of heaven
will take away my pain,” she said.
At last, one day in May, the pilgrims reached the
foot of the hill of Diamante. There the deseri
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