Off of I-19 headed from Tucson south to Mexico lies the Tohono O’oodham Nation’s reservation. As you approach this sovereign yet long since subjugated people’s tribal territory, glistening in the bright desert sunlight rises a magnificent white emblem of their history, America’s policy of manifest destiny history, and the history of Spain’s Conquistador’s all gently blurred at the edges by time and romantic notions – the San Xavier del Blac Mission.
The Mission, initially established by the Jesuit priest Fr. Kino more than 300 years ago, was not this beautiful church itself. No, instead, it was the message of Christ and his love brought to a nation, in Spain’s estimation, of heathens in desperate need of salvation. No telling what the “heathens” themselves thought. The Mission has survived, transferred hands to the Franciscans, then abandoned at one point by the Roman Catholic Church completely for some 70 years, only to have the Catholic church return in 1912 to find that the Tohono O’oodham had, for their part, maintained their unique blend of Catholic Christianity and traditional religion. Today the Mission still functions as an active Roman Catholic parish and school. And it is magnificent.
But the Mission and it’s brick and mortar embodiment, while wondrous to behold are not my point, nor is the Spirit that fell upon the Tohono O’oodham, never abandoning them though the Church did. No, instead I’m choosing to focus on a small mountain, a hill really, that sits due east of the white plastered buildings. This hill, the Mission is careful to clarify, is an entity separate from itself.
The hill is nothing really compared to the grandeur of other Arizona rock mountains – it’s size unassuming, and shape uninspiring, but what sets it apart is the white cross square in the center of the absolute peak. The cross draws you to the mountain, a gravitational tractor beam (Did I just go Star Wars on you???) pulling you to it, and once caught there is nothing but to go but toward that cross. (Sound familiar?)
I’m here with my sister and her significant other, and we start the climb easily enough, just a steady incline up a dirt drive until we reach an unpaved track wide enough to accommodate a single car. The track is guarded by two magnificent, weather-worn, bronze lions perched upon stone columns, and I wonder at the significance. Lions guarded the palaces of Rome. I find it somehow ironic that the lion is used to mark – to “guard” – places deemed important to Christainty. (Think about it; you’ll catch my train of thought.) Just past the lions, a niche has been cut into the mountain and an altar of sorts erected. Lining every available inch of the grotto burn candles, and a plaque affixed to the wall testifies that this place, this quiet, beautiful, holy place, is meant to commemorate the apparition of Mary, the Mother or Our Savior, at Lourdes, France. Even not professing Catholicism, I feel the presence of the Spirit here. This humble cave carved lovingly into a mountain in Southern Arizona thousands of miles from France has seen and heard the tears, the prayers, the cries of scores of people. Even now their candles burn to signify the hope and faith carried in the hearts of true believers. One cannot casually dismiss that. So, I back away quietly, even reverently, because truly, this is holy ground.
But we did not come for the grotto. We came to seek the cross. So, we start again down the path, certain it will lead us to the cross. What would be a dusty walk had it not been raining for two days, is instead it a muddy trudge along a road little better than a worn track. At times we feel as though we are climbing toward our goal, that just another few steps and we shall reach the summit, come face to face with the empty cross. That, however, turns out to be an illusion, because, instead, soon enough we again come face to face with the imposing bronze lions guarding the entry to the grotto. We have come full circle and have gotten no closer to the cross.
Walking back down the hill, I begin to wonder how much of an analogy that walk is to my life: circling, circling, circling the cross with every intention of attaining it but never quite getting there. I pause along the way, frequently stopping at holy, almost sanctified places, but I never quite reach the One who can change everything. Instead I stay comfortably on the well worn tracks laid down by others, afraid to do the real work – the hard scrabble climb over volcanic rock, and thorny scrub brush, reaching for handholds that may contain unseen poisonous creatures (You get I’m not really talking about the spiders and scorpions and rattlesnakes here, yes?). But the question remains, if I’m not willing to step out of where I feel safe, where I feel protected, then I’m not likely to encounter the cross and all it promises. Is this really what I would consciously choose?
I stand again at the base of the cross’ mountain and stare out across the Tohono O’oodham reservation. Black storm clouds roll across the desert towards me, and they rival the storm in my heart. Here, at this peaceful site, one man brought his Christian faith to a people who embraced it as their own. Behind me, a white cross tops a mountain that I could not climb to reach a savior that, in my humanity, I do not truly understand, and I wonder if I have failed at something fundamental. Then, soft as a gentle caress, a breeze stirs my hair, and I am reminded that the same God that brought Fr. Kino to this desert 300 years ago is the author and finisher of my faith, and in this, too, he shall be faithful.
It is enough.
The Unexpected Life 