Once, a long time ago when the newcomer was a boy, he was at his
Dziadzia's house looking around. On Dziadzia's bureau he saw two sets of
rosary beads in a small porcelain dish. One was black, the other was white.
"You sure have a lot of rosaries," the newcomer
remembered saying. But he
was just a boy when he said it.
"This one is from Medjugorje," Dziadzia had said, picking up
the
black set. He
held it up so that the long metal crucifix hung down in front
of the boy's eyes.
"A friend gave it to me."
The newcomer remembered looking at the rosary. The links were
yellow - an unusual color for links that held together a
rosary.
"When my friend went to Medjugorje," continued Dziadzia,
"the
links were ordinary metal. But he had them blessed at the feet of a statue
of our Blessed Mother.
And she turned them to gold."
"Did you have them tested?" the boy had asked.
Dziadzia made a little frown.
"No," he said.
"Then how do you know they turned into real gold?" the boy
said.
"Look at the links," said Dziadzia. "My friend said they were
made of ordinary metal before he had them blessed."
The boy was doubtful.
"Why would our Blessed Mother turn them
to gold?" he asked.
"To show how much she loves us," said Dziadzia. "It was a
miracle."
"My dad says only God can work miracles."
Dziadzia whistled high and let the sound come down low. "Your
dad is right," he said. "In Catechism, did they teach you that God is
Love?"
"Sure," said the boy.
Dzadzia touched the crucifix.
"Only God can work miracles.
And
God is Love. So
anywhere there is love there can be miracles."
"But what if it's only our Blessed Mother's love?" said the
boy.
"There's no such thing as only our Blessed Mother's love,"
Dziadzia said.
"That's why the links turned to gold."
Standing in a strange place so many years later, and holding the
rosary that had become his own now that Dziadzia had died,
the newcomer who
had once been a boy considered how much he missed his
grandfather. He
fingered the beads gently, and listened to them click, and
marveled at the
gold that linked them.
