A Small Pilgrimage Journal 27

A Night for Pilgrims

While I was having dinner in the first-floor dining room with other guests, the innkeeper told us:
"Are you all going to the pilgrims' mass? Tonight is special, and there will be a concert afterward."
"Come on, if you don't hurry, the mass will start."
...Oh my! There's a mass at night! I didn't know that!
I hurriedly finished my dessert, returned to my room, grabbed my backpack, and rushed to the Abbey of Sainte-Foy in the center of town. From the inn at the edge of town, it was a steep, unique cobblestone climb. Dragging my feet, still slightly tipsy from the wine, I scrambled up, breathless, and managed to slip in just as the mass began.

Conques is a key point on the pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela. The abbey was almost full, packed with outdoor-style pilgrims.
The night mass felt like it had a different kind of power compared to the masses I had attended before, fueled by the fervor of the pilgrims. Just thinking that I was here right now made me want to cry.

As always, I couldn't understand the words being spoken, but I grasped something in my heart, and the mass ended in a state of great emotion.
Then, we were urged to go outside. Was it for the concert preparations? Suppressing the desire to stay inside the abbey, I followed the other pilgrims out.

The mountain night was quite chilly.
As I stood in the square in front of the abbey, vaguely gazing at the night lights of the town and the abbey, a monk quietly emerged from inside and stood in front of the tympanum.
And then, he began to speak to us.
The surrounding pilgrims lined up in a circle facing the tympanum. Of course, I followed everyone else.
The night lecture had begun.

The monk pointed to the tympanum, which was softly lit in the darkness of the night. The magnificent carved tympanum depicted heaven on the left and hell on the right. The theme was the Last Judgment. Characters with colorful expressions and movements, no two alike, were densely carved into it.
The monk carefully explained each and every one of them.
The tympanum floated like a moon in the darkness of the night. The monk stood straight, facing the darkness. The abbey seemed to emerge from the night. It was like a fantastical scene.
I think I spent quite a long time 'gazing' at this lecture.
When I came to my senses at the applause of the audience, the abbey had finally been opened for the concert.

The singing and string performance were lovely, but... unfortunately, it was not the religious music I love so much.
However, there was another wonderful gift there.

Diagonally in front of where I was sitting, there was a dark, open entrance, and one person, then another, timidly peeked in and went inside. And they never came back.
...What could it be?
I quietly slipped out of my seat between songs and, out of curiosity, peeked in to find that it seemed possible to go up via a staircase. Without making a sound, I climbed the steep stairs, one step at a time. When I emerged into a dimly lit room, a woman was sitting in a chair waiting for me.
It turned out that only during this concert could one enter the second floor of the abbey, which is usually off-limits.
...What a miracle this is...!
I paid a small fee and went through the narrow entrance to the second-floor gallery.

It was a surprisingly wide gallery. In the dim lighting, illuminated here and there by large candles, I walked slowly, occasionally checking on the concert taking place far below.
Strange carvings on the pillars emerged vaguely in the soft light from below. The organ looked as if it might start playing on its own the moment I looked away. A dark, eerie landing with no lighting.

Few people must have noticed the entrance to those stairs. Besides me, there were only four other people here. A couple, presumably, were strolling happily, and someone else was sitting in a spot with just the right amount of light, listening to the concert comfortably. It was a world with a strange warmth and peace. After walking to the exit at the end of the world, I turned back, found my own seat, and enjoyed the concert below for a while.

When I left the abbey, an even colder night wind was blowing.
Watching the cobblestones illuminated by streetlights, I leisurely walked down the pilgrimage path toward the inn. The wind blowing gently up from the bottom of the mountain, the scent of plants and trees moistened by the enveloping night dew. I hoped I wouldn't trip in the darkness while lost in thought like this.

That night, where the dreams I had at night seemed to become reality. I have never experienced a night like that before or since.

2024, Conques, France