The Light on the Lane
Have you met St. Papa Nicholas Planas? He born in 1951 on the island of Naxos in Greece in the beginning of the Twentieth Century. He traveled around the outskirts of Athens, serving the people God gave him to shepherd.
Late one night, long after little girls go to sleep, Lucia leaned against the window. Looking, gazing, seeking, she sighed, her cheek leaning in her hand.
No sights and no sounds.
She sighed.
In the other room, a cough slit the silence. A tiny old man hacked and moaned with shaking gasps.
Lucia rose to tend the poor man her family cared for. With willowy white hair and cloudy white eyes, the little old man tried hard not to cough.
She put a cold cloth to his forehead and sweet honey to his tongue, taming the cough back, back, down. And told it to stay until Papa Nicholas could arrive and pray.
Papa Nicholas!
She hurried back to the window, but only the black night nodded back to her. So dark not even a star dared to wave or wink.
She scraped her finger along the window pane, wishing for the priest to appear. When she looked up, a bobbing light illumined the path from the east.
It must be a carriage lamp. Not Papa Nicholas, who would surely be walking.
She watched the tiny light work its way towards her, closer and closer until she could see clearly. No carriage jangled along the way. A man was walking.
Papa Nicholas!
The tiny old priest bobbed along the winding way. Tiny but strong, he was neither slow nor hurried, just making his way, with a light glowing in front of him.
Lucia dashed downstairs with a quick pitter patter, pausing at a window to greet him. “Don’t put out the light, Father!”
“What, my dear? I have no light?” The little man’s voice sounded like a little child.
“Don’t put out the light, Papa Nicholas! Our lampada is out for the night, but I’ll go fetch it so you can light it with yours!”
Her face disappeared from the window. By the time she made it down to the courtyard entrance, the priest was taking off his outer coat in darkness.
Her lampada swung sadly from its silver chain.
“I hoped you would bring in your light, Papa Nicholas.” Her voice complained as she offered him her palm and he blessed her and she kissed his hand.
“My child. I had no light.”
She looked up and indeed didn’t see a light. He didn’t hold a torch. He didn’t carry a glass lamp.
“But….”
“I had no light.” He smiled.
A cough came down from upstairs. Papa Nicholas patted Lucia on the shoulder and his hand brushed along the wall, feeling his way up the steps.
She watched him disappear into the dark, but she was not fooled.
The miracle from only minutes ago whispered within her mind.
He might brush it off, but she knew. And she knew why he had Light.
Standing in the dark, a huge smile lit up her face.
Lagniappe
In Louisiana, we use the Creole French word (lan-yap) to mean "a little something extra." Here's your lagniappe for this story.
* Here's the biography I read that inspired this story. It's full of similar fantastical accounts, as well as daily faithful deeds of obedience. I found it very encouraging.
* Like this story, Papa Nicholas often traveled around to pray with his flock. He carried a large handkerchief full of little scraps of paper. What was on the paper? Lists - hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of names of people he was praying for!
* Papa Nicholas was very short, significantly smaller than everyone around him, so he knew what it was like to have trouble reaching high items. Once, as a little boy, he wanted to kiss a saint on an icon hanging high on a wall. But he couldn't reach it to kiss him. So he spoke to the saint, "Hey! I can't reach you! Give me a break!" And the saint lowered his foot down from the painting so that little Nicholas could reach :)