When will the angel come to roll away the stone?
"Alas, alas, our Lord is dead! But as I have already said, one hardly
knows anything in this back country. Well, well, He cannot have been
very young, for I have heard of Him all my life. But all the same His
time has come at last. Ah, who can escape!..." Thus spoke old
Schwammelfuchs, when he learned that on Good Friday it had been
proclaimed from the chancel in Holdenschlag that our Lord had died for
the sins of the world.
The old man meant it seriously and in the greatest reverence, although
every evening at his prayers he repeats the words: "Suffered under
Pontius Pilate, crucified, dead."
It is a prayer of the lips. True prayer, the heart offers only in its
need, in its joy, but these people are not conscious of this. Deeply
buried is that which we call true worship or religious feeling.
The people hasten Easter eve or in the morning out into the open woods,
where they kindle fires, discharge their guns, and gaze into the air for
the papal blessing, which from the pinnacle of St. Peter's at Rome is
scattered to the four winds on Easter morning.
There is always present the unconscious longing and struggle. One sees
that something lies hidden in the heart which is not dead. But when
will the angel come to roll away the stone?