Lord, I place myself in your presence, and ask you to shine your light into my heart as I look back upon this day, so that I may see more clearly your grace in everything that has happened.
Just as I feared, the relics in the gift shop were indeed stolen. But I don’t want to focus on that to the exclusion of everything else; today gave me many reasons to think of you, and I shouldn’t ignore them.
My first full day in San Francisco began well; thank you for a good night’s rest in a hotel bed. The days of train travel took their toll; or, should I say, the nights. I’ve always had trouble sleeping on trains, so they’ll always be my least favorite form of travel. I would much rather cross a desert in a motorcar and sleep under the stars at night.
San Francisco is a city where no one can forget your presence, Lord. The moment I left my hotel, a petitioner asked me for a donation for Yosemeti Cathedral. Presumably they’re outside every hotel, targeting visitors from out of town because every local resident has long since reached the point of fatigue. I didn’t donate, but I did admire the paintings on the sandwich boards next to the petitioner. There were some lovely depictions of what the cathedral will look like when it’s completed. I was particularly impressed by one that showed the main gallery illuminated by the setting sun. I’ve read that the gallery will be a thousand feet high from floor to ceiling, and the painting did a good job of conveying the scale.
No one can deny, Lord, that you’ve sculpted a landscape of great beauty on the surface of the Earth. I’ve been fortunate enough to have visited three continents, and I’ve seen cliffs of chalk, canyons of sandstone, pillars of basalt; all spectacular. But for me, the knowledge that they’re no more than a decorative façade tempers my appreciation; perhaps it is my scientific mind-set that makes me want to look deeper. I have more reverence for the granite that lies just beneath the surface of all those features, the ocean of stone that the Earth is actually made of. So it’s when I see those places where the granite is exposed, where the true essence of the Earth is visible, that I feel a more profound connection to your handiwork.
The Yosemeti Valley is one of those places, and I wish I could have visited it a century ago, when it was pristine and untouched. I’ve seen photograms of the rock formation from before they began hollowing it out, and it was magnificent. I don’t mean to criticize the archdiocese’s decision. Or perhaps I do. Forgive me, Lord. I know the Yosemeti Cathedral will be awe inspiring when it’s completed, and I hope it happens within my lifetime. It will no doubt bring countless people closer to you. I just happen to think that the sight of the granite peak itself could have done so just as well.
Is it wrong of me to question whether the construction of cathedrals is, as we approach the twenty-first century, the best use of countless millions of dollars and the effort of generations of people? I agree that a project lasting longer than a human life span provides its participants with aspirations beyond the temporal. I even understand the motivation for carving a cathedral out of the Earth’s substrate, to create a testament to both human and divine architecture. But for me, science is the true modern cathedral, an edifice of knowledge every bit as majestic as anything made of stone. It fulfills all the goals that Yosemeti Cathedral does and more, and I wish more people appreciated that.
Perhaps I’m merely envious of the Church’s ability to raise money; forgive me for that, Lord. They are trying to celebrate your glory, Lord, just as we in the scientific community are, so I cannot disagree with them too strenuously. Our commonalities are more important than our differences.
I went to the post office where Martin Osborne received his mail and sat on a bench at a bus stop across the street. I had sealed the package with colored tape so I’d be able to recognize it easily when he left the post office, so I waited and watched. I felt conspicuously awkward as people arrived and got on buses while I continued to sit there. An hour passed, and then another, and more than once I wondered if I had gone about this in the wrong way. I am more accustomed to hunting for bones than for living prey, Lord; I know very little about stalking or camouflage.
At last I saw the package that I had prepared. I had almost missed it, because I had been expecting to see a man, but instead a young woman had carried it out and set it down on the curb while she hailed a cab. She was young, no more than eighteen, and maybe younger; too young to be an employee of the museum. At first I thought she must be an accomplice of Martin Osborne, perhaps someone he’d inveigled into his scheme, but then I realized that I was being a chauvinist just as much as the men whose preconceptions constantly irritate me.
I approached her and asked if she was “Martin Osborne.” She hesitated for a long moment and then, accepting that she’d been caught, said, “Yes, I am. Did you send the mailgram?” I told her I did. I’d been prepared to hurl fiery accusations at the brigand I expected to find, but faced with a young woman, I was uncertain how to proceed. I introduced myself, and she said her name was Wilhelmina McCullough. The surname was familiar, and struck by a sudden suspicion, I asked if she was related to Nathan McCullough. She answered, “He’s my father.”
That made things clear; the girl was the daughter of the director of the University of Alta California’s Museum of Natural Philosophy in Oakland. None of the staff would question the presence of the director’s daughter in the storerooms.
She asked me, “I take it this means this package doesn’t actually contain the relics?” I told her it didn’t. She picked it up and dropped it in a nearby trash container. “So now that you’ve found me, what do you want?”
I said that for a start, she could explain to me why she had stolen from her father’s museum.
She said, “I’m not a thief, Dr. Morrell. Thieves steal for their personal benefit. I took the relics for God’s benefit.”
I asked her why, if she wanted to support the construction of Yosemeti Cathedral, had she asked that the relics be sold at modest prices. She said, “You think I was trying to raise money for the cathedral? I don’t care about that at all. What I wanted was for as many people as possible to be able to appreciate the relics. I would’ve handed them out for free, but who’d believe they were real if I did? I couldn’t sell them myself, so I donated them to someone who could.”
I said that people could appreciate the relics by visiting the museum.
“No one could see the relics I took; they were gathering dust in cabinets. It makes no sense for the university to collect so many things it can’t display.”
I told her that all museum curators wish they were able to display more of their collection. I told her that they rotate through their collections.
She responded by saying, “There are plenty of items that will never go on display,” and I couldn’t deny that. She pulled an item from her purse; it was a primordial clamshell, with a smooth section surrounded by growth rings. “I show this to people when I talk to them about God, and everyone who sees it has been impressed. Think of how many people could have their faith strengthened by the relics that sit in the back rooms of the museum. I’m trying to put them to good use.”
I asked her how long she had been taking relics from the museum, and she said she had only begun recently. “People’s faith will be tested soon, and some of them will need reassurance. That’s why it’s important for the relics to be available. They’ll dispel people’s doubts.”
I asked her what kind of test of faith was coming. She said, “There’s a paper that’s about to be published; I know about it because my father was asked to review it. When people read it, a lot of them will lose their faith.”