Thanks to a simple church hymn, the writer, dramatist, dental mechanic and Abbot of the Abbaye de Solesmes (which, by the way, was built to honour the great-great-great-great-great-great Saint Peter), baptised by his parents as Gianpietro Vestronillo, has objected those interpretations which are in favour of proclaiming the divinity of our saviour Jesus Christ, or the ones that advocate his possible celestial origin. In his Liber Magnus Opus Tetram, he observes:
“The celebrated song of worship inspired in John’s Gospel can still be heard in some humble churches across the Iberian peninsula; it is sung in the vernacular language of Castilla y León, and it sounds like this:
Sé como un grano de trigo que cae, en tierra y desaparece; y aunque te duela la muerte de hoy, mira la espiga que crece. Un trigal, será mi iglesia (…)
“This sung poem could be imperfectly translated to English as: be like a kernel of wheat that falls to the ground and disappears; and although today’s death might feel painful, take a look at the growing sprig. My Church will be a wheat field… This is a scent that leads me towards a remarkable intuition: the Master Jesus never talked about stone and brick and mortar churches; nor about priests, nor ranks and pedophiles nor sexually repressed (hence maniacs) clerics; all He really wanted (and wants) is that, through being a perfect reflection of not his supposedly proclaimed divinity but of his essential Unity, we shall build and create an edible wheaty abode for the harvesting of all those lost souls who abundantly populate this wonderful planet, granting them the much needed comfort and actual material nourishment: a church made of salt and water and wheat.”
This very short chapter (II) was recollected on his way home, as his well deserved first holidays after fifteen years of uninterrupted service were barely commencing.
The aforementioned melodic tunes and lyrics turned out to be both definitive and fundamental for the Abbot’s interpretations and posterior actions. As a result of these, a resolute and convinced Gianpietro destroyed, by dint of fist, shovel, pick and spoon, the famous San Pietro cathedral in Bari[1]; and thanks to the generosity of the Famiglia Mortessi, he did manage to build, as a replacement of the ruined one, a monumental church made entirely of wheat and water and salt in one of the many estates of the mortuary family.
The first – and last – celebrated mass took place during the 1st of August 1758, year of our Lord; the birds (despite the strategic placement of several dozens of scarecrows), the homeless, the starved, the harvested lost souls, the heat and other divine works, helped in the tragic collapse of the futile and edible building, precisely three hours after its doomed inauguration. Some see in this brief delay a sign of the almighty and omnipresent Father and His Holy Trinity; others, simply human imbecility. Albeit, miraculously (or not, given that the falling weight was already half eaten and quite light), no fatalities occurred.
The Abbot Gianpietro, with his almost exhausted faith, decided that the only logical next step towards his enlightening redemption (or perhaps he chose to read his misfortunes in such a way) was to become that inspiring initial wheat kernel; the ultimate sacrifice; the Jesus of the fields. He dug a generous hole on the promising and redemptive soil and, disguised as a gigantic wheat spike, jumped into the void with the purest of intentions at heart: to be reborn through His grace. The eventually suicidal leap took place precisely three hours after the crumbling dooming end, in the vicinity of the former San Pietro cathedral of Bari.
Scientists from the most prestigious universities worldwide have analysed samples of DNA found on the silver tray used to deliver the communion bread in the Abbaye de Solesmes, and had it compared with the molecular structure of the wheat spike found some meters away from the spot where it is assumed that the suicidal hole had once been created. The similitude between both is astonishing; and leads everyone to the conclusion that both might share the same human origin.
The mass hymn turned out to be a premonition of the death and resurrection of our wretched Gianpietro, who once knew how to be an inspiring and revolutionary and generous Abbot; a man who today could very well be on your table under a wheaty shape, or swimming in your digestive fluids.
To then restart the whole cycle again…
[1] Home town.