The Magi (Caspar)
By 1973, our search for one more manifestation of divine mystery had taken us to the Mousetrap Bar on Cocoa Beach, Florida. We were hoping to find men of the right stuff in there, and, sure enough, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were chatting at the bar, whilst Michael Collins – who did not step onto the Moon but went around to the other side, coming back a day later to pick Neil and Buzz up off that pure, pristine landscape – was heading to the restroom.
We three went over to explain that in ancient days our rain-beaten faces had traversed field and fountain, moor and mountain, then looked down adoringly upon […]. Buzz slammed his glass down on the counter: “Okay, wise guys, are you trying to tell me that back in first century Palestine, you and your camels calculated the position and transit of a star relative to a stable? Get out of here!”
“Yes, we are!” I replied, “And let me tell you, back in our day yours would have seemed a tall story indeed, claiming you were up on the Moon, collecting rocks, driving a ‘lunar buggy’, playing golf!”
He fixed me with a glare and I remembered reading he had once punched somebody who said the landings were faked; instead, he was distracted by a television in the corner of the bar: naked Vietnamese children ran from their burning homes. “What use was your gold to honour Kingship, Caspar?”, he grimaced, “Was Herod any worse than this? And you, Balthazar, you must have used up all your myrrh in embalming long, long ago”.
“But Buzz”, I cried, “You were a believer, taking communion side by side with Neil in that capsule, adjusting helmets, taking those giant stiff steps for humanity”. “But falling back through the blue depths of the sky”, interrupted Neil, “returned to an Earth of hatred and lies, like you three Magi, we remain disappointed, unsatisfied.”.
Michael Collins came over and led us all outside. He pointed up at a star and described the elemental mystery that birthed each one of us from oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, calcium and phosphorous. And Melchior, who has never given up his belief that God is nigh in acts of human kindness, swung his frankincense around us and smiled at the turbulent Calvary and the uncontrollable majesty that shall remain in each one of us.
2024.