The Way

The Spanish poet Antonio Machado said in his day: Traveler, there is no path. The path is made by walking.

Many years later, a popular Catalan singer turned the poem into an indispensable anthem for an entire generation. Here on the Island, in those days, Machado’s poem set to music fit like a glove. It seemed necessary to urge people to break through the brush and make the paths needed to shatter the inertia of times standing still. We all sang that refrain with a certain fervor bordering on rebellion; it was a clear inclination toward breaking with an apparent harmony that seemed to conform to our own dreams as young insurgents, new, like new men with a new school, new ideals, new perspectives, new flights, and a new morality—all seasoned with a heavy dose of devotion to novelty.

We sang and intoned the phrase with intellectual airs. “…the path is made by walking.” We thought ourselves poets; we were poets. We turned day-to-day life into everyday poetry. We dreamed of being one of those heroes of the moment; we praised the protagonists of a new imported literature, heroes steeped in snow, war, and suffering—sometimes morbid, realistic, and also, in a certain sense, humanistic and beautiful. I wanted to make my path, you wanted to make your path, and we were all engrossed in making our own paths. It was an exceedingly significant conviction in those days. There seemed to be no other way to walk except by making our own path. And all paths led to another romantic path, a great, broad, singular, and at the same time individualistic path.

But not all roads lead to Rome, or at least not to our heavenly “Rome.”

In time, God took it upon Himself to teach me the truth, and I thank Him for all that time when I depended solely on the path I was capable of making by myself and for myself. I am being honest, for, after all, I knew no other way to walk. From the countless falls I suffered while retracing my own paths, I bear indelible scars. But today I can glorify God for having shown me the Way, which is narrow, difficult, sacrificial, and costly, yet at the same time pluralistic, blessed, and everlasting.

God’s psalmist told me on God’s behalf: “I will give you understanding and teach you the way you should walk; I will fix my eyes upon you.” (Psalm 32:8)

Dear poet and brothers and sisters, there is indeed a Way. One Way alone. There is no need to make it; it has already been made. It is the way to God, embodied in His Son Christ for the salvation of this world. He is waiting for you so that you may begin walking together toward the Father. Your paths have nothing to do with His way. He has fixed His eyes upon you and will teach you everything you need to know about this way. One travels it with the conviction that, in journeying along it, any obstacles that arise will be overcome despite untimely, troublesome, and timely falls. Yes, of course it is narrow and difficult! But there is nothing more wonderful in life than accepting it, traveling it, and loving it. I invite you to do so. May God bless you!