The Bishop of Lipoppo

“Yes. I will tell you a story about Gabriel and his elephants but then I must go to sleep.”

Many in the crowd sat down on the ground. Father Cropsy found a wooden box for his diminutive friend to stand on so he could be seen by everyone.

“When he was eight years old, Gabriel was crippled by polio. The boy had no friends except for his elephants. Every morning just after dawn, Gabriel would take his cane and hobble to the water-hole. There he would sit talking to his friends. Every now and then, one of the elephants would kneel in front of Gabriel so the boy could pull out nettles that stuck in his hide. If he found a nettle that had become infected, Gabriel would apply a poultice made from a plant that grows along the water’s edge. Gabriel even learned how to treat parasites that bore into the elephants’ iron-hard feet. The townspeople shook their heads. ‘Poor Gabriel, they would say. He has nobody but the elephants.’ Then last year the fire came. The wind blew the flames towards Lipoppo. The water trucks would not arrive for at least three hours. The townspeople gathered their possessions and prepared to flee. Gabriel came to me. ‘Father Harbinger, the elephants can use their trunks to spray water on the fire. They can hold back the flames until the water trucks arrive. But the villagers must help. An elephant’s eyes are weak. They need to be shown where the fire is burning.’ I gathered a group of villagers and ran to the water-hole. Gabriel gently put a rope around the neck of each animal. ‘Hold one of these ropes, each one of you. Use it to guide the elephant from the water-hole to the flames. He will not hurt you. I have told them what we must do.’”

The Bishop’s eyes filled with tears as he remembered that night.

“Gabriel, the crippled boy whom the villagers said would never amount to anything, saved Lipoppo from destruction. God has a plan for all of us. Now I must go. It is late.”