Building The Family Chapel — Legendary Gualfin

Week 34 of the Quarantine

When you stop building, you die.
– Old Chinese proverb

SAN MARTIN, ARGENTINA – On the hill behind the house, we have begun building a tiny, family chapel.

Almost all the farms in the area have a church.

Ours has none… at least, not on this side of the river.

Why would we want a chapel?

The world is a busy place. The busy-ness of it can distract… mislead… and distort your life.

If you watch the news today, for example, you will come away thinking that the U.S. presidential election is the most important thing happening in the world… that the future of the nation depends on it… and that we must turn our thoughts and emotions towards it as if our favorite dog were dying in the corner of the room.

(As we explain below, as the election dust settles, it looks more and more like the world has not changed at all.)

In any case, it doesn’t hurt to have a place set aside for non-busy-ness… where the hustle and bustle of the outside world can be tuned out… with no internet, no TV, and no radio…

…a quiet, solemn, cool place… to wonder about what really matters… to admit our weaknesses and vanities… to strengthen our soul, steel our spirit, and prepare our mind for the vicious indignities…

…in the news!

Faith and Courage

For nearly 50 years, we’ve almost always had some building project underway. Not only were they fun to do, they were also ways of engaging our children in meaningful work.

Restoring our old family farmhouse in Maryland. Fixing stone walls in France. Scraping off wallpaper… and painting rooms in an old wreck of a château. Building barns. Putting up fences.

And then, there were the “experimental” projects.

One of them was particularly difficult. It was down here in Argentina eight years ago. The altitude made breathing difficult. The sun was so intense, we erected a sunscreen so that we could work in partial shade.

The rocks were heavy. The flies were biting. And we worked alongside a local crew from dawn to dusk; the last thing we wanted was to show ourselves up as weak or incapable.

“If you can do this,” we told our two boys, “the rest of life will seem easy.”

The boys didn’t forget. That experience stuck with them… giving them faith in themselves and courage to tackle whatever comes their way.

At least… that’s what we’d like to think.

Sticky Mud

Now, we are alone. The children have their own lives. But the building continues.

Here in San Martín, the techniques are basic. We buy no materials, save for a few bags of cement. Everything else comes from the ground… and nearby trees. The only real expense is the labor… currently running about $1 an hour.

With a small team of locals, led by a friendly giant named Monzon, we mix up mud, just as it has been done for the last 3,000 years.

A pool is shaped… dirt shoveled in… some straw added… and then, one of the changos (boys) stomps around in it until it is the consistency of, well, sticky mud.

The mud is then shoveled into brick molds and left to dry in the sun. These bricks are about three times the size of the common, oven-fired red brick used in the U.S.

Once dry, they are laid up with more mud, on a foundation of stone and concrete… up to about 6 and a half feet high.

In the eastern wall, we have embedded a cross. It is made by taking our empty wine bottles – of which we have many – cutting them in half, and then putting two bottom ends together with duct tape. This gives us glass tubes that transmit the morning light over where the altar will stand.

Roof Plans

The difficult part is the roof. It would be easy to stretch some barras from wall to wall, lay on some sheathing of cane stalks, and cover it with more mud. That is the usual way of making a roof in this area.

But what would be the fun of that? Where’s the challenge?

And then, gazing up at the ceiling in a moment of solemn prayer, where would we find inspiration? Great churches – and humble ones, too – typically have soaring roofs, braced and buttressed, reaching up to the heavens.

Here, without rafters, cross-bracing, or sheathing… we will build a roof of mud bricks in the form of two intersecting vaults, following an ancient model.

Years ago, we came across a book – Roman Era Construction Techniques. We will use it to guide our roofing effort. Then, if all goes well, in moments of quiet reflection, we will look up and admire our handiwork.

Home for Thanksgiving

But the finale will have to wait until next year.

In the next two weeks, we will complete the walls. And then, we hope to go home to the U.S. for Thanksgiving.

Argentina opens up this week. Airlines are back in business – on a much-reduced scale. With a little luck, we should be able to make our escape, flying from Salta to Buenos Aires and then on to Miami.

But if we are able to get away, the chapel will remain unroofed… until our next visit here… in 2021. (Fortunately, it almost never rains here.)

As always… stay tuned.

Regards,

Bill