Chronicles From The Future: The amazing story of Paul Amadeus Dienach

One had to have a heart of stone to manage to withhold tears in the sight of that venerable centuries-old tradition coming to life, here, now, after it has touched the souls of so many generations before us.

I couldn’t help myself telling Stefan that all those around me looked like Christians, dropping a hint about what he told me about the fall dogmatism, which had started in the 20th century along with the progress in scientific research. “And this dogmatism has continued up to now,” I pointed out.

“You’re not entirely right,” he replied patiently. “Modern life is deeply religious, far more than it was in your own time.” He told me that the outburst of disbelief that had prevailed during the centuries that were marked by an extensive and one-sided technological advancement, were succeeded by the deep faith of the Nojere. “God exists; Only his essence—what he is and what he’s not—is not up to humans to define. And the relationship between creator and creation cannot be conceived by any of the biological forms of organic matter.”

I found it impossible to follow all his thoughts. Sometimes I don’t even understand what he means, especially when talking about the “undiagnosed element of a mental entity that comes and infuses the higher organic forms of life, without being life itself” or when he says that “there are many more worlds and dimensions of life that escape us, apart from the three-dimensional world in which we perceive something as real.”

THE VOLKIES

The story of the first “200” and the early years of Alexis Volky

16-VII

This morning we found ourselves in Nayatana again and later in the Pantheon, more or less in the same places as yesterday. After going down an anonymous pebblestone street, we ended up in the long paths of Labejona and the orangery. Everything has been preserved exactly as it was 525 ago, in the exact same state and in the exact same place. This is where Alexis Volky walked around as a child.

The first Volkies were of Slavic origin. In fact, their great ancestor was among the “200” who founded the Valley. Much later, after the year 700, three of Volky’s direct ancestors married French and Scandinavian women hence the mixed origins.

Initially those first Polish and Ukrainian families were settled in another region, in the northern outskirts of the Valley, but according to history books, after the 6th century (circa 3000 AD), they moved to this area. They were pious, frugal, kind and enlightened people, who dedicated themselves mostly to fruit growing and crafts and in their free time lived a practically monastic life and in many cases ascetic, with a strong inclination towards spiritual meditation and reflection. They lived like that for hundreds of years; their lifestyle became a family tradition that was passed down from generation to generation.

The guide, Viktor Gorms, leads us and ten pilgrims, to a simple, three-storey house-museum of which he’s been the caretaker for forty years. However, Stefan informed me that Gorms is not a mere caretaker and guardian of this house; he is also a rare spiritual person and a research scientist.

In this ancestral home, this small farm and the surrounding gardens, Alexis Volky’s father, Eugene Volky, spent almost his entire life. Son of the caretaker of a great library of the time and famous in his time for his finest monographs on aesthetics, Eugene Volky was a worthy thinker of the Chillerin School during their 10th century. They say that he never travelled outside the Valley. He was a humble and modest man, a lecturer devoted to his studies. He never aspired to become famous. The more he felt the need to improve his inner self, the more indifferent he became towards recognition of his work and acceptance from others. He was also unconcerned with building up a “career” or climbing the social ladder. The only thing that mattered to him was the maturity and the richness of his intellect and spirit.

At the age of thirty-two he was married for love to his twenty-year old student, Inga Keiry, a sweet brunette with dark grey eyes. Her family tree was of insignificant historical value, but her parents were virtuous people with a spirit of self-sacrifice, which they managed to bequeath to their daughter, along with fine education and excellent manners. “She is worth the risk,” the library caretaker had told his son before the marriage was decided, “there are very good chances that she will make you happy and give you a wonderful family!”