UNION, NJ -- She doesn't look like a prophet. Mousy hair, a pretty face. With her broad shoulders, she's not dainty, but hardly one to be splitting the Hudson River. Yet after listening to her admirers for a while, you might believe that's how she got here from her home in Manhattan.
"She knew me!" exclaimed Maria Dibella, who had come all the way from Kingston, New York. "I could tell by how she looked at me. And she told me what I was going to say before I said it. She really is Jesus' girlfriend!"
Maria, a devout Catholic all her life, left her husband in charge of the four kids so she could meet this prophet, this woman, Sarah Fischer, who is walking across New Jersey, her destination unknown to anyone I talked to. Her claim to be the girlfriend of Donald Uffizi was first made on the Miss Roc Show on Wednesday, just three days ago. Maria has no difficulty believing this claim. And she has no difficulty believing that Donald is Jesus.
"Has the Pope told me not to believe it?" she asked me. "The Pope said nothing about Marlboro, either (site of an alleged visitation by the Virgin Mary). Sometimes, with the miracles, they just stand by, like the rest of us. Their affairs are Church affairs. Some things are beyond the Church, you know? Like, direct from God? That's what a miracle is."
But this is the Second Coming we're talking about here. Surely that affects the Catholic Church? Maria says, not yet.
"The Church goes on until Jesus takes us home with him. As long as there is the Earth, there is the Church, and it stays the same."
In some ways, Maria is not alone, and I don't just mean the crowds that are surrounding Sarah as she walks. Many Catholics find the visceral response of Bishop Salacci on national TV (also the Miss Roc Show) to be more convincing than the Church's lack of official recognition for the would-be Messiah. The Bishop has made no official pronouncements, either, but his tears spoke volume.
But what does "Jesus' girlfriend" think about all this? Her only response to my queries was "I don't remember you" before she was swept away in a deluge of other questions from a seeming horde of frantic questioners. An enigmatic response? Certainly. But what else would you expect from a prophet?
Objects: words