This is the story of Gilá, the 38-year-old Moroccan shepherd.

Seven years ago, he emigrated from Morocco to the village of Roales del Pan in Zamora to tend sheep in a region dedicated to wheat and livestock. He was doing well in this job, but he became obsessed with a supposed treasure that his boss had mentioned, which was buried under the sheepfold where the sheep were kept. This sheepfold was near the famous Valderrey chapel, where the famous and popular Cristo del Valderrey pilgrimage is held every second Sunday of Easter. Gilá, together with his Portuguese friend Albano, obsessed with gold, began digging tunnels 70 cm wide and nine meters deep every night. Such was their obsession that one day his clothes, cell phone, wallet, and shoes were found on the surface, and deep below, the body of Gilá, who had died from lack of oxygen, an 18% air mixture that caused him to lose consciousness and ultimately led to a sweet and sedative death.

And this is the story of the prodigal son (Luke 15:1-3 and 11-32) who, like Gilá in the 21st century, also decided to leave his home and father and go to “a distant country,” with the difference from Gilá that the prodigal son “squandered his fortune there, living recklessly” (Luke 15:13). Hard times came, and he “fell into poverty” in his job “feeding pigs”; so much poverty that “he longed to fill himself with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything” (Luke 15:16).

The two shepherds could be examples of a sin that we could describe as a “sin of youth”: aspiring to ideals and a better life, which in this case means going to a distant country in search of fortune, but based on unfounded aspirations, without reflection or consideration, without establishing priorities and a scale of values in strategies for the future. Thus, this sin of youth could be defined by the word “precipitation.”

Gilá did not reconsider because he was swept up in the “gold rush.” However, the prodigal son in Jesus’ parable went from rashness to reflection:

“Recapacitando entonces”, se dijo: “Me levantaré, me pondré en camino adonde está mi padre, y le diré: Padre, he pecado contra el cielo y contra ti.
– (Lucas 15, 17)

In this regard, it is curious how, throughout the history of European painting, artists have emphasized the embrace of mercy and forgiveness that the father gives to his prodigal son (Rembrandt and Murillo). However, there are two paintings that are exceptions (the Neapolitan Salvatore Rosa in the 17th century and the French artist from Lyon, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, in the 19th century). Both focus on the prodigal son in a state of meditation against the backdrop of a distant country and surrounded by the lands and animals he tends. Salvatore Rosa paints him in a meditative pose looking up to the sky, faithfully interpreting the phrase: “I have sinned against heaven and against you.” Pierre Puvis, on the other hand, paints him in an attitude of contemplation, lost in thought, with his hands crossed over his heart. In both paintings, the only company of animals is striking.

This state of reflection on the part of the two painters leads us to the key to the stumbling block of youth. The 12th-century French Cistercian monk Isaac of Stella shows us this key applied to the prodigal son, and applicable to the ill-fated Moroccan shepherd Gilá. Isaac of Stella emphasizes the importance of the journey within oneself as opposed to going outside:

Si quieres conocerte a ti mismo y dominarte, entra en ti mismo y no te busques fuera… Entra pues en ti mismo, pecador, entra donde existes verdaderamente: en tu corazón. En el exterior, eres un animal, a imagen del mundo…; dentro, tú eres un hombre, a imagen de Dios, , y por tanto capaz de ser deificado.
– Gn 1,26)

The residents of Roales del Pan knew that there was treasure buried deep in the earth, However, their lifelong priority had been to cultivate the surface to obtain wheat and bread, and to go every year to the pilgrimage of Cristo de Valderrey to cultivate the bread of heaven that leads them to find themselves, search for the treasure in their hearts, and aspire to heaven (“to be deified”). Not so for Gilá, who dug deep, not into his heart, but into the earth. In contrast, the prodigal son looked within himself, as Isaac de Estrella so aptly pointed out:

Will the man who turns inward not find himself far away, like the prodigal son, in a different region, in a foreign land, where he sits and weeps with memories of his father and his homeland?
– Isaac de Estrella

The prodigal son finally decided—after looking inside himself, at heaven, and at God—to bet on a land of fixed income: his father and his father’s mercy. He was a man of faith who, in his priorities, set aside “distance” and valued “filial friendship with God, in whom he recognized his infinite mercy” (John Paul II), as do the neighbors who go on pilgrimage to the hermitage of Valderrey (Zamora).

In our youth, we have all had that desire to go to a distant country, leaving behind the country closest to our hearts, where God’s love dwells. Benedict XVI emphasizes the response of the older brother who does not want to participate in the welcome party that the father throws for the prodigal son. For the Pope Emeritus, this shows that all those who remain in their homeland, these “devotees,” also have hidden in their hearts a desire for a distant country and its attractions. Envy reveals that these people have not truly understood the beauty of their homeland, the happiness of “everything that is mine is yours,” the freedom of being children and owners. And so it appears that they too secretly desire the happiness of the distant country… And, in the end, they do not enter the feast; in the end, they remain outside.“ (Benedict XVI). But they are not the majority, for the ”devotees” of the pilgrimage of Cristo de Valderrey prepare their traditional “A fellowship meal attended by most of the 500 members of the brotherhood. Rice à la zamorana, roast lamb, and torrijas were the main dishes on the menu, which was also enjoyed by the authorities, including the deputy mayor of the city council.”