A LOCOMOTIVE NAMED “LUCIFER”

The official version of the blessing of locomotives, quoted in the previous entry, was not fully correct. Only nine were blessed according to the narrative of the local “Sémaphore” newspaper:

However, a small problem arose in the last minute, just before the ceremony.

Each of the ten brand-new locomotives had its name engraved on a plaque. But if, as the journalist from Le Sémaphore so aptly wrote, “some of these fearsome steam-powered machines had very sweet names, others had quite different names, and it was in the demon category that their names had to be sought!

One of them was indeed called “Lucifer”. Go and get a bishop to bless a machine named after the prince of demons!

And so, as the locomotives, slowly festooned and adorned with flags and foliage, made their way to the podium, over there, at the far end of the station, at the very end of a siding, a solitary machine could be seen making a few vague maneuvers to escape the fallout of the episcopal blessings. It was the ill-named “Lucifer”.

REFLECTION

Nothing spiritual today, just a smile!

“It’s not how much we have, but how much we enjoy that makes happiness.” (Charles Spurgeon)