Still the postman, still the catechist

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On a pastoral visit to Chile’s Robinson Crusoe Island, Fr John Boles uncovers evidence of the original hero, and meets an inspiring modern-day castaway.

Most people have heard of Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, reputedly the first true novel in the English language. Fewer realise that the story is based on a real person and a real island.

In 1704 a Scottish seaman named Alexander Selkirk fell out with the captain of his ship, and asked to be set ashore at the next landfall. This happened to be the uninhabited island of Masatierra, some 450 miles off the coast of what is now Chile. For over four years he survived in isolation until he was finally rescued. Defoe read an account of the episode and Selkirk became his “Robinson Crusoe.”

Some years earlier, another sailor on an English ship was inadvertently left behind on the same island. The man was a Nicaraguan Indian, known as Will the Miskito. Will spent from 1681 to 1684 on Masatierra before his rescue. Defoe went on to immortalize him as “Man Friday.”

By the time Chile gained independence from Spain, the novel was famous around the world. Eventually, the new regime decided to re-name the island after the book, and so Masatierra became Isla Robinson Crusoe… Robinson Crusoe Island.

The island really is a paradise, and hardly warrants the adjective “desert.” The volcanic peaks that thrust 3,000 feet out of the Pacific are covered in lush rainforest. The jungle is full of plants and animals found nowhere else in the world. In fact, the area has been declared a UNESCO World Biosphere Reserve. There is just one village. San Juan Bautista has a population of less than 700, nearly all from the Chilean mainland. And there is only one source of livelihood – lobsters. The lobster grounds around the island are amongst the richest on earth.

There is a parish church on the island, but no resident priest. The Chilean Church occasionally sends out priests for short pastoral visits, and recently I offered myself for the task. With so little contact with the outside world, I expected to find the Faith virtually absent. However, I’d reckoned without the passion of a modern-day castaway, a remarkable individual by the name of Jorge Palomino.

Jorge is a mainland Chilean, a devoted Catholic layman who, in 1973, found himself studying theology in Santiago. That was the year of a brutal military coup by the infamous General Augusto Pinochet, and like many liberal-minded young people, Jorge had to make himself scarce. He took refuge on Robinson Crusoe Island, intending to stay, “for a few months.”

Instantly, he fell in love with the place. He also fell in love with one of its female inhabitants, and soon was married with three children. He took a job as the island’s postman. But, increasingly he began to worry at the lack of pastoral care of the islanders. Remembering his earlier theological studies, he volunteered as a catechist. Soon, he was running weekly liturgies and sacramental programmes. He began to undertake house-to-house visitations, and pushed the bishop on the continent into restoring the derelict church.

More than 35 years have passed, and Jorge is still there. Still the postman, still the catechist. He is the bishop’s right-hand man on the island. Thanks to an ingenuity and tenacity that any Robinson Crusoe would be proud of, the Catholic Church is flourishing on this dot in the Pacific.

Jorge was my host when I went there. It is a lovely experience, wandering round with him as guide. Everyone greets him. Virtually all the spouses have been married by him. All those with the sacraments have been prepared by him. Everyone has had their loved ones’ funerals celebrated by him. He is Mr Catholic Church on Robinson Crusoe Island.

On Sunday morning after Mass, I hiked a track originally beaten by the luckless Selkirk, past the site of the lair he huddled in for four years, up to the breathtaking viewpoint that bears his name. From the lookout I was able to see the whole island, from one end to the other. I looked down on the lone village of San Juan Bautista with its tiny church roof, and smiled at the legacies left by these two very different Robinsons.

Fr John Boles SSC is from Stockport, England, and is Rector of the Columban Seminary in Santiago, Chile.