with her mother’s blessing Joe and Joneva were ready
to be married, but mother knew that her father would not
like to give her away to this man of whom he disapproved.
So without any wedding dress or any wedding party
they eloped to Nevada to meet one of Joe’s sisters and
there they were married, but only by a justice of the peace.
With the holiest of ideals she somehow felt in a deep down
and unspoken way that she married in a less than holy way.
They did plan to marry soon in the church to make it right.
I.3.2 Holy Child
On May 18,1938, at 1:30 a.m. in the same Hailey Hospital where
she had been born mother was delivered of her first child.
He was named David Levaur Goicoechea and his last name was
her husband’s last name, and his middle name was her father’s
name and David was the name she associated with the holy.
She now had nursing at her breast her own beautiful, healthy
well formed baby and she gave him the name for which she
wanted a son for she named him after Just David and now
she could teach him the holy arts as David’s father taught him.
Her baby’s name was also associated for her with David,
the shepherd boy who took care of lambs the way she did,
who was the conqueror of Goliath and the friend of Jonathan.
And she was so happy in the joy of her husband who was
the only one left with the name Goicoechea from his family.
For his father died when little Joe was five and his mother
raised him and his five sisters and now he was so proud
of this new Goicoechea that he had to quickly get out
the good news to all of her family and to his that mother
and baby were doing ever so excellently well and he brought
his wife and baby congratulations from those whom he called.
And also the baby’s name was David Levaur and her own
dear father now had a little grandson named after him
and she knew that with him there would be those tears of glory.
She and her husband and her father loved her new little baby
with such great affection that it went beyond all contention
and in her baby all were united in the harmony of reconciliation.
Her mother and her sister and her brothers and all her friends
and relations were so happy and this was an image for her
of what the holy must be like and it was not so much
a mysterium tremendum of some mystery that makes you
tremble in fear, but it had the peace and joy of Baby Jesus.
I.3.3 Sacred Priest—Sacred Baptism—Sacred Matrimony
Baby David was born on May 18, and baptized on June 30.
Even though mother was not catholic she was eager to have
her child baptized and did not want the least procrastination.
She and Joe had been married in a private mass by Father
Dougherty once they got back from their Nevada elopement.
Mother was completely taken by the priest and right away
there was a master-disciple relation and she even asked him
what was so different about a Catholic priest that she had
never sensed in a Mormon priest or an Episcopalian Bishop.
He told her that the Latin word of priest is sacerdos and
that the priest in his celibacy lives apart from the profane
so that through the sacraments he can help people be holy.
He said that the fanum is the temple so that everything profane
is outside the temple or even against the temple and that the
temple is the place of the sacred sacrament of the real presence
of the Body and the Blood of Jesus in the sacred Host and that
that is why the red light burns in the Church and everyone genuflects.
She sensed the sacred in the celibate sacerdos and wondered
and pondered for years what he told her about the difference
between the holy and the sacred and yet their significant relation.
Joe’s sister Claudia and her husband Pete were witnesses to
the marriage and the Godparents for their nephew, David.
There was nothing mother wanted more than the love that brings
the reconciliation of joy and peace and she knew
that with her baby and the priest and his sacraments there
were intimations of a new hope that fit her Just David dream.
And Mrs. Billingsley, one of her high school teachers, gave
her a little pink baby book and mother wrote down
the gifts and from whom they came and each of the gifts
was a sign of love’s power to turn any problem into
a gift and they became memories of everyone’s love.
I.3.4 The Holy, the Sacred, and the Profane
Father made his living by running poker games at the pool hall.
Deep down he was pleased that mother did not approve for he
loved her most of all because she was a holy woman like his
mother
