49 years living in a hermitage in the middle of a natural park

Cornudella de MontsantIf it is true that he who has most needs least, Montserrat Domingo surpasses us all. One could say that with prayer, she has enough. She lives in an old stable of about 40 square meters, distributed over two floors. The dining table is full of cardstock and small pots of paint that she uses to reproduce the flowers and plants that surround her. She makes bookmarks with them and gives them away to visitors. The walls are covered with calendars from past years and books, especially on religion and icons, but also on artificial intelligence and nature. In one of them, dedicated to foxes, she even appears, where the authors explain that a lame fox used to approach the hermitage of Sant Joan del Codolar so that the hermit woman would give it food. "It was coming for a long time and it would stretch out right here. It was lame, but when someone came, it would run away. It's dead now," she recalls. She also has dozens of copies of Serra d'Or, the magazine published by the Abbey of Montserrat. The animals of the forest, the plants, the ancient trees, and prayer, especially prayer, are her life. "Prayer is what sustains me," she says.

49 years ago, while observing the faces of the people around him on a train, he saw so much suffering that he understood his path was solitude. "I don't just want to study the gospel, I want to live it," he explains. Since 1977, Montserrat has lived in the Montsant Natural Park, in a small building next to the hermitage of Sant Joan del Codolar, in Priorat. The building, which dates from the 13th century, consists of three naves and is at an altitude of 750 meters. Montserrat lives completely isolated, four kilometers from the nearest village, which is Cornudella de Montsant. "I don't have a car, nor have I ever had one because I haven't needed it," he assures. He also doesn't have a refrigerator, so he can't eat meat or fish because it spoils. After nine years without tasting meat, a friend invited him to dinner and he ordered a steak that made him very sick. He hasn't gone back since. "I mainly eat eggs and cheese, and also chickpeas, lentils, rice, beans, pasta," he says. He also likes yogurt but only eats it on Saturdays, which is when he goes down to the village to buy. He is 83 years old and has a bit of back pain, but he doesn't take any medication. "I have paracetamol for people who go up the mountain." The only thing he needs and doesn't have, like the whole region, is water. "I've never had water inside the house, but before the fountain used to flow, until three years ago," he laments. Now he lives on the water that friends bring him when they visit, and also the rural agents who patrol the park. According to him, they have already agreed with a dowser to try to find water and make the fountain flow again. He has been praying for this for a long time. He also prays for the people who ask him, because they have a sick relative or have had an accident. "Prayer, prayer," he repeats.

Hikers and animals

Christians, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, and also atheists have passed by her home. "I don't ask anything. I just ask them if they want water." People also come to meditate, to do a retreat, and she joins them. As she explains, more hikers used to come up before, and now many people come to run. Some climb up here without water. "I offer them water. Just as they give it to me, I also give it to those who need it," she says. She likes it when people come up: "I don't judge anyone, not even those who burned a woman at an ATM," she says. Of course, the more people who come up, the fewer animals come to see her. From time to time, she photographs a snake and posts it on Instagram or observes the bats hanging from the hermitage's ceiling.

The risk of fire, which constantly forces the closure of access to the Montsant Natural Park, worries her but doesn't frighten her. In fact, she is not afraid of anything because she is convinced she found her path many years ago. "Prayer for all," she says by way of farewell.