Esperanza is in a state of extreme grief, so she expresses her doubt at the ability of the rituals of the Catholic Church to heal her emotional wounds. She believes her daughter, against all physical odds and evidence is still alive, so the funeral seems futile -- hence the sense that she has buried nothing. There is a gentle humor in her frustration at the size of the funeral, as if the bigger the funeral and the more gaudy the accoutrements of mourning, the more effective it will be.
There is an evident sexual tension between Father Salvador and Esperanza, or at least, in Father Salvador's perception of the woman. Father Salvador is attempting to comfort the woman. His hand is "trembling" like "an adolescent boy "about to kiss a girl for the first time" (70). Of course, this is a first for Father Salvador, as...
"His caress reminded her of her own father," and gives Esperanza much needed, human, personal contact in a way that the more conventional tears of the funeral ritual lacked (70).
The connection between the priest and the woman is intense and real, but it is not merely an expression of Salvador's sexual repression, nor innocence and faith in the Church. It is a fantastical melding of the two elements of human existence, just like Esperanza's vision. This is why the priest can speak with such confidence when he says that he believes Esperanza will find her daughter, because he and Esperanza have undergone a physical communion of an embrace as well as a spiritual communion of confession.
