(This is a photo of the scallop shell that I carried with me on the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela. The scallop shell is the symbol of that pilgrimage.)
There are signs everywhere that there is a renewed interest in
the community of saints in our modern Church.
Maybe it is because of the influence of Pope John Paul II, who had a
great devotion to the saints and who beatified and canonized many men and women
during the papacy. Maybe it is the way
the saints ignite our imagination with their courageous stories and adventurous
travels from ages past. But, perhaps it
is because many modern Catholics today feel the help and guidance of the saints
in their lives. Father James Martin’s
wonderful book, My Life with the Saints, even won acclaim from the
secular media.
July 25 is the
feast day of one of my favorite saints – the Apostle James the Greater. Perhaps some of you have wondered why for web
address for my blog is “peregrinolincoln”.
“Peregrino” is the Spanish word for “pilgrim”. I am proud to identify myself as a pilgrim,
specifically a pilgrim who has hiked the Camino to the resting place of St
James in the town of Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain. I went to Spain in the summer of 2003 with my
dear friend Nancy Sowa, whom I met as a Peace Corps volunteer in Guinea, West
Africa. Nancy and I started in the city
of Burgos and traveled throughout northern Spain until we arrived in Santiago
de Compostela. I will be ever grateful
to Nancy for that wonderful journey week took together. I am currently a part of a group from St
Richard parish in Jackson, Mississippi that has been meeting for about a year
now with our goal of being able to hike together this same pilgrimage route in
April 2012. Ever since I was in Spain in
2003, I’ve been hoping to get back there, to once again trace the footsteps
leading to St James. I am excited to be
a part of this wonderful group that will journey together as pilgrims this
spring.
Thank you, St.
James, for your witness of faith, for the call of pilgrimage you have brought
to our modern Church. On this feast day
of St James, I send out my prayers to all the pilgrims throughout the world who
make this great leap of faith, who cross time and space to search for a greater
spirituality in their lives. I also pray
for the people of Spain, for their wonderful country, and for the gift they are
to our Church. Spain is the homeland of
Ignatius of Loyola, Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, three of my favorite
saints.
Long ago, I wrote
down this quote by theologian Richard Niebuhr about pilgrimage, that I think I
originally saw in Parabola magazine: “Pilgrims are persons in motion, passing through
territories not their own and seeking something we might call completion, or
perhaps the word clarity will do as well--a goal to which only the spirit's
compass points the way.” That quote really captures the spirit of pilgrimage
for me. Thank you, St James, for
directing our spirit’s compass to Spain, to your final resting place. Thank you for the adventurous spirit of
pilgrimage that lives in so many of us.
As the pilgrims in Spain say as they greet each other on the pilgrimage
route: “Buen Camino” – have a good journey!
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