On pilgrimage

On the eve of taking up the post of the Chair of the Assistancy Provincials, former Australian Jesuit Provincial Fr Mark Raper recently spent a month making the Camino pilgrimage. He walked 670 kilometers from Roncesvalles to Santiago de Compostela.

Santiago de Compostela began to be a significant place of pilgrimage in the eighth century. It was believed to hold the remains of St James the Apostle. By the twelfth century it was the major pilgrimage destination in Europe, attracting pilgrims from throughout Europe.

The pilgrims dwindled after the Reformation, but since the 1980s the Camino has again become very popular. The main route runs through France to Roncesvalles and on to Santiago, although there are other routes historically taken by pilgrims from other European cities.

Pilgrims can find places of accommodation of different degrees of austerity along the way.

Here is a selection of Fr Raper's photographs highlighting the beautiful vistas and places of visitation along the Camino.

Mark’s reflection on the pilgrimage:

On pilgrimage there is freedom, limitless horizons, movements of the heart of joy, respect, wonder, thanks, and sometimes of urgency.  Unexpected events, welcome or disturbing, break the rhythm of the walk. Scenes of beauty to stop and admire, an unfamiliar pain, harsh weather to endure, stops, changes of route or of pace, a simple welcome, a fresh start stiff and sore, and always friends to share a meal and a word.  Conversations continue over days.  Companions, believers and unbelievers, offer a welcome, share their stories, travel with us some of the way.

God, present, discreetly observing, enabled our way.  As in the Irish blessing, the road comes to meet us each day, at each step. There is time to be alone, even as we hear our companions’ paces, breathing, or call to stop and rest. There is time to dig down through layers of memory, to recall faces, to pray and give thanks in simple ways for many people and for events long calcified in our memories. 

We walked in Springtime.  In the quiet of winter, valleys had recovered. Vines, flowers and healthy crops revealed their fresh goodness, strength and beauty. Even the bad times help us grow strong for the sake of all.

We can see the path ahead as far as the next bend, or sometimes to the next mountain. The end of our journey, although still hidden, is yet sure.

Some Australian accounts of walking the Camino

Walking the Camino: A modern pilgrimage to Santiago, Tony Kevin, Scribe, 2007.

Camino Footsteps, Malcolm Wells & Kim Wells, Fremantle Press, 2008.

The way of a thousand arrows: An Australian family's journey through the Camino de Santiago, Jonathan Drane, 2007.