Pilgrimage as a risk taking activity

I’ve been submerged in a mixture of planning and research (as well as the usual family and work commitments, of course) and have started to feel the panic rising – not enough time to do it all, etc….

Still, there is an element in all of this that is about just letting go and letting the Spirit do some of the work. It made me think of stuff I was writing a year or so ago about “God the risk-taker” – in some respects the whole of creation is a risk with everything left to self determination and it is up to us to work out the right things to do, etc. But, of course (and although this is for those of you who believe in God, it is also something everyone might consider in some way) if we are made in God’s image, surely we too have an element of risk taking built into us. And I think we have, whatever source we believe our nature to be, it is in our nature and is part of the key to our survival as a species, that we take risks. It has its bad aspects (global warming, global economic ruin, etc) but it has huge benefits, too and is one of the keys to our success as a species.

But, of course, in order for it to work, risk taking has to be in some way enjoyable. Leaping into the unknown is something we do rather well and taking calculated risks is also a pretty good human talent. So, whether it is purely evolution or part of God’s rather open-ended plan for the universe (or our part in it), we humans are known to reach particular points where there seems to be no other option but to take another step and see where it leads us. And some of us do this with relish!

Now, this may seem a bit esoteric for such a blog as this but there is a very important point I feel I need to make (or is it an excuse?) …

On the 5th of April we finally start to put one foot in front of the other and set off on our travels. I will have done all I can to get things ready and planned but there will be gaps, there will be lots of unknowns and we will have points of destination with no guaranteed place to rest our heads, etc. We will have to rely on the good will of strangers and the fact that we can deal with what ever is presented to us. Come rain or shine, we will have to get by. We will be living in interesting times!

In contrast to this, almost all of the organised pilgrimages I have taken part in have had fully planned routes with agreed stops and so on along the way. The only exception was when I walked solo to Walsingham and relied on people putting me up along the way. During that journey I did encounter a couple or so difficult times where I faced the prospect of a night in the rain, etc. but it all worked out OK in the end and the whole experience is a precious thing that I hold near to me and treasure as a special gift. So, I expect the coming trip to be at least as good, despite the greater risks – or perhaps because of them!

I will end this ramble with a short extract from the book on the Pilgrim Cross march to Vezelay in 1946. Sorry about returning to that particular event but see what you make of this…

Fr Gerald Vann O.P. wrote a letter on the 24th May to all of the Catholic press calling for, as the book narrates, “20 or 30 strong men who would be willing to walk a distance of 300 miles through France carrying a heavy wooden cross to Vezelay where 800 years previously St. Bernard had preached the Second Crusade. No definite arrangements for food or shelter had been made in France. They were to be prepared for hunger, thirst, fatigue, insults. They could expect nothing better than a barn for shelter or even the open sky. They would be required to carry packs on their backs as well as the cross on their shoulders. To cover the expenses of those selected but unable to pay, others were asked to send donations. All this was to be done for the love of Christ and peace in the world through him.”

The letter got a huge response with too many volunteers and more money than they needed. Out of the hundred plus volunteers, Fr Vann and his compatriots chose as broad a cross section of men as they could to undertake the walk so that it would best represent the breadth and depths of character of the British public as they saw it.

Well, as a man and a woman we are a pretty good cross-section of the public (50% better than the 1946 one in some respects, anyway) and I hope we will be facing better prospects – so I better get back to that panning thing!

One final note, I wrote to the Osprey people (about the unavailability of my preferred rucksack) and they treated my query/request as an appeal letter for sponsorship, which was a minor part of the letter I sent. After a second letter they did point me to some possible stockists but no offer of equipment… ho hum! I hope for and expect more generosity on the road!

Origins and images

On Thursday afternoon I collected the book “Pilgrim Cross – Vezelay Peace Pilgrimage) which was published by Blackfriars Publications in 1946, shortly after the peace pilgrimage took place.

I am on my third reading of the text and once my useless printer starts working I will scan it in (HP printers are the pits, folks, this one wants to update the drivers every day and re-install on a very regular basis, grrr).

Printer problems aside, this book is fantastic. It tells the story of the British contingent of that amazing pilgrimage to Vezelay and of what happened when everyone arrived. It is a truly moving story and the sermon by the author and instigator of the British element, Fr Gerald Vann, O.P., is also very good. The photos just knock you over as they are both extremely evocative of the time and event and are so redolent with the experience of Student Cross even today. Certainly, the pattern and experience of pilgrimage on Student Cross is directly inherited from this event.

I have a lot to reflect on and write about as a result of this but for the moment it has placed one particular dilemma in my path. The pilgrims walked from Dieppe to Vezelay taking a longer and slower path than Alison and I intend to take. However, it may be possible for us to follow part of their route and so I am about to re-assess where we are planning to walk and see how it might be changed.

Of course, if it means adding days to our route it will be difficult to justify – we have a limited time frame for all of this – but we will certainly give it a try.

Also, I must share with you this revised image of the pilgrimage. I imagined (romantically, I must admit) them emerging from the mist to see Vezelay for the first time in the morning sun. Well, they certainly entered Vezelay for the first time in the morning but my romaticism did not even come close to the real story!

This is how it happened - all of the 14 groups arrived there on the 19th July 1946 and were led to spots on the hills within sight of Vezelay. So they settled down for the night in a ring of small camps around the town. Each could see the basilica perched on the top of the hill and each waited as darkness fell. Silently, they gathered wood for a beacon fire and waited. As they held their vigil a summer storm began to gather and lightning flickered and lit up the sky. Then, at 10 pm the basilica bells rang out, a rocket was fired from the roof of the church and the building was lit up with lights and one at a time, each group fired off their rocket and lit their beacon fire. Everyone in the church and in each camp sang together the plain chant Vexilla Regis, then silence again as the lights in the church were extinguished and each group was left to spend the last night praying together on the hillside by their dying fire and their cross.

Well, what an image to deal with! What an amazing thing to have experienced!

I will stop there and get on with my work! Cheers!

Starting with an old photograph

Just a quick note during these dull and drizzly days.

Alison and I were talking about the origins of the first Student Cross pilgrimage and she said that she had looked at a close-up ‘photo of the first Student Cross Pilgrims taken in 1948. Her earlier viewings of the ‘photos had been of small, blurry pictures but this had been taken for a newspaper and was obviously a publicity picture (or, rather, a picture staged by the group at the request of a photographer). Why did she know this? Well the group were walking over one of the London bridges (looks like London Bridge, actually) and that is something that never happens on any of the Student Cross routes. The first walkers left from the Catholic Church in Ely Place, Holborn and walked north. Subsequent pilgrimages did this until they set off from the Catholic Chaplaincy at Moore House in South Kensington and headed up, by tube, to Epping.

So, anyway, she was telling me that she looked at the group in all of the detail offered by such a picture and she noticed that the leader was wearing a pin stripe suit. It looked a bit odd, but it all made sense. Just after the war clothing continued to be rationed for a good few years, so an old suit was a good choice rather than you trying to buy something new. Of course, most of the pilgrims at the beginning were ex-service men so a number of them also wore fatigues left over from their days in the services.

The other things that were noticeable were the orderly way they seemed to be walking together (marching?) behind the cross and the youthfulness of so many of them. When you think what some of these young men had gone through it is somehow not surprising to me that they were willing to take up the cross and walk with it.

It made me think of the experience of walking with the cross at that time. They would have walked through some of the most damaged parts of central London and then into a section of the rest of London that was either grim because of the bombing or simply because of the deep impoverishment suffered y it since Victorian times. Farringdon and Smithfield, Clerkenwell, Old Street, Shoreditch, Kingsland Road, Dalston, Stoke Newington, Shacklewell, Stamford Hill, Tottenham, Edmonton and so on… Slums and dereliction, impoverishment and disruption … and through it all came these ex-servicemen marching along with a blooming great wooden cross singing hymns and saying the Rosary as they went!

It must have been quite a thing to behold.

It also makes me think of those who walked across war-torn Europe just a short time before them on the peace march to Vezelay. I see them in my mind, marching along those quiet Burgundian lanes that wind their way through the forests and vineyards to that ancient hill top village and I imagine hearing the sound of their feet rumbling below their song as they march along and emerge out of the heavy morning mist to see for the first time the basilica spot lit by a warm golden sun. I can only imagine what drove them to join the march – what had they seen, what had they experienced - and it helps me focus on the reasons why Alison and I are planning our own pilgrimage.

Yes, It’s good to look carefully at the past and see how the signs of the times then drove them to their actions and to remind ourselves that it is the signs of the times that should motivate our thinking today.

The special act of walking together

I attended the AGM of the Confraternity of St James on Saturday (30th Jan.) and had a very enjoyable day. Two of our friends who are members had stayed over with us the night before and, as Alison went off to talk at a Las Casas Institute conference in Oxford, I went with them to the meeting.

I picked up a lot of useful advice and news regarding the route and the practicalities of pilgrimhood. I also enjoyed the real camaraderie which is ever present in any group of pilgrims and was deeply reassured by this. I also have a longer list of things to think about and consider/worry on – but that was to be expected!

Alison and I believe that there is something very special and particular about walking together. The effect of walking and talking together as you share a journey seems to be greater than the sum of all the parts (if you see what I mean) and deep friendships are often forged though this simple process.

Considering the “why” of this has led me to a couple of conclusions.

Firstly, we could simply say that the root of all human journeys is the act of walking together. It is what all animals do in family and social groups and was the only method for humans for many (hundreds of)thousands of years before we began to domesticate animals, develop wheels, build boats, etc. and persisted as the most common experience up until the 19th Century in Western cultures (though it is probably still the most common experience for a huge percentage of people even today). So, walking together is a fundamental part of our nature which has only very recently become a marginalized activity in our society.

This thought leads me to suspect that we still have a lot of hard-wiring adapted to this act of walking together that is opened up or used to its full when we share a journey on foot. Perhaps this is why walking is not only physically good for you, but is also a therapeutic thing to do.

My second idea is that the act of walking’s physical aspects may bring us together in a particular and special way. When we walk together we tend to match each other’s pace. We slow down or speed up slightly to match our walking partner and end up walking in time with them (or they with us). Our breathing begins to regulate itself and our heart begins to beat at a regular pace which matches our activity. We end up not just walking in time with each other but in harmony with each other! Heartbeats, breathing and physical movement are tuned into each other and we come closer together than we would come if we were simply sitting next to each other. What other activities end up with you matching another person’s movement, breathing and heartbeat?

Don’t answer that!

Playing music, singing and dancing together are the ones I was going to suggest!

Anyway, I found the whole day very enjoyable and am glad that Alison and I are now full members of that wonderful organisation. We also look forward to walking with many new friends over the coming months.

So much to do, but so much to look forward to as well!

You can’t always get what you want

Just got back from the recording of the News Quiz at the BBC Radio Theatre – excellent panel and a very amusing evening. Thank goodness that we were both well enough to go! I have not recovered as quickly as Alison from this bug and this has caused me some difficult moments. My stomach has been rumbling like thunder moving over the plains after every (light) meal and we all know that a storm follows thunder! So, when my light lunch today heralded a new, non-celestial chorus I began to wonder if it would be wise for me to leave for the BBC.

At the very least they might have decided that my stomach was too loud for the recording studio equipment!

Happily, the storm passed and I refrained from even a snack until now (10:53pm at time of writing this bit).

I came home imagining a meal of a lovely bag of chips..... perhaps a saveloy as well, as it was too late for a bit of cod, but I decided that this would not be a wise choice for both digestive and pecuniary reasons so I sat in the kitchen wondering what to have.

It was one of those times when the kitchen seemed to have nothing available for me to eat. Admittedly, this is Thursday, and Friday is shopping day, so the cupboards were a bit lighter in available foodstuffs than usual - but that was not the real reason. It was just that when you set your heart on something it can be hard to move yourself towards a lesser alternative. Couple this with it being a bit late in the day and with hunger nagging you in an annoying way and you begin to feel that nothing will do.

Then I looked in the cupboard where we keep our various tinned goods and I saw that we had some tinned tuna and tins of chickpeas and an amusing thought occurred. Fish and chips, fish and chips, fish and chicks! Weak link, I know, but I was clutching at straws.

So I am now eating a salad of tuna and chickpeas with some onions caramelised in olive oil (from yesterday) and some left over salsa with a bit of lemon juice, white wine vinegar, pepper and Tabasco. It is a pleasing mixture.

All that this illustrates is that, as Mick Jagger tells us, you can't always get what you want, but you can get what you need (rough quote).

So, what relevance has this to the walk?

Well, firstly, it is a reference back to this idea of making do as you progress along the road – we are not always able to make do gracefully but whether we do or not, we can make life easier for ourselves if we try to focus on the possible rather than the most desired thing. Of course, even if we fail to do this we will still survive and the next day will be different.

And then there is the ongoing story of our preparations and I have been trying to find a particular type of rucksack, one made by those wonderful people at Osprey, and it seems that every store in the world has run out of the particular version I am looking for and they are not likely to get any more from Osprey for a while!

The Exos 34 is what I can't seem to get but want! It weights under a kilo and for my medium height it can pack up to 34 litres inside, it is the state of the art and when I didn't have the means to buy it I tried one on and it fitted like the proverbial glove. Bah humbug!

Tomorrow I will write to the Osprey people themselves and ask what's going on – perhaps they might even offer me some much needed help when I explain the good use it will be put to and that it will be undergoing a 1600 mile road test, to boot!

Otherwise I will just have to find another light weight sack to meet my needs.

 

 

 

 

 

Letting go

OK, this is the thing, I started off writing a blog last week on what I will miss and not miss when we actually start walking.

The piece was going to say how most things are actually easy to do without for a while and that what you do miss will surely be small compared with the gains. I was then going to talk about the real things that are hard to give up.

Interestingly, I wrote one blog and then had to go somewhere before loading it up onto the site. The next day, I reworked it then other things led me to leave it unpublished. I went back to the subject at the end of the week on my office computer rather than my netbook and re-wrote it with a bit more vigour but other things got in the way and it is still on that computer tapping its electronic fingers with growing impatience while I write this one on my netbook.

Perhaps, you might think, I am either going soft (I don't miss deadlines – ever!) or perhaps the subject was not worth writing about but both ideas would be mistakes. No, the fact is that these delays are perfect illustrations of what is going to be hardest to leave behind and probably my biggest challenge!

What, you might ask, causes these delays and diversions? Family responsibilities, I answer. For example, this weekend saw us helping Rosalind and the girls (daughter and twin granddaughters) at various times. On Sunday and part of Monday that extended to helping Rosalind deal with two 14 month old girls suffering with the norovirus. What little tough cookies they were, too, real stars – they handled it fantastically well! I speak of this with deep experience as Alison, Rosalind and I have all, subsequently, gone through that very personal hell which is the norovirus. Phew, is that some bug! It picks you up, shakes you all about and puts you down pretty fast but it is one seriously unpleasant ride.

So, putting aside further reflections on nasty bugs, what do I conclude?

Well, I feel that can handle a variety of discomforts, especially if I know they are for a limited period; I can handle not having my own space or my own bed, I can deal with the walking, the different places, food, pains and faces, etc all for the same reason (come to think of it, it doesn't sound very bad to me at all) and especially when I can experience them while walking through three great countries (in fact it all sound pretty good, really). But my problem is how do I let go and not worry or feel like I am letting people down? No I am not Mr Indispensible, but I am a father and grandfather and it does feel like I am doing the abandoning.

This trip will see Alison and myself step out of the normal things in our lives and will give us the space and time to reflect, pray, discuss and learn.... so the things I will have to try to let go of are not those comforts, etc, but much of my responsibilities and family cares/life. I know Alison will have to do the same and will also have the burden of being the (absentee) Chief Executive of a charity (Housing Justice) to deal with, too.

Those are going to be the hardest things to let go of.

This is how it is.

Travelling really long distances

Just can’t believe that New Year is now two weeks away….

I have a question for the readers of this Blog (if there are any) but first I just need to share the following with you -

We spent a wonderful week up in the North of Scotland at a place called Nigg with a bunch of really great people. Richard and Sabine, our hosts, run a seriously good B&B there (check out http://www.niggbnb.com/) and our good friend Mike drove some of us up and back down again – was it 1500 miles? Almost as far as Alison and I will be walking!

When we were there we ate/drank/walked/danced and broke bread together, we made a student cross leg out of snow and I will never forget the walk we did leaving a long trail of our footsteps across a beautiful snow covered landscape, stopping occasionally to eat Christmas cake and drink good malt whisky or some other high octane beverages (what was that Polish liqueur called again?) while some of the group tried to make snow angels in the very deep snow.

Thank you Mike (a star for sure) and thank you everyone else for being there and to Richard and Sabine for their fantastic welcome. And thank you Susie’s mum for the stop over on the way up and to our daughter Dominique for the Durham stop over on the way back.

The weather did stop us from getting to the Dornoch New Year’s street party and put paid to the surprise visit we planned for my sister who lives in Lybster (another great B&B www.acarsaidlybster.co.uk) a further 64 miles north of Nigg. Sorry Sheena and Norman!

So enough of the thanks and the ads and all that….

I have to say that we are not just planning to walk all the way to Santiago; we also have to plan a brief interlude during the walk when we will be slipping back to Durham for a day from somewhere in Northern Spain.

I know it sounds weird but it is necessary as our middle daughter graduates from Durham University this year and the graduation ceremony is on the 29th of June. As the proud parents (and as we went to her sister’s graduation, too) we need to be there! So far, I have found an affordable flight from Biarritz to Stanstead and back. Which would mean getting a couple of buses from wherever we are (Pamplona?) to Biarritz, fly to Stanstead, train to Durham, dress smartly for the occasion (clothes stored with Dominique before we start the walk), celebrate, jump on a train and reverse the route back to the place we first though of (Pamplona?).

Of course, I will keep looking, but have you got any other ideas? Have you travelled around there and perhaps know a different route? Perhaps we are too close to it and something extremely obvious has been missed by us…

Ideas in an email please.

See, I told you we would soon be getting you to do some of the work!