Cindy on pilgrimage

pilgimage trail in spainLast night we had a big meal and a prayerful send off for Cindy Blick who starts the pilgrimage trail (Camino de Santiago de Compestela) on Wednesday.

Cindy has been living with us for 2 months, and she was one of the girls in my youth group when i was a youth pastor at North Beach Baptist Church (91-93). She expects to walk it in 6 weeks, and to be in Santiago by July 24th, for the big celebration.
Pilgrimage, for many young people, is the new missions – a two-way journey, a spiritual quest, a journey of giving and taking, listening and telling your story, experiencing God and the people of the country, tuning into the spiritual needs of a country, entering that country in a posture of humility and need (like Jesus said to do in Luke 10), and its also just a fantastic way to meet other spiritual seekers.
Our family walked part of the pilgrimage trial – i mean TRAIL last summer. Jesus walked one each year with his family when he was a kid. Walking up to Jerusalem was a part of the festival itself. Some people would walk for a week to get there and a week back. They walked it as a big crowd of pilgrims which is why Jesus parents couldn’t find him in the crowds and left him behind in Jerusalem.
Last year, nearly 70,000 people walked the Camino in Spain. Guess where the spiritual seekers in Spain are.

Andrew

Andrew Jones launched his first internet space in 1997 and has been teaching on related issues for the past 20 years. He travels all the time but lives between Wellington, San Francisco and a hobbit home in Prague.

10 Comments

  • abigail says:

    There was an article in The Guardian travel supplement this weekend about the Camino, which gives an interesting ‘secular’ view of one woman’s reason for doing the pilgrimage. When reading it, I couldn’t help feeling she was slightly missing something along the way… But at least she did better than the art critic Brian Sewell, who cruised the Camino in his Mercedes!

  • Sergey says:

    Hello Andrew,
    I am working on comparison of Mk1:15 (kai as conj of antithesis) and Mikhail Bakhtin theory of aesthetic (replacement of ethics by aesthetics). Looking for an expert to help. Can you help me in landing this subject to the area of missiology?
    By the way, I am also tall and skinny Russian.
    Thank you,
    Sergey

  • Tim says:

    Andrew:
    IT has a team in Santiago de Compestela. They just opened up a cafe there called Cafe Terra Nova during Holy Week. The family and I are headed to Spain later this summer to work with them at the Cafe for a couple of weeks. They make a great cup of coffee and also have Guiness on tap!

  • Andrew says:

    Sergey, good question.
    I dont know of anyone who has made that link – maybe you will be the first, or maybe others might know.
    A lot of people make the connection with Bakhtin and Biblical criticism, certainly Julia Kristeva has taken his ideas on intertexuality, . . but missiology . . . i just dont know and the internet is not cooperating. And unfortunately, i dont know of an expert that could help either, although i am sure there must be some.
    If it’s any help, Bakhtin gets a mention in the Postmodern Bible (pg 130) and the Postmodern bible Reader (page 92) and a helpful book on his thoughts is “Education and Civic Culture in Post-Communist Countries” by Stephen Webber and Ilkka Liikanen (which you have probably read)
    Why dont you just go ahead and beocme the expert for us – when you write something, post it online and let us know.
    Where in Russia are you?

  • BLT says:

    Just curious if you can give a link or something to get more info on that pilgrimage. Sounds incredible. Just devising a personal “rule” for my life and hoping to make regular pilgrimage a part of it. Spain and Italy have been kind of calling me…but first have to get to India this summer on a specific mission. BLT

  • Andrew says:

    The link in the post is OK – it will lead you on to other links.
    But the really big deal is your trip to India – it will be a pilgrimage if you make it one. Luke 10 is a great guide (leave your bag at home, eat with people, etc)
    Have you thought of publishing your journey and discoveries online on your blog? Let me know. Maybe we should have a listing of all the summer pilgrims . . and offer a RSS feed so that we could all keep track of you. Yeahhh.

  • BLT says:

    I have no idea what an RSS feed is but I love the idea of having a listing of all the summer pilgrimages… if you do it, please let me know.
    🙂

  • Greg says:

    Ok, I’m going to throw something out here:
    Pilgrimage to Canterbury, 2005…2006?
    “In April, when the sweet showers fall and feed the roots in the earth, the flowers begin to bloom. The soft wind blows from the west and the young sun rises in the sky. The small birds sing in the green forests. Then people want to go on pilgrimages. From every part of England, they go to Canterbury…”
    (from the Prologue of Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales”)
    O the route from the Tabard Inn to the Canterbury Cathedral…Southwark, St. Thomas a Watering, Blackheath, Bexley Heath, Dartford, Gravesend, Strood, Rochester, Newington, Sittingbourne, Ospringe, Boughton, Harbledown, and finally Canterbury…
    O the stories to be shar’d in a digital age…walking, riding, moblogging…
    O the laughter, mirth and camraderie to be had by those souls on pilgrimage…
    O our kind host the tallskinnykiwi, towing family and friends…
    “I’d spoken to them all upon the trip
    And was soon one with them in fellowship,
    Pledged to rise early and take the way
    To Canterbury as you heard me say.”
    (from the Prologue)
    Anyone up for it? Hosting it…?

  • Lisa says:

    I walked the Camino in 1999 and would be happy to chat about it if people have specific questions. Just email me at this email.
    Lisa

  • Bart says:

    I spent last fall working in Santiago, but not with the IT group specifically. I got to know them pretty well, and I definately have to recommend dropping in on them. Tell them I sent you and they’ll either kick you out or give you a free coffee. 🙂

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