And on the seventh day God rested, evening and morning of the seventh day. It is my seventh day and I am resting. Good enough for God: good enough for me! I have walked 137 km in 6 days, not quite the pace I was hoping for, but good enough. It's the hills that slow me down; some are so steep that I am reduced to a crawl....
May 26. One year ago, to the day, I began my remote preparations for walking the Camino de Santiago. Now, after a couple of thousand kilometres of walking, several hundred hours of exercising in the gym, careful gathering of materials, clothing, and equipment, it's time to go. On May 30, I will go to Madrid, then on to Roncesvalles the next day, to begin the walk on Saturday, June 1....
I arrived in Santiago de Compostella yesterday, May 21, around 11am, on day 29 of my 750km journey. I made short work of the final 20km because I wanted to make sure I arrived in plenty of time for the daily Pilgrim's Mass at noon. In spite if the quickened pace, gone was the sense of physical fatigue that often accompanied the moments of arrival. First, I was elated to be done and second the body and spirit were definitely tuned differently than they had been a short month ago. The sense of elation of the moment was augmented by an atmosphere of solidarity with the many, many familiar faces of fellow pilgrims with whom I had shared the journey. Some had walked a shorter distance, for a week or less. Others had begun the walk long before I had and from much farther away than my 750km. No matter, the common sentiment was that this was not a group of tourists come to visit a beautiful old city....
The past number of days have been the most picturesque of the entire Camino. The walk from the medieval city of Léon towards Galicia takes one through fields of wheat and barley, vineyards and orchards, all with a backdrop of snow capped mountains. Eventually, the route climbs up to about 1500 metres, to the famous Cruz de Ferro, where thousands of pilgrims have placed a stone which symbolizes their personal journey, a desire or a petition....
It was in the summer of 1963 that I pulled off my novitiate caper. We were in the midst of our summer holiday. The novice master, Fr. Len Fischer--who would later work with me in Northern Ontario--was away for his holiday too. I approached the prison chaplain, Fr. Charlie Carroll, and suggested that we could field a ball team and challenge the inmates to a game--on their turf of course. And so it happened that one evening a paddy wagon arrived at our door and whisked our makeshift team to prison. The stands surrounding the prison ball field were packed with their fellow-prisoners. We had two fans--Fr. Redden a former lawyer, and the prison chaplain....
It seems strange to think that there are just over ten days left, or about 250km, on this journey that was little more than a dream a few short months ago. These are my thoughts as I lie in my dorm bed musing on the fairly lackluster day - soft rain, a few conversations with walking companions, a relaxing afternoon of resting and rinsing clothes, a nice meal prepared with a few fellow pilgrims, and an early night....
Honzanas is about 250km into the Camino. It is May 2 and I'm sitting in a tiny albergo ,the name given to the pilgrim dorms that charge 5 euros a night. They are rustic to be sure and one needs to get used to sharing a room with 20 or more people; men and women of all ages....
After three full days of walking, I'm beginning to say that I've found my stride. I know my body a little better; when to slow down, when to take a breather, and when to say 'enough for today Erik'. Day one was a big endurance test: 27 km of mostly a steep climb through foggy and rough terrain and a painful long descent to the first stop at Roncesvalles. This tiny hamlet boasts a lovely early Gothic church, the pilgrims 'albergo' and a few other ancient buildings....
As you wave goodbye to the kids today, staggering under the weight of their 30-pound backpacks, stuffed with textbooks, iPads/ iPhones/iPods, healthy lunch (which they'll pitch as soon as you're not looking and head for the nearest cheeseburger), gym clothes (which are clean for at least one day this year), and various waiver forms, consider the investment that's climbing out of the SUV....
When the Jesuits accepted in 1918 direction of the newly established Campion College in Regina, they had no money whatsoever to run the institution. Everything depended on Thomas J. MacMahon, SJ, the first appointed Rector there. He had to raise the money within a three months' period, and it wasn't easy. He relied on giving retreats, missions, preaching, speeches, and he begged. By late August, he had scraped together barely enough to open the two rented houses on 13th Avenue for classes and for a Jesuit house. Not much fazed him, however, and certainly not the lack of money or the poverty-stricken living-conditions he and his fellow Jesuits shared. In time his fearless determination to make the college a success paid off....
