Peregrinos, Pèlerins, Pilgrims

In Northern Spain and over the Pyrenees into France, we passed hundreds of pilgrims. Our route ran along the Camino de Campostela, a famed pilgrimage path that ends in Santiago, Spain. Of these hundreds of pilgrims (peregrinos, in Spain; pèlerins, in France), many of them sat on the side of the road or in church squares, rubbing and bandaging their sore feet. As would happen to many of us on a ten-week trek, their bodies suffered.

Seeing them, I asked myself if they can take a car, bus, or train if they need to. Or are such shortcuts, such conveniences, such avoidances, antithetical to the spiritual pilgrimage?

This question turned over in my mind as my legs turned the pedals. I slowly uncovered the premise of this question: that pilgrimage specifically, and the spiritual path more generally, must involve some suffering. The spiritual journey requires us to overcome our self-interested comforts and small-minded habits. But exactly how much pain, suffering, and inconvenience must one endure?

Thomas Merton and monks of all traditions live the “via negativa,” radically saying “no” to all that cannot be sacralized. They forgo ‘normal' habits in order to join something greater. A pilgrimage has some of this logic: walking for weeks on end along the same trail that monks have walked for thousands of years is a spiritual departure from one’s quotidian life. A departure that has discomfort, but also joy, companionship, and participation in history.

Seeing the pilgrims suffering, if only over temporary blisters, I thought of our pilgrimage. We are on a pilgrimage, too: one exploring what love and marriage is all about. And like the pilgrims on the Camino de Campostela, ours is a very physical journey.

The physical intensity brings me back to my question: in my attempt to go beyond myself and participate in something greater, how hard must I push myself out of convenience and comfort? What is the appropriately flexible sway between self-flagellation and a cowardly retreat into habit? Is the point of bleeding blisters and knee injuries necessary?

These questions spun like my wheels down the other side of a mountain pass. 

Spinning this inquiry around, I came to see that I do relish the physical challenge and the extreme nature of our journey. I believe that a spiritual pilgrimage and the path of questioning the status quo requires effort and a willingness to be uncomfortable as I loosen up on my fixed ideas. At the same time, however, it doesn’t feel helpful to go “beyond myself” with grim determination or self-flagellating physicality that makes no room for the heart’s wandering. 

And because this tour is about marriage and lasting partnership, the metaphor of a grim, white-knuckled pilgrimage just doesn’t hold up. I don’t want the tenor of our marriage to be one of blindly striving after extremes and suffering for it—that is not the type of goal I wish for us to accomplish together.

What I do want for us is to keep learning, challenging our assumptions both physically and spiritually, and going beyond ourselves into new discoveries. And I want to have fun doing it! As Father Tom Weston says at the beginning of all his retreats: “Easy does this. Easy does this….” Our pilgrimage continues!