What AM I looking for? or, "Ditch the plan, Ruth!"

This was one of my favorite songs from growing up:

At least part of the reason why I like the song is that it captures the essence of Wanderlust for me...That elusive feeling that you don't know what it is, but you are missing something.

As I'm about 10 days away from my second Camino, I'm a little perplexed as to why I'm going.  I really don't have any burning questions to ask God, and I don't really have any kind of spiritual or psychological healing that I feel I need.  I'm in my dream job, I'm part of an awesome parish, I get to go to Adoration 2x/ week, and I (and the bank) own my home.  I don't have that feeling of missing something, and honestly, that is something that I tend to feel at the two year mark of any position I've ever been in before.

I can honestly say that I'm content--or maybe blessed and grateful are better terms for what I'm feeling.  Which brings me back to the question, "Why am I going? What am I looking for?"

I know that I've been called to do this Camino, and I AM looking forward to it, even though I know that it won't be anything like the first one. For one, I will be working as I go--I will be teaching all summer long online.  This means that I will be more plugged in to what is going on in the world as well, since I have to stay on top of emails, etc.  I'm also going to be tuned into every little thing my body tells me, and I know that, if my body tells me to, I will be skipping to the end.  I don't anticipate that happening, but it is a possibility.  I also know that, if things go really south, the pilgrim's office in Santiago are always looking for volunteers, so I could very well end up most or part of the summer volunteering until my plane trip home.

Even so, I really wonder what this Camino will be like, and how it will be the same/different from the last one.  Something that many pilgrims say is the phrase, "The Camino Provides."  As a Catholic Christian, I believe that it is God providing what we need through the intercession of St. James, but, based on my experience, those of us who are Christians and doing this as a spiritual exercise are in the minority.  No matter what, you often find yourself at the right place at the right time, and you get exactly what you need to be encouraged/helped/taught along the way.  Also, the lessons you learn may or may not be the ones that you start your trek hoping to learn.

Actually, I suspect that God really wants to teach me about His provision this trip: every time I start to think about where I might want to end my stages or figure out mileage or make sure that I have enough time to finish the full Camino, I feel like the Holy Spirit is whispering in my ear, "Ditch the plan, Ruth. Trust Me."  And, that is why I think that God hasn't laid some burning question on my heart or my mind.  My job is to be open to whatever lesson He wants to teach me.

With that in mind, I'm on the lookout for a short prayer that I can pray daily while on the Camino, and which reflects that openness.  If you have any suggestions, I'm all ears.

And, one good song from my childhood deserves another.  This is also my prayer:

Santiago de Matomoros and Santiago de Peregrino

As I have been reading about the Camino in preparation of going there myself, I found out that there seems to be two basic depictions of Saint James in Spain, and along the Camino particularly.  The first is Santiago de peregrinos, or St. James the pilgrim.  He usually has a floppy hat whose brim is being held up from his face with a scallop shell pin.  He also has a walking stick and a satchel, with a gourd hanging from the walking stick.

This is a statue of St. James found along the Camino.

According to Wikipedia (I know, not the most reliable of sources, but the easiest place to find what I was looking for),  there are several legends that describe why the scallop shell became a symbol of St. James, as well as some practical reasons for pilgrims carrying them:

Version 1: After James' death, his disciples shipped his body to the Iberian Peninsula to be buried in what is now Santiago. Off the coast of Spain, a heavy storm hit the ship, and the body was lost to the ocean. After some time, however, it washed ashore undamaged, covered in scallops.

Version 2: After James' death his body was mysteriously transported by a crew-less ship back to the Iberian Peninsula to be buried in what is now Santiago. As the ship approached land, a wedding was taking place on shore. The young groom was on horseback, and on seeing the ship approaching, his horse got spooked, and horse and rider plunged into the sea. Through miraculous intervention, the horse and rider emerged from the water alive, covered in seashells.

The scallop shell also acts as a metaphor. The grooves in the shell, which meet at a single point, represent the various routes pilgrims traveled, eventually arriving at a single destination: the tomb of James in Santiago de Compostela. The shell is also a metaphor for the pilgrim: As the waves of the ocean wash scallop shells up onto the shores of Galicia, God's hand also guides the pilgrims to Santiago.

The scallop shell also served practical purposes for pilgrims on the Camino de Santiago. The shell was the right size for gathering water to drink or for eating out of as a makeshift bowl.

Personally, the romantic in me likes the second explanation better--who doesn't like a good love story?  However, the real reason is probably more simple than that: shells are ubiquitous on the coast of Northern Spain, and pilgrims used to pick them up and take them home as souvenirs of their travels.  Whatever the reason, I now have my own shell to mark me as a pilgrim, a Peregrina.

I took a shell I picked up from the coast of Denmark when I was an exchange student, added a pin to the back with superglue, and then added the St. James Cross with a red Sharpie.  Except for a mishap with the superglue, I'm pretty proud of this!

Notice the Santiago Cross, though...if you look at it, it looks a little like a stylized sword.  I was talking with a friend who let me borrow a statue of St. James, and because he was carrying a sword, I thought he might be a depiction of Santiago de Matamoros, or St. James the Moor Slayer.  However, my friend said that St. James is often depicted with a sword, since he was beheaded.  

This is my (newly clean) dresser.  I know the picture is a little dark, but I wanted to show the St. James statue where it is currently residing, and I just thought that having the candle lit made it pretty. :-) The other statue there is St. Rita of Cascia, my Patron saint.

When I looked up pictures of Santiago de Matamoros, I realized that this for sure wasn't a depiction of this...

This is Santiago de Matomoros: he is always on a horse that is trampling a Moor while wielding a sword.  This particular statue is on one of the buildings in Burgos, where I will begin my Camino.

In this day and age, seeing St. James depicted as a soldier who is in the process of brutally killing his enemy on the battlefield seems excessive, heinous, ugly...but St. James is the Patron of Spain, and when Spain was fighting for its life in the (about--I'm not sure of the exact dates...) 10th through the 12th centuries against the Moors, seeing St. James as fighting for them must have been very comforting.

And yet, isn't that what all of us are called to be: both pilgrims and soldiers?  Think about it--we here on earth are called the "Church Militant,"  because we are in a spiritual battle, and that means that we have to be willing to strap on our armor and get on with the battle.  Granted, that doesn't mean slaying actual people most of the time, but it does mean that we have to be willing to engage the enemy of our souls.  So, as I leave for pilgrimage (TOMORROW!!!), please pray for me, and don't stop praying.  We will battle together, even as I take this journey that God has placed my feet upon.  And so, as I set my feet on this path, let me leave you with a snippet from one of my favorite Tolkein Poems:

The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way,
Where many paths and errands meet.

The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with weary feet,
Until it joins some larger way,
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.

Blessings,

Ruth