So this one time, I went to Spain....

*In case you don't know what the Camino de Santiago is, I suggest you read this. Even Wikipedia can explain it better than I can!*

Well, it's finally time.

 It's been over two months since I landed back in the states, and nearly three since I finished the most amazing journey of my life: walking the Camino de Santiago, from St. Jean Pied-de-Port in France, all the way to St. James' tomb in Santiago, Spain. To some, it may seem strange that it would take me this long to really talk about it. But unless you've done it, unless you've been there, you don't know how it changes you. You can't put it into words.

Shortly after I returned, I was scheduled to give a talk at the Catholic charismatic prayer group I help to run here in DC, and I was taken aback to find that many people were surprised or disappointed when they found out I was not talking about the Camino. The truth is, I couldn't. I couldn't even explain why I couldn't. For reasons I cannot and will not go into right now, it was impossible for me to process anything that I experienced in Spain right away. As soon as I was back in the states, I had other things to think about, other problems to deal with....problems that I had spent a month on the trail trying to work out in my own head, mostly without success. 

The past two months have been rich with growth and full of excitement, changes, surprises, challenges. Some of it has been unbelievably good...some of it has been unbelievably painful. And through all of the things I have dealt with since coming home--endless job searching, family crises, adjusting to a long-distance relationship, and trying to re-acclimate to life in DC--I have begun to understand what it is that the Lord was showing me through all this time on the Camino. I have begun to understand that he was showing me a truth that I never understood in all the kilometers I trekked over the months of August and September: that life itself is the Camino....that we are all on a journey, a difficult journey, full of unexpected challenges and joys, with one goal. We seek his strength, depend on others, make friends we weren't looking for, and experience beautiful, powerful, incredible things....if we can just take our eyes off the pain and the long, dusty road ahead.

One thing's for sure: no matter why, when or how you do the Camino--and the variations are endless, I assure you--it changes you. And usually, it's for the better. I'm hoping that by sharing it with you, I can understand those changes myself, and maybe help you out on your own Camino.

 

I'll let the Codex Calixtinus close out this first post:

"The pilgrim route is a very good thing, but it is narrow. For the road which leads us to life is narrow; on the other hand, the road which leads to death is broad and spacious. The pilgrim route is for those who are good: it is the lack of vices, the thwarting of the body, the increase of virtues, pardon for sins, sorrow for the penitent, the road of the righteous, love of the saints, faith in the resurrection and the reward of the blessed, a separation from hell, the protection of the heavens. It takes us away from luscious foods, it makes gluttonous fatness vanish, it restrains voluptuousness, constrains the appetites of the flesh which attack the fortress of the soul, cleanses the spirit, leads us to contemplation, humbles the haughty, raises up the lowly, loves poverty. It hates the reproach of those fuelled by greed. It loves, on the other hand, the person who gives to the poor. It rewards those who live simply and do good works; And, on the other hand, it does not pluck those who are stingy and wicked from the claws of sin."

Buen Camino!