“Yet the Lord pleads with you still: Ask where the good road is, the godly paths you used to walk in, the days of long ago.  Travel there and you will find rest for your souls.”  The Prophet Jeremiah

“We don’t control life, we just do it.” Isla Grace Schelle, age 5

On the return trip from Wisconsin last week I chose a different route.  I went across southern Minnesota and South Dakota, staying overnight in the Bullock Hotel in Deadwood.  You might recognize the name if you watched the HBO series that was popular some years back.  Seth Bullock was the sheriff of Deadwood during the gold rush days of the late 1800’s.  I was told when I checked in that it is haunted, and that room 314, which is the one I was assigned, is purportedly the one with the most paranormal activity.  Nothing happened to me, at least not when it came to ghosts.  But I did enjoy the time walking the cobblestone streets lined with historical markers and taking an early morning trek up to Mt. Moriah, burial site of Wild Bill Hickock and Calamity Jane.  Though I would’ve appreciated spending more time there, I was thankful for the rich and relaxing experience.  I realized, as I drove back toward home, that more than merely a return trip to Wisconsin for a wedding, this had been a mini-pilgrimage.  And as I pondered that, it occurred to me that for me this captures life:  A Pilgrimage.

I believe we are all pilgrims, whether we realize it or not. Our lives are a temporal journey toward an eternal destination.  Could it be that one of the greatest illusions that human beings live under is that of permanency when in truth everything is temporary and we are from the very beginning created for a pilgrimage back to God?  I wonder if this is the reason that so many people love travelling and touring; because we are looking to not only visit or see something else, but to satisfy a sacred longing buried deep in our souls?  St. Augustine summed it up when he said, “My soul will not rest until it rests in Thee.”

Pilgrimage is a recurring theme in the Scriptures.  Adam and Eve are sent out of the garden, Abraham is called away from his home at a very old age, the Israelites wander for forty years, and Jesus’ birth takes place after a pilgrimage of sorts for his parents to Bethlehem.  Jesus Himself was a pilgrim. He had no permanent lodging, saying once that He had no place to lay His head.  He called people to follow Him, and one could say that they were led anywhere and everywhere, never quite sure where they were going, but always headed for home.  It’s fascinating to me that not long after the resurrection of Jesus the temple was destroyed, and St. Paul clearly proclaimed in one of his sermons that God doesn’t live in temples made by hands.  We shouldn’t be surprised that for the first 300 years the followers of Christ didn’t build churches, but instead worshipped in houses and crypts and caves.  They were a people on the move, either intentionally reaching out to others in new places or trying to get away from them by escaping into the dry distances of the desert.

The Celts, as I’ve mentioned before, were a people populated by pilgrims.  It was built into their very fabric even before they experienced the Christian Faith but was certainly perfected afterward.  The Isle of Iona was the sacred site of the pilgrim Columba, and for centuries after even up to the present day pilgrims have continued to follow in his footsteps, washing up on this sacred shore.  Most, maybe all major religions have a strong sense of pilgrimage.  Moslems go to Mecca, Hindus to the Ganges, and the Buddhists—well, they are always going somewhere!  Walking is a central component of their spirituality. Yes, pilgrimage is foundational to any and every faith tradition!

The day after I returned home, In one of life’s many moments of guided serendipity, a friend gave me a book entitled “The Art of Pilgrimage”, which put into words what I was and am feeling in my heart.  It is a delightful book that turns the soil of this sacred concept.  Don’t be surprised if I use it as the basis for future blogs.  But for now let me say that it is a delightful invitation to take a different perspective on travel and trips, seeing them not merely as sightseeing, but sometimes surprisingly as soul-seeking adventures to encounter the sacred. And even more importantly to make life itself a pilgrimage.  To not try and control it, as Isla said, but to just do it. In the words of Joseph Campbell, to follow your bliss.

What is YOUR bliss in life?  How do you view life? Is it a destination?  Or is it a pilgrimage?  And does this pilgrimage really end in death?  Or is this simply another departure, a jumping off point to a new adventure to a distant country, for which our heart has yearned, and is not that far away?

As if to put a punctuation mark on this topic of pilgrimage, I opened my Friday reading from Renovare and discovered that the topic was pilgrimage.  Here is how it concluded:  “In one sense our whole life is a pilgrimage of slowly making our way home to God.  But we also need intentional pilgrimages because journey begets transformation.  This may be as dramatic as a year in Spain, or as simple as spending a day intentionally noticing the sunlight.”