American Pilgrims on the Camino/Gatherings

[Edie Bennett]

American Pilgrims on the Camino is indeed, as Robert Ward says, "a group who
decided it would be fun to have a big annual get-together of Camino lovers."
And if you read the open letter posted by Kathy Gower recently, it is also a
group who made the appropriate contacts and arrangements to provide
hospitalero training given in the Spanish tradition by qualified Spanish
trainers, a service those of us in N/A would have to travel to Spain to take
advantage of.  It is also a group who made arrangements to offer a spiritual
retreat at the Franciscan retreat center in Santa Barbara for pilgrims who
want to re-connect with the spiritual side of their Camino experience.

On the subject of names, it did indeed occur to us that people outside
"America" would want to join.  People who live in the U.S. encounter a
unique situation when describing our nationality.  We're "Americans" but
America is two vast continents.   We're from the United States but there is
no name for that.  United Staters?  You are right that North America best
describes us.  These are challenging issues that I believe, in time, will be
resolved as we work toward our mission, which is to educate and celebrate
the pilgrim experience for all pilgrims everywhere.

As Robert so nicely put it, "We're all on the same Camino, and we can all be
proud of where we come from."

Peace along your path,
Edie Bennett

----- Original Message -----
From: "Robert Ward" <robertwardaGOSYMPATICO.CA>
To: <GOCAMINOaPETE.URI.EDU>
Sent: Tuesday, December 23, 2003 9:54 AM
Subject: Re: American Pilgrims on the Camino/Gatherings


> Ah, but note that the Little Company of Friends has a maple leaf on its
logo!
>
> I assume you are being facetious (irony being our national forte), but
just in case you aren't I'll point out that the "American Pilgrims on the
Camino" is, as its name suggests, a group of Americans who decided it would
be fun to have a big annual get-together of Camino lovers. It probably never
occurred to them that anyone from outside the States would want to join (and
indeed, at last year's gathering, I was the only Canadian, and non-US
citizen, in the crowd of 80 or so.) My guess is, though, that if droves of
Canadians and Mexicans suddenly started applying for membership, the first
thing these good people would do would be to add "North" before "American."
Until that happens, it's a little presumptuous to ask them to change their
name -- like telling the Camino Association of Burgos that I might join
them, but only if they drop the "Burgos."
>
>