Just Want to Party!

[Jeffrey Crawley]

That's a point of view, Daniel.

But surely LIFE is a sacred place full of literally millions of people's
hopes, dreams, questions, pain, epiphanies, growth.

The Camino (and life) is also a living, breathing place full kind, generous
and vibrant people.

I often wonder why the inside of 'established' churches (Roman Catholic and
Protestant) are so often a solemn and dreary place to worship compared to
the more modern, lively services in, say, a West Indian Baptist church.
Could it be that tradition has isolated them from the realities of life?

Some of the warmest, helpful and most vibrant people you can meet are the
parish priests and brothers along the Camino, struggling to maintain a
church with an aging congregation that would only be 4 or 5 strong if it
were not for the pilgrims. And not adverse to sharing a copa or two with
their transient flock.

I'm sure if God have not wanted us to enjoy ourselves He wouldn't have given
us the power of laughter which often succeeds even when faith waivers.

Certainly we don't want the money changers returning to the temple but not
everybody would want a life of sack cloth and ashes - certainly not the
hoards of energetic young Spaniards who flood the Camino in early July. And
surely it would be some kind of sin not to celebrate the end of the Camino
with your own 'last supper' in the company of the friends and companions who
have helped and shared so much with you over so long a distance?

'Enjoy' the Camino in your own fashion, Daniel but don't disparage those who
celebrate in a different way either.

If you think that pilgrimages have always been/should always be such a
solemn event try reading Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales - but then
again perhaps not.

Here endeth the sermon.

Jeffrey

-----Original Message-----
From: Daniel De Kay [mailto:dandekayaSBCGLOBAL.NET]
Sent: 05 March 2003 23:18
To: GOCAMINO
Subject: RE: Just Want to Party!


If you want to walk, party, and drink lots of wine then go somewhere else.
The Camino is a sacred place full of literally millions of people´s hopes,
dreams, questions, pain, epiphanies, growth.  Treat it as you would a holy
place for it is indeed a living church made of the souls of people from all
the world.