two sides of pilgrimage

[David Hough]

Pieter makes inteeresting points.    One of the first things I did before my
camino was translate a commentary on that subject that I had found on the
web site of the Association Rhone-Alpes des Amis de St Jacques.
The text and translation is at http://camino.oakapple.net/ethique.html

One of the things I got from reading Melczer is that the commercialization of
the pilgrimage dates back probably to before it started!    Relics and
pilgrimages were big business in the middle ages, to the extent that relics
were stolen.    So there's nothing new here.    It was a different pilgrimage
for the rich than the poor, but they almost all spent money.

Most of the local people I met never doubted the religious and spiritual
motivations of the pilgrims, even if they lost patience with them
from time to time
for one reason of another.    Especially in the infrequently traveled parts
of my camino, from Cluny to Le Puy and again via Muxia, where people were
not used to seeing pilgrims, I got two reactions - apprehension about an
unknown foreign man hiking through their village, or enthusiastic gestures
of support from those who understood what was going on.

So just as Santiago has two faces, Santiago Peregrino and Santiago Matamoros
that are part of his historical whole, so the pilgrimage has always had
two faces, spiritual and temporal, and the only thing new is the scale.

I don't know what Monte de Gozo was like before, but I appreciated the
adequate hot water and the well-designed showers that didn't spread water
all over the floor.



As a final note, I continued my camino this weekend in a most wonderful way
by making my Cursillo.    For all those cursillistas here... De Colores!
For those of you making your Cursillo soon, let me know so I can light
a candle for you!

And to all, Ultreya y Suseya!