May 7, 2024 • 54 mins
In today's episode we continue our discussion of the history of pilgrimage, this time heading over to England. Our guest is Father Philip Connor, a parish priest from Cumbria in the northwest of England. Father is a self-described addict of pilgrimage, and he shares tales of faith and devotion from medieval England to the modern resurgence of pilgrimages. Our paths cross with iconic figures such as St. Thomas Becket, exploring sites like Canterbury and Walsingham, where history and spirituality intertwine.
We also discuss how the English Reformation affected the pilgrimage tradition. As we unravel the centuries-old allure of sacred travels, Father Connor's personal anecdotes reveal how these quests mirror life's broader journey, enriching our daily existence.
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Episode Transcript
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Joan (00:01):
Welcome to In Via, the podcast where we're navigating
the pilgrimage of life.
We are all in via on the wayand we are learning a lot as we
go.
I'm your host, joan Watson.
Join me as we listen to stories, discover travel tips and learn
more about our Catholic faith.
Along the way, we'll see thatif God seeks to meet us in
(00:21):
Jerusalem, rome or Santiago, healso wants to encounter you
right there in your car, on yourrun or in the middle of your
workday.
Welcome back to In Via.
In today's episode we continueour discussion of the history of
pilgrimage, this time headingover to England.
My guest is Father PhilipConnor, a parish priest from
(00:43):
Cumbria in the northwest ofEngland.
We talk about the history ofEnglish pilgrimage, including
Canterbury, thomas a Beckett,walsingham and the Holy Wells,
along with how the Reformationaffected the English pilgrimage
tradition.
Father is a self-describedaddict of pilgrimage, so he
regales us with tales of his ownjourneys and has a lot to teach
(01:04):
us along the way.
So I actually always begin ourconversation just asking.
I usually am very specific andask for three sentences.
If you could tell somebodythree sentences about yourself,
just to kind of make someonereally tell us the highlights.
But, father, do you just wantto introduce yourself and tell
us a little bit about yourself?
Father Conner (01:24):
Yeah, hello, my name's Father Philip Connor.
I'm a parish priest in a placein West Cumbria, which is on the
west coast of England, actuallyjust across the border from
Scotland.
I've been a priest for 18 years.
I have a brother who's also apriest, and three other brothers
(01:45):
and a sister, so that's mybackground.
I spent a lot of my life as apriest, as a pilgrim, moving
from place to place, andcurrently I'm a parish priest,
but before that I was a youthchaplain for the diocese and
worked in the college campusministry.
Yeah, my background my fatherwas in the army, so it's
(02:13):
probably quite a goodpreparation for the priesthood
because you get moved arounddifferent places.
So I don't really have anyroots.
Joan (02:25):
So if you're trying to work out where my English accent
is from.
Father Conner (02:26):
it's a bit of a mixer of everything.
I love it Most of my collegetime.
University was up in Scotland,so I'm a little bit of a mixer.
I think, well, I'm definitelyup to and just yeah, life as a
(02:49):
priest, as a Catholic and as aChristian is fantastic.
Yeah.
Joan (02:55):
It's funny you mentioned the accent, because it was only
really in getting to know peoplevery well that are from England
that I really came toappreciate the differences in
English accents.
Because I think growing up itwas like, oh, you have an
English accent.
And then realizing, and youknow all of our British TV shows
that we consume as Americans,you realize there's a great
nuance and you can just likeAmerica, right, like just like
(03:17):
the United States.
Father Conner (03:17):
You can tell, but you have a mix yes, if in fact,
when I moved up to this part ofEngland, when I first arrived
here, I couldn't understand whatpeople were saying.
So even for an English personit can be quite hard.
The West Gubberin accent it'slike nothing else, and I think
(03:38):
about 10 years ago we had therewas some terrible tragedy in
this part of the world and itwas on the national news.
They actually had to subtitlewhat the locals were saying
because just the vocabulary andthe language is different.
This part of England has beeninfluenced by, I think, a lot of
Nordic and Icelandic peoplesthrough the course of history.
(04:03):
We're very different.
There are Vikings up here.
That's fabulous, and maybebecause it's so far away from
places like London and stuff andbehind the mountains it sort of
cuts off.
It's a very distant part of thecountry.
Joan (04:20):
There are probably some similarities to the deep south
in the United States wherethere's other woods for things.
And you go and you're like areyou speaking English too?
I thought I was speakingEnglish and so I love it.
I love, like love, thinkingabout linguistics in that way,
(04:45):
about pilgrimage, not just, youknow, actual pilgrimages that we
take walking, but also thepilgrimage of life and the
lessons learned.
But why?
Why do you think pilgrimage issuch an important part of so
many religions?
I mean, we see it obviously inChristianity that's what we're
here to talk about but it's notjust a Christian phenomenon.
We see it, you know, in Mecca,and why do you think there's
(05:05):
that pull of the heart, I guess,and maybe that gives the answer
away.
But why do you think christian?
Why do you think pilgrimage ispart of so many religions?
Father Conner (05:13):
yeah, I I think sometimes it's really hard to
get our hands around lifebecause right in the middle of
it and we don't it's just toomuch, we, we don't have any
sense of perspective.
So a little bit like a retreat.
When you go on a retreat, youstep out of your normal everyday
life and you see things in anew light and and I think
(05:36):
pilgrimage is just an extensionof that sense that actually we
step out of our normal everydaylife, you begin to see your
whole life in a new perspectiveand in this sense it provides a
sort of miniature version ofyour whole life, because there's
a beginning and there's an endand it provides something, a way
(05:59):
of understanding your life, allof the ups and downs, the
difficult times, the struggles,the wonderful people that you
meet.
So it's a very intense and verypersonal experience of life and
I think if you live thatexperience, it then transforms
(06:22):
the way in which you approachyour whole life when you get
back home.
Does that make sense.
Yeah, I think.
The other thing I'm reallynoticing, and certainly in this
part of the world, thatpilgrimage is having a massive
comeback at the moment.
People are having been lost forcenturies.
It seems to be beingresurrected.
(06:44):
Having been lost for centuries,it seems to be being
resurrected and not just fromthe faithful, but all sorts of
people are discovering it forall sorts of different reasons.
Someone said I was walking inthe route through Spain.
It says not everyone begins thepilgrimage as a pilgrim,
(07:05):
because everyone ends as apilgrim.
And so I think it sort of shakesus all down you know and sort
of helps you to work out what'sreal and what's not, what we can
get rid of and what is actuallyessential to us.
It gives us a sort ofdestination and a focus for life
(07:29):
.
And the other thing which I canjust share and this was a
beautiful insight and I didn'tknow what it meant, but when I
set off on that route throughSpain, we met someone who had
walked the Camino de Santiagosix times, you know, when we
were just struggling on ourfirst day, it made our jaws drop
to think that someone hadactually done the whole thing
six days, six times.
(07:51):
But he spoke to us and I alwaysremember his words were just
full of wisdom.
He said you know, your firstweek on pilgrimage you will
discover that you have a body.
And the second week you beginto listen to your body.
(08:13):
And the third week you willdiscover that your body is a
temple of the Holy Spirit.
I can remember and I've thoughtabout that so many times, and
it's not as if the pilgrimageyou know falls neatly into those
sorts of things, but thoseelements are all there and I
think, particularly in theWestern culture today we live so
(08:34):
much in our heads.
You know, we're always on ourphones, we're watching TV, we're
thinking and talking aboutthings, but we leave our bodies
behind.
In a sense, or they're anaddition to we, or they're a
addition to we, think they're anaddition to who we are, but
actually, as christians, we sayno.
No, the body and soul are one.
We don't separate them out, andI think what pilgrimage is is
(08:57):
helping us to understand this,is to rediscover the truth of
who we are you, you know, bodilyand spiritually you know.
And and also, as I said, givingus a destination and a
direction.
Because people have suchhorizontal lives, we've
forgotten the transcendentaldimension that we're made for
heaven.
You know, we're made.
(09:18):
So I think, in a strange way, Ithink the Holy Spirit is using
pilgrimage today to wake up someof these things in us.
Joan (09:25):
Yeah, yeah, I was talking to a friend the other day and
actually we've talked about onthis podcast, about how it's
hard for us to be uncomfortableto be taken out of our comfort
zones unless we go on pilgrimage.
He had walked the.
Camino and he said you know it's, it's too easy to live the
comfortable life.
You actually have to go to seekthis, to actually find that,
(09:46):
that union of body and soul, andto recognize these things we
have to be shaken out of ourcomfort zone and I think it's
hard to convince somebodysometimes to do that.
Who is very comfortable, who'snot searching you know, you see
this influx of people on theCamino who aren't religious but
are searching, and they probablyhave a better chance of finding
the answer than the comfortablecatholic who's just living.
(10:08):
You know, oh well, I go to masson sunday and I'm fine like no.
You need to be shaken out of ittoo.
You need to be shaken out ofthis comfort and you need to
start searching.
But how, you know, how do youconvince somebody they need to
go suffer, to, uh, to answer thecall to pilgrimage, you know?
Father Conner (10:23):
but I think you'd have to think of a different
marketing tactic.
You know, come and have somesuffering, it will do you some
good, you don't sell a lot ofpilgrimages that way.
But it's not.
I mean, I've never thought ofit.
You know, occasionally you geta blister or your legs are tied
and things like this, but thesuffering is, that's not the
(10:48):
point of it, right?
Yeah, you know, and I and I,and I think that may happen and
it does happen, and um, but you,you, you discover so much um
which, yeah, you're not gonna,you're not gonna discover by
just sitting on your sofa athome and your couch.
You know, and um, and I wouldeven say there is a difference,
(11:11):
because I used to take a lot ofyoung people to lourdes in the
south of france and differentpilgrimage places would jump on
a bus and or, or sometimespeople would fly to it and then
they'd have this experience.
I think they all had wonderfulexperiences, they loved it, but
there's a difference.
I would almost call that likereligious tourism.
(11:31):
You know where you go, you stayin a nice hotel and
everything's provided, there's anice routine and things.
But, as you said, one of thethings about pilgrimage is that
you might have your idea howit's all going to be, but you'll
discover pretty quickly, maybeon day one or day two or, if not
, definitely by day three, thatthat your version of how it's
(11:55):
going to be just won't work,because all the things which we
think are important, actuallywhen you become a pilgrim you
realize actually they're notimportant, those aren't the
significant things.
And so this sort of revolutionhas to take place, and that's
why it's such a powerfulexperience.
(12:17):
You know, in a sense we aredismantled and then rebuilt, and
it is.
We are dismantled and thenrebuilt, and it is okay.
If you're going to mention thesuffering, I can't deny that
there's no suffering, but thereis a resurrection as well, and
that's what makes the wholething possible.
And so you begin to choose it.
(12:41):
I actually I think I've probablybecome addicted to it now.
I actually I think I'veprobably become addicted to it
now, but that's what I actuallyfind this.
Why have I got addicted to it?
It's because it's, I know itdoes something really good for
me.
It's pulling me out of myselfand we have very strong
gravitational forces which pullus into ourselves, which close
(13:05):
our walls in on ourselves, whichwhich seek for comfort, and
actually that's not the way tolife.
Joan (13:12):
Yeah, yeah yeah, we have to make our choices.
It is, um, the walkingpilgrimage does bring those
things to the forefront, so muchclearer and quicker than
something like a pilgrimage.
So I do work for a pilgrimagecompany and most of our trips
are more fly to a place, get ona bus, right, and it's
interesting to help the pilgrimson those trips embrace the
(13:36):
pilgrim mentality, because it'sharder to see and it's harder to
experience than when you're ona walking pilgrimage.
The elements are still there,but not to the extremes that
they are, and so you might havesomebody go on one of these
pilgrimages and be unsatisfiedat the end because their bed was
too hard or they were rushedfrom site to site and you're
like, okay, this was apilgrimage, this wasn't a
(13:57):
vacation, and so I think on awalking pilgrimage, all of that
is brought to the forefront somuch clearer because you have to
face it immediately, like yourdays not might not go the way
you want it to go, because it'sraining, for example.
You know there's all theseelements in the walking
pilgrimage.
Um, and I'm I'm anxious to hearyou said you're addicted.
Um, I can't wait to hear aboutmore of the walking pilgrimages
(14:20):
you've done.
We've talked to people about theCamino, and I think that's what
comes to people's minds whenthey hear this idea of walking
pilgrimage.
But, being in England, thereare other pilgrimages and I
think I'd love to talk to youabout Canterbury a little bit
before we get to some of theother ones, because to many
Americans Canterbury Tales is abook we read in high school or
(14:43):
college and there's kind of adisconnect between the idea,
even though it's all aboutpilgrimage.
It is like the pilgrimage tale.
I think sometimes there's adisconnect because maybe we
don't know the story of ThomasBeckett, and so I'd love to know
more about like the Pilgrim'sWay.
And why Canterbury?
Why Thomas?
Where is this in Englishhistory and why is it important?
Father Conner (15:08):
yeah, that's.
Thank you for those questions.
I I think right at thebeginning.
Um, during the medieval times,pilgrimage became massive in
England because part of thereason for that was once the
Crusades began.
In the 11th century, thetraditional places of pilgrimage
(15:30):
would have been to Jerusalem.
And that's what people headedfor.
But once the Crusades began,people had to look for other
places to go to, and that's whySantiago, where the relics of St
James were, became veryimportant.
Or in Scotland there's StAndrews, which was a university
(15:55):
city.
It's a golfing place now, butthat was a great place of
pilgrimage to go to the relicsof saint andrew, which arrived
there in the 12th century fromfrom uh, italy and different
places like that.
So in england, england,medieval times was covered with
thousands of shrines, thousandsof shrines and thousands of of
(16:17):
holy wells like these.
These were deep holy wellswhere people would go in into
the water, bless themselves.
Sometimes they were associatedwith saints, and many of them
still exist.
You have to do a little bit ofresearch because as the layers
of time have gone by, a lot ofthese have got lost from the
(16:38):
public consciousness.
But certainly where my parentslive, in Preston, there's a very
ancient shrine which goes backto the 7th or 8th century,
called Ladywell.
And in the north of Walesthere's another place called
Holywell and it's still fullythere.
You can go to it and there'sthis huge, big, there's this
(16:59):
spring of of water, really quitepowerful, and it comes up out
of the earth and it's allassociated with saint winifred,
who lived in the in the 7th or8th century, and, um, you could
go in and wash it and it's, it'sbeautiful.
So these places were verypopular in the medieval times
and and out of all of the greatshrines in England, I think
(17:22):
people would go to Glastonburybecause that was connected with
the story of a visitor of Josephof Arimathea, who of course, we
know from the Gospels, butthere was always a tradition
that Joseph of Arimathea tookJesus on a trip to England at
one point and there's thatassociation with that.
(17:46):
It's very ancient.
Joan (17:48):
Is that why he shows up in King Arthur?
Is that why he shows up in theHoly Grail?
Exactly, yes, okay, excellent.
Father Conner (17:53):
Yeah, that's the connection, yes, and then, of
course, if we've got time, wecan talk about Walsingham, which
is in Norfolk, and there was anoble woman called Rochelle de
Stavavish and she had this dreamof the Holy House in Nazareth,
(18:18):
and so when she woke up, she wasinspired to build the house of
Nazareth in Walsingham and itbecame known as England's
Nazareth, and kings, even HenryVIII, they went on that, they
walked to these places and theywent on pilgrimage.
But Canterbury in the 12thcentury became one of the
(18:39):
biggest shrines and this was, asyou said, because of St Thomas
the Beckett, but also known asSt Thomas of Canterbury, and so
we have this tradition then.
Joan (18:51):
So everybody's walking everywhere and we remember
Canterbury, perhaps because ofCanterbury Tales, but it wasn't
limited.
It's actually a prettyprevalent desire to go on
pilgrimage throughout England.
Father Conner (19:05):
When you think about even the word.
You say vacation.
We call it holiday and theholiday comes from Holy Day and
if you read the Canterbury Tales, it will speak about the season
of spring is the time ofpilgrimage.
This is when everyone used tojust get up out of their normal
(19:25):
everyday life.
Let's go on pilgrimage, let'smeet some new people, and that's
what the Canterbury Tales isall going on about the
conversations they have and someof it.
You know it's pretty grittystuff but at the end of the day
this is very, very incarnational.
(19:46):
When we think about it, wedon't just walk around with our
hands held together and look allpious and holy.
You know, when Jesus walked onthis earth, he lived a pretty
gritty life, going into the pubsand the taverns, speaking with
the sinners, getting thrown intothis situation, walking across
(20:08):
deserts and meeting all sorts ofpeople demoniacs and
prostitutes and Roman soldiersand I think that's part of the
glory of pilgrimage is that webreak out of that little world.
So if you go to Canterbury, it'sgot a very ancient history in
(20:30):
the sense that it was inCanterbury that St Augustine,
who lived in the 6th century.
He was a Benedictine monk whowas sent by St Gregory the Great
to bring Christianity toEngland and he was welcomed by
(20:52):
the King of Kent and they set upa monastery at Canterbury and
that became the first sort ofEpiscopal see.
So the seat of the bishop, stAugustine, became St Augustine
of Canterbury.
This is became the first bishopthere.
So it was always like thecentre of Christianity in
(21:12):
England.
But with time they built thisgreat cathedral there which is
absolutely awesome.
It's just the mostextraordinary building and
builds.
Yeah, I mean you just have tovisit these cathedrals in
(21:34):
Britain to see how people I meansome of these cathedrals were
built over the course of 100years, so the people who were
building it at the beginningnever saw the end of it.
But they had this sense thatthey were building something of
the kingdom of God in the midstof people and it really was.
(21:54):
The intention was that when youenter into these buildings you
are entering into heaven, and sotoday they're pretty stripped
back.
I mean they're still absolutelyawesome, but in the medieval
times they would have beencovered with frescoes and paints
and different patterns andstatues and and it was the sense
(22:15):
of you'd come in from your long, long pilgrimage, your
intentions, which you werecarrying in your heart and you
would approach the altar and youwould approach the shrine of
the saints and things like this,and it was this sense of heaven
and earth being united, youknow, with the singing, the
music, the sense of majesty andgrandeur and things like this.
(22:38):
So they were great high pointsfor people's lives.
It's yeah, and I'm trying tothink well, do you want me to
share a little bit about StThomas of Canterbury himself?
Sure, yes, yeah, that would begreat, was Canterbury.
Joan (22:55):
Was it a place of pilgrimage before Thomas, or do
you think it was just the centerof Christianity in England?
Father Conner (23:04):
No, I think St Thomas actually made it Okay,
but I think because it was thefirst sea, yeah, like St
Canterbury and York in the northof England were the two big
ecclesiastical centers, okay,yeah, yeah, I think I think they
(23:27):
were.
Basically they governed thechurch throughout the kingdom,
those two big places, one in thenorth, one in the south.
So St Thomas Becket well, youcan tell from his name that he,
you know, at this time ofBritish English history that
Normandy, in the north of France, was very much part, well, at
(23:48):
least linked, associated withEngland.
You know there's a lot ofcrossover.
Remember, william the Conquerorwas Norman, and so the
boundaries which we think of nowas England and that's France,
it wasn't quite thatstraightforward at that time.
These boundaries have changedquite a bit through the course
of history.
But St Thomas the Becket wasactually, I think, from a fairly
(24:12):
middle class, middle ranking,but he was noticed as having
particular skills by the bishopsor the ecclesiastical sort of
set up in London and things likethis, and he was introduced to
(24:33):
Henry II's court and he was seenas a great fixer, a political
fixer, and I think Henry IIthought, yeah, they used to love
going out, drinking and havingwild times together and stuff
like this.
And so when Henry II becameking, he thought, right, I know
(24:54):
what I'm going to do, I'm goingto make my friend Thomas
Archbishop.
And at this point he wasn'teven ordained, thomas, wow, he
was just.
He'd been trained up in thechurch by the great churchmen at
the time, but he was apolitician, okay, you know.
So he was quickly ordained andmade Archbishop and things.
(25:16):
And Henry II got a bit of ashock, because it's questionable
, I don't know how much of aconversion Henry had at that,
sorry, thomas had at that point.
But he, he obviously understoodthat he had different
responsibilities.
He wasn't just there to be theking's like rubber stamp,
(25:37):
everything the king did.
And, um, he, he now was in asense speaking on the behalf of
the church and and of god, andand he realized actually he,
having having attacked thechurch's privileges as a
politician, now as a church man,he began to realize, no, I, I
have to protect the church.
That has to be some sort of ofcan't just let Henry II be a
(26:01):
tyrant and just overruleeverything.
So I think that's where thetensions began.
Their friendship became alittle bit taut.
It became difficult, a bitstressed, there were different
efforts to try and help thechurch and the state to work
(26:24):
better together with each other,but it never seemed to work.
Thomas the Becket was exiled atsome point for I don't know
several years.
He lived in the north of France, he was protected and
eventually he came back toEngland and I think things
calmed down a bit.
(26:44):
But of course it wasn't longbefore the tensions grew up
again.
And I think there's that famousline which, if you read, I think
is it TS Eliot's Murder in theCathedral.
You know, there's that greataccount of just Henry II's
exasperation, just overspillingand saying who will rid me of
this turbulent priest?
And those four knights thinkthat they're doing the king a
(27:10):
great favour and actually takehim at his word.
They hunt Thomas of Canterburyin the cathedral and I think
it's yeah, it's just at the endof December, isn't it?
And he's about to celebrateevening prayer and things and
(27:30):
he's knocked to the ground andthere's a bit of scuffle and
things like this.
But I think when you read theaccounts and what historical
information we have, it wasreally.
I mean, if you look at him as a, where was his sanctity coming
from, I think in the last fewmonths of his life, thomas
understood that actually, goingback to Canterbury, his days
(27:54):
were numbered and I think it'samazing and you find this on a
pilgrimage Actually your wholelife could come into focus in a
very, very short amount of time,and I think there's a lot which
is contradictory in thomasbeckett's life.
But in the last few weeks,months, you know his prayer and
(28:15):
his, his sort of centering ofhis life upon christ and his
surrender of his life to christ.
This is really what puts him ina place so that when his
martyrdom comes it is out oflove for the church, but also,
you know, a total surrender ofhimself to Christ, and I think
that's there's somethingwonderful about him.
He's not a papy maché saint.
(28:37):
He's quite, as I say,contradictory as a character.
Joan (28:43):
I love saints like that that I can actually I can find
myself in because I strugglemyself right and we all do.
Our life is a pilgrimage andsometimes we get off the path,
sometimes we're walking on thewrong path, right.
And so I love when saintsreflect that that they're not
these completely pious all thetime, never but that they
(29:03):
struggle being true and it's howthey ultimately choose for
Christ.
That's right At the end, youknow, and I think the
juxtaposition of him dying inthe cathedral, which should have
given him sanctuary, we don'tthink of I mean, especially in
America, we don't think of thisidea of sanctuary in churches.
But you should have been ableto find sanctuary in the church
and been freed from politicalpower, right.
(29:25):
And he actually dies, showingthat when he took on that role
as Bishop he wasn't, there wasno sanctuary in that, right.
He was actually taking on avery difficult position where he
was going to have to contradicthis friend and and put his life
on the line.
And he doesn't even findsanctuary in the building of the
church, but he's killed rightthere.
Father Conner (29:45):
That's right.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I think after his murder,actually the whole country was
in a state of shock.
I think Henry was in a state ofshock and he regretted it.
You know he did penance for itand things like this and things
like this, but there was thisimmediate outpouring of well,
(30:10):
public acclamation of ThomasBeckett's holiness or sanctity,
and so it wasn't long after thatthat he was canonized.
And then you get all thecharacters which we meet on the
(30:30):
Canterbury Tales appearing andwanting to touch something of
his tomb and to come in to youknow, to reach out to a saint,
you know.
And so what you get along allthese pilgrimage routes, is it
little brass or metal medallionsand pilgrimage crosses and
(30:53):
things like that are created andpilgrimage routes begin to be
established.
Joan (31:01):
I love that incarnational, like we want something, we want
to touch something.
We need these examples in ourlife of holiness we're going to
take this incarnational walk tolike.
there's so much in the Catholicsacramental worldview that's
present in pilgrimage and I'mgoing to limit it to not.
How does the Reformation affectall of this?
(31:21):
Because I know it means theclosing of churches and
monasteries.
But how would you say theReformation affects this
practice of pilgrimage, when Ithink we could falsely see it as
earning our way to heaven or,you know, working.
And so it seems that in theReformation, pilgrimage would be
(31:44):
looked down upon because itseems to be a work.
Reformation, pilgrimage wouldbe looked down upon because it
seems to be a work.
But is that the case?
How do the post-Reformationyears look in terms of
pilgrimage?
Do we still see, I mean I knowWalsingham, for example, becomes
an Anglican shrine, so there'ssome practical results, but do
we also see the waning ofpilgrimage in practice?
Father Conner (32:07):
Well, actually even Walsingham.
It's only in the 19th centurythat it's been rediscovered as a
shrine amongst Africans.
So at the time of theReformation everything was
destroyed, everything, all themonasteries, the Holy House, it
was absolutely destroyed.
(32:28):
And I think the great shrines,let's say, durham Cathedral had
the tomb of St Cuthbert,westminster Abbey had the tomb
of St Edward the Confessor, Idon't know like Canterbury had
(32:51):
Thomas Becket, but a lot ofthese tombs were opened up and
they were in some cases, in someplaces, the relics and things
were all just thrown out.
And just you know.
But you know there were a lotof people who didn't.
This was, I think they're sortof ardent, sort of iconoclasts
(33:14):
and people who wanted to destroyall of this.
They were actually a very smallminority of people and there
were lots of holy people whowere just absolutely scandalized
and shocked, absolutelyscandalized and shocked, and so
I think a lot of the holy thingsand relics and statues and
(33:35):
paintings they were hidden away.
They were taken away and hiddenin places until time eased up a
bit.
So, yeah, there was a massivedisruption.
You couldn't have publicpilgrimages and things like this
.
Um, however I think you know itwasn't, as if one day england
(33:56):
was all catholic and the nextday was, it became like ultra
calvinist and and just totallyeven if, even Even through all
of the centuries, there was alot, you know, which I think a
lot of people still had, thesedeep oceans and things like this
(34:16):
.
And so we know, for example,holywell, which is in the north
of Wales, it's one of those holywells, wales, it's a um, one of
those holy wells, it's it.
You know there were Catholicsgoing there all of the time and
the, the police authorities,they couldn't stop it.
You know, and we know lots ofJesuit priests and missionary
(34:37):
priests were going andcelebrating mass in these places
secretly and things like this.
So in, in a sense, these thingsnever stopped the public, sort
of big jamboree, pilgrimages andthings, that's all finished.
But quite the other peoplefound pilgrimages and because I
(34:59):
mean a lot of people would havedone made their own quiet
journeys to Rome and places likethis.
So the practice of pilgrimagecontinued.
Interestingly, when I walked toCanterbury the main route is
from London to Canterbury Iactually walked from Winchester,
which is an Anglo-Saxoncathedral town, to Canterbury
(35:23):
and we hadn't even planned towalk that pilgrimage route.
But it was the time when therewas a big volcanic ash cloud
which was flying, which wasfilled the atmosphere around
Iceland, and they and no planescould take off.
So we had been planning to walkin the Santiago to Compostela
and we couldn't do it anymore.
(35:44):
And so we were sitting at homethinking I was with my brother
and I was thinking, well, whatshould we do?
This is our.
And so we were sitting at homethinking I was with my brother
and I was thinking, well, whatshould we do?
This is our holiday time, wewant to go on pilgrimage.
So we just went down toWinchester, we bought a few maps
, we had our rucksacks with oursleeping bags, and this is a
great thing about pilgrimage isyou don't need anything.
Once we had two or three mapswhich would cover basically the
(36:07):
150 miles we had to walk.
We just set off.
We didn't know where we weregoing to eat, we didn't know
where we were going to slay, wedidn't know anything about the
route and we just set off and wefound out quite quickly.
We found out quite quickly andthis is why I'm saying about
(36:28):
these ancient pilgrimage routesbecause, little by little, just
tiny little indications here andthere we became aware that we
were walking on ancientpilgrimage routes.
So you could find little streetnames in the countryside
Pilgrim's Way or things likethis, or little crosses hidden
in the undergrowth and thingslike this which were from
(36:49):
different times, or the names ofthe pubs were.
They still hadn't changed thenames of the pubs from the
medieval times.
And so when you're walking,because you're going slower, you
begin to notice things.
And we became aware that,although that is not an official
pilgrimage route at the moment,we felt as if we were, you
(37:12):
could sense it, that we werewalking in the footsteps of
other pilgrims who trampled onthat route.
A wonderful experience, becausewe didn't stay in any hotels or
there's no, no hostels or youthhostels along the way or
(37:33):
anything.
So what we used to do is wefound a lot of these anglican
churches, which all used to becatholic churches.
They had lovely porchways, youknow, and there was just enough
room.
You could get two sleeping bagsin them and we slept in their
porchways at different churchesalong the way.
And most of those churchyardshave a tap, and you know.
(38:03):
So we always felt that if wehad shelter and we had water,
you know, because there wasalways a tap so that people
could water their plants in thecemetery and things like this.
So most nights we were actuallysleeping in graveyards or in
the porchways of churches.
But it was a wonderfulexperience and it made me
realize that you don't needanything complicated.
(38:23):
You know, and sometimes we gotlost and um but but I think
because we didn't plan it muchand because we didn't know what
was happening and it wasn't inour plan, we became very
sensitive to the presence of thelord and jesus just just
(38:44):
walking around, and some of theencounters that we had.
I mean, the first person we meton that walk, it was a little
boy actually.
We were helping him to get hisbike over the fence and we met
his parents and we said, oh,what's your name?
(39:05):
And he said Santiago.
Wow, and that's where we wereplanning to have gone and we
were feeling disappointedbecause we weren't going to
Santiago and the first person wemeet is called Santiago.
I mean, we met his, the family,we we met later on in the pub.
We were just going to drop inand have a nice pint before
finding somewhere to camp andactually they invited us to come
(39:27):
and sit next to them and we sataround and had a meal together
and then they took us back totheir home that night and we had
such a.
It was such a good beginning tothat pilgrimage and after that
we felt, no, we're on the righttracks.
This is, we're just really opento what happens and, honestly,
(39:48):
you meet angels.
You meet angels on theseexperiences, when you, when you
stop over planning andoverthinking and just just try
and live and be present to whatis before you you.
You realize that god has hisplans and his, his, his.
What he desires to give us isso much more than what we could
(40:10):
think or imagine or plan forourselves.
So there's a big element oftrust.
Joan (40:16):
So you relied like that reliance on the Lord that's, I
mean, that's a huge lesson forour life, right, and we can be
so comfortable in our dailylives that we forget we're
relying on the Lord unlesssomething's taken away from us.
But you, that very first day,the Lord, I, you know I've got
your back.
You didn't go to Santiago.
In a way, santiago came to youin this form of this little boy
(40:39):
right and the.
Lord was going to take care ofyou.
I also thought, when you talkedabout slowing down and noticing
things because you would slowdown that how pilgrimage teaches
us to be in the present moment,which can be so difficult in
our everyday life, but to reallylive in the present moment, to
think about the step that'sright in front of us and to open
(41:00):
our eyes and see and hearthings that we would miss when
we were thinking about the next.
You know, a year from now, oryou know, like so often, we're
living in the future rather thanin the present moment.
That's a really powerful lessonof pilgrimage yeah yeah, yeah,
absolutely.
Father Conner (41:18):
I think that's one of my big lessons, because
I'm definitely one of thesepeople who prefer to have things
organized.
If I could just share thislittle experience.
It was actually on the route toSantiago de Compostela.
(41:39):
Again, I was with my brotherand we arrived in Pamplona and I
don't think we were in a good.
We weren't in a good way at all.
We had begun the pilgrimagesleeping in ditches and the rain
was pouring down at night andwe got soaked, we were tired and
I don't it.
Just it wasn't good.
(42:02):
But I was looking forward toarriving in Pamplona, because I
know it's a beautiful city.
It's got a fantastic history.
It was a place where SaintIgnatius of Loyola had his leg
blown off and there were so manythings I wanted to visit.
And I can remember going intothe hostel and going to have a
shower.
I thought, oh, that's so nicehaving a shower.
But whilst I was in the shower,my brother.
(42:24):
He thought, well, he was doinga good deed.
He got all my clothes and hewent and put them into the
washing machine, which was great, very nice, yeah.
But I came out.
I didn't have any clothes towear.
But I came out I didn't haveany clothes to wear.
(42:44):
And just at that moment in thehostel because they're often
mixed dormitories in thesehostels all of these very nice
French women all turned up, andthey were about six or seven.
I thought I was reallyself-conscious.
I jumped into my sleeping bagand I was just like, but I was
fuming, I was so angry inside.
You know that, because therewas my opportunity to visit the
(43:07):
city it's gone.
I had to stay stuck in mysleeping bag.
I felt.
I felt anyway.
But you know, when I waslooking back and it was later on
the evening there's a fewawkward hours when I did get my
clothes back, you know, I beganto laugh about it because that
(43:27):
was a moment which somethinginside me broke, because there
was me thinking I'm going tohave this pilgrimage all in the
perfect way.
And I've spoken to a lot ofpilgrims and they say, somehow
it happens to everyone.
You, you have to get to thatbreaking point, you know, and um
, but then it allows somethingwonderful to happen.
(43:49):
Um, and I, I was thinking of anexample of that and you
remember, with saint francis ofassisi, when he's had this great
conversion and he was from apretty wealthy background and
stuff, and his dad is absolutelylike furious with him that he's
, he's had this religious turnin his life and and he says, dad
(44:13):
, you know I love you andeverything, but you can have
everything.
I know you've given me allthese nice clothes, but you them
.
And he just took off all hisclothes in the middle of the
public square and he was totallyfree, he didn't need anything.
And the bishop was scandalizedand, of course, covered him up
and things like this.
Joan (44:33):
St.
Father Conner (44:33):
Francis, but I thought that was my St Francis
moment in a sense.
I thought that was my StFrancis moment.
In a sense.
It was a moment of somethingbroken me and I thought, oh, I
don't need any of this anymoreand I was able to leave it all
behind and the rest of thatpilgrimage and in fact, all my
(44:54):
years of doing pilgrimages sincethen, something has changed.
You know, I don't I try not toover plan, I just try and go.
Simply, I thinned out myrucksack to just like five or
six kilos, and that includes mymask kit, so it's just bare
minimum, and I've met so manyother pilgrims who have done
(45:15):
that.
There was a guy walking thewhole way from Belgium, all the
way through France into Spain,and he said he didn't have a
penny with him, he didn't bringany money, and he said he'd been
walking for when we had met himfor two and a half months and
every single day he had had ameal.
Wow, you think, well, how doesthat happen?
(45:37):
You know, yeah, so just theopportunity to trust in
providence and to know actually,god is a father who provides,
who, who gives us everything weneed I mean even jesus, you, you
see, when he he saw the fivethousand and they saw how hungry
they were and and things, hedidn't just leave them, he fed
(45:58):
them, them.
So it does give you a wonderfulsense of the providence of God.
And I'll just give one otherstory which I think you might
like.
It was a very, very hot dayagain on that pilgrimage.
We were exhausted.
You can see me, my brother andmyself, we have our moments, but
(46:21):
we were absolutely exhaustedand it was 38 degrees Celsius.
We'd been walking, I think, along, long, long day and we went
to try and get into the churchand the church was locked
Because in Spain everything,they have siesta, so everything
gets shut, and we wanted to goin the church just because it
(46:42):
would be the one cool place togo and sit and just relax and be
at peace and things.
It was locked and we just satin the town square, absolutely
exhausted, fed up and justthinking this is it.
And then we heard the twoshutters of window above our
head.
We were sitting on a bench openlike that, and out came two ice
(47:05):
cold beers and we thought, oh,my goodness, this is amazing.
You know, they were speaking tothe spanish guy who gave us.
He was an elderly man and weasked him his name and his name
was angel angle.
Joan (47:22):
I like angels that bring beers.
That's like that's a good angel.
I like that's it, that that.
Father Conner (47:27):
So this is what happens on pilgrimage and you
know, I I think we're there's,there's surprises around every
corner.
There's just it's beautiful.
Joan (47:36):
Yeah also that lesson of of accepting help, because I
think some of us have adifficulty asking and accepting,
like allowing people to help us, and so, even whether it's
Santiago's parents letting yousleep, you know at their house
or you know being stripped ofeverything, but being allowed to
let others help us, I thinkthat's an important lesson that
(47:58):
it's hard to learn in oureveryday life of living.
Father Conner (48:01):
Absolutely yeah, yeah.
Joan (48:03):
Well, we probably have to wrap up, but I can't help but
ask.
I think you're about to take apilgrimage because you're
addicted.
There has to be another walkingpilgrimage, Are you?
Father Conner (48:12):
about to do part of the Viyagraha for Jijana.
Yes, that's right, yeah, Shijina, yes, that's right, yeah, so,
um, yeah, so, my, all mysiblings, so, um, the five of us
, we're going to walk a section.
I mean, the whole route isactually from Canterbury to Rome
, okay, so that you need aboutthree months for that.
(48:33):
And, um, in fact, I would say,you know, if you're new to
pilgrimage, you know, just beginin a little way.
You can just start with a oneday or a three day pilgrimage
and just it's OK to and that'show, more or less, I began and
just did it in little sections.
So we're just doing, we'redoing a five or six day section
(48:56):
of the Rio Francigena.
But actually we thought, well,if we only got five or six days,
let's do a nice bit, let's notjust walk across flat French
fields.
So we're going to Tuscany, Ilove it.
So we're flying to Pisa andthen we'll walk from Lucca to
Siena, beautiful, which will bethrough these beautiful places
like San Gimignano and SanMignardo, the land of Chianti,
(49:20):
wine, and yeah, so we're goingto walk that.
And actually, what will bedifferent?
I've often walked with mybrother, who's a friar, but the
three others want to come too.
We just got to a point in lifewhere actually people's
responsibilities and thingsthey've been able to work it so
that we can actually.
(49:41):
So this will be the first timethat we've all been on something
just together and we don't evenhave our mom and dad to sort of
sort out the fights and thatwill be an adventure it will be
an adventure and, and you knowone of my brothers, he wants to
stay in five-star accommodation.
The other one wants to live in ahammock and just hang from the
(50:02):
trees and things like this, andI think I think there's going to
be some interesting uh sort ofdynamics and things like this.
But we're, we'll just see howit goes.
So maybe you can all pray forus and uh, but, um, yeah, so, um
, we're looking forward to that.
That that's in the middle ofMay.
Joan (50:20):
Definitely.
Well, we definitely will bepraying Father Definitely, and
that's a beautiful gift.
It'll be lots of lessonslearned, I think even in the
School of Humanity, probably onthat trip.
I guess I wanted to say, likeone last question before we go
Any recommendations for someonethinking about a walking
pilgrimage?
I know you said just go do it,maybe that's the best
(50:42):
recommendation.
Just start small, but do youhave any other recommendations
for someone?
Father Conner (50:53):
Just to have courage, you know, not to be
afraid.
I think the hardest thing isstepping out of your house and
just saying, right, I'm going,yeah, that that's the biggest,
the biggest thing, you know.
But but if you've got a week,yeah, just take the opportunity
and just say, right, we're goingto do this.
And you know, um, you know, gowith a few friends and things.
(51:19):
You, you know it's, it's, makeit, make it an adventure, you
know, and you, you, you pulleach other through it.
And and, as well, don't beafraid to go lightly.
You know, because I rememberwatching.
There was a one pilgrim fromSouth Korea.
She has state-of-the-art gear,a huge rucksack and she but you
(51:46):
could see her battling andbattling, and battling every day
.
I thought that really is likethe image of misery.
And one day I was sitting in asquare in a village just resting
and I saw her walking throughsquare in a village just resting
.
And I saw her walking throughthe village and then she just
threw her rucksack down.
And it was amazing justwatching her go through her
(52:09):
rucksack and just chuckeverything into the dustbin.
And I tell you, if I wasn't onpilgrimage I would have looked
in that dustbin afterwardsbecause there must have been
some nice equipment, nice thingsin there, but she realized she
didn't need it.
Yeah, um, and so that I thinkthat was her breaking point,
because I saw her a week laterand she was flying and the joy
(52:31):
in her face and you know, andyou think that that that's what
we want.
We want resurrection and wedon't, we don't want to take
things which they're nice, butthey're actually weighing us
down, you know.
So, if you want to receive, ifyou want to to receive something
, you have to be prepared to letgo, and and that's ultimately
(52:53):
what we have to do at the end ofthis earthly life.
So why not get into trainingnow?
You know that's what that'swhat pilgrimage is about.
Is is just just um, learning tolet go a bit, and we let go,
not so that we have emptiness inour life, but so that we can
have fullness.
You know, that's that christ is, is our fullness, and he gives
(53:17):
us everything that we need, andwe are his children.
He will provide for us.
So it, you know, I think it'sthe greatest adventure.
So, um, have courage, don't beafraid.
Um, if it's, don't over plan itand and and just go with the
flow.
It's beautiful to see howdifferent people live the
experience of belgium, whicheveryone, everyone lives it in a
(53:38):
different way.
So don't think, oh, I need todo it like father ph, oh, I need
to do it like Father Philip, orI need to do it like this
person, or that.
Just do it as you can.
It's the same with prayer,isn't it?
We pray as we can, not as wethink we ought to, or should, or
things.
Let's just, let's try to bereal.
Joan (53:54):
Amen.
Well, thank you, Father.
This was great.
Thank Well, thank you, Father.
This was great.
Thank you so much for theconversation.
Thank you, listeners, forlistening and tune in again when
we talk about the pilgrimage oflife on NVEA.
God bless.
Welcome to In Via, the podcast where we're navigating
the pilgrimage of life.
We are all in via on the wayand we are learning a lot as we
go.
I'm your host, joan Watson.
Join me as we listen to stories, discover travel tips and learn
more about our Catholic faith.
Along the way, we'll see thatif God seeks to meet us in
(00:21):
Jerusalem, rome or Santiago, healso wants to encounter you
right there in your car, on yourrun or in the middle of your
workday.
Welcome back to In Via.
In today's episode we continueour discussion of the history of
pilgrimage, this time headingover to England.
My guest is Father PhilipConnor, a parish priest from
(00:43):
Cumbria in the northwest ofEngland.
We talk about the history ofEnglish pilgrimage, including
Canterbury, thomas a Beckett,walsingham and the Holy Wells,
along with how the Reformationaffected the English pilgrimage
tradition.
Father is a self-describedaddict of pilgrimage, so he
regales us with tales of his ownjourneys and has a lot to teach
(01:04):
us along the way.
So I actually always begin ourconversation just asking.
I usually am very specific andask for three sentences.
If you could tell somebodythree sentences about yourself,
just to kind of make someonereally tell us the highlights.
But, father, do you just wantto introduce yourself and tell
us a little bit about yourself?
Father Conner (01:24):
Yeah, hello, my name's Father Philip Connor.
I'm a parish priest in a placein West Cumbria, which is on the
west coast of England, actuallyjust across the border from
Scotland.
I've been a priest for 18 years.
I have a brother who's also apriest, and three other brothers
(01:45):
and a sister, so that's mybackground.
I spent a lot of my life as apriest, as a pilgrim, moving
from place to place, andcurrently I'm a parish priest,
but before that I was a youthchaplain for the diocese and
worked in the college campusministry.
Yeah, my background my fatherwas in the army, so it's
(02:13):
probably quite a goodpreparation for the priesthood
because you get moved arounddifferent places.
So I don't really have anyroots.
Joan (02:25):
So if you're trying to work out where my English accent
is from.
Father Conner (02:26):
it's a bit of a mixer of everything.
I love it Most of my collegetime.
University was up in Scotland,so I'm a little bit of a mixer.
I think, well, I'm definitelyup to and just yeah, life as a
(02:49):
priest, as a Catholic and as aChristian is fantastic.
Yeah.
Joan (02:55):
It's funny you mentioned the accent, because it was only
really in getting to know peoplevery well that are from England
that I really came toappreciate the differences in
English accents.
Because I think growing up itwas like, oh, you have an
English accent.
And then realizing, and youknow all of our British TV shows
that we consume as Americans,you realize there's a great
nuance and you can just likeAmerica, right, like just like
(03:17):
the United States.
Father Conner (03:17):
You can tell, but you have a mix yes, if in fact,
when I moved up to this part ofEngland, when I first arrived
here, I couldn't understand whatpeople were saying.
So even for an English personit can be quite hard.
The West Gubberin accent it'slike nothing else, and I think
(03:38):
about 10 years ago we had therewas some terrible tragedy in
this part of the world and itwas on the national news.
They actually had to subtitlewhat the locals were saying
because just the vocabulary andthe language is different.
This part of England has beeninfluenced by, I think, a lot of
Nordic and Icelandic peoplesthrough the course of history.
(04:03):
We're very different.
There are Vikings up here.
That's fabulous, and maybebecause it's so far away from
places like London and stuff andbehind the mountains it sort of
cuts off.
It's a very distant part of thecountry.
Joan (04:20):
There are probably some similarities to the deep south
in the United States wherethere's other woods for things.
And you go and you're like areyou speaking English too?
I thought I was speakingEnglish and so I love it.
I love, like love, thinkingabout linguistics in that way,
(04:45):
about pilgrimage, not just, youknow, actual pilgrimages that we
take walking, but also thepilgrimage of life and the
lessons learned.
But why?
Why do you think pilgrimage issuch an important part of so
many religions?
I mean, we see it obviously inChristianity that's what we're
here to talk about but it's notjust a Christian phenomenon.
We see it, you know, in Mecca,and why do you think there's
(05:05):
that pull of the heart, I guess,and maybe that gives the answer
away.
But why do you think christian?
Why do you think pilgrimage ispart of so many religions?
Father Conner (05:13):
yeah, I I think sometimes it's really hard to
get our hands around lifebecause right in the middle of
it and we don't it's just toomuch, we, we don't have any
sense of perspective.
So a little bit like a retreat.
When you go on a retreat, youstep out of your normal everyday
life and you see things in anew light and and I think
(05:36):
pilgrimage is just an extensionof that sense that actually we
step out of our normal everydaylife, you begin to see your
whole life in a new perspectiveand in this sense it provides a
sort of miniature version ofyour whole life, because there's
a beginning and there's an endand it provides something, a way
(05:59):
of understanding your life, allof the ups and downs, the
difficult times, the struggles,the wonderful people that you
meet.
So it's a very intense and verypersonal experience of life and
I think if you live thatexperience, it then transforms
(06:22):
the way in which you approachyour whole life when you get
back home.
Does that make sense.
Yeah, I think.
The other thing I'm reallynoticing, and certainly in this
part of the world, thatpilgrimage is having a massive
comeback at the moment.
People are having been lost forcenturies.
It seems to be beingresurrected.
(06:44):
Having been lost for centuries,it seems to be being
resurrected and not just fromthe faithful, but all sorts of
people are discovering it forall sorts of different reasons.
Someone said I was walking inthe route through Spain.
It says not everyone begins thepilgrimage as a pilgrim,
(07:05):
because everyone ends as apilgrim.
And so I think it sort of shakesus all down you know and sort
of helps you to work out what'sreal and what's not, what we can
get rid of and what is actuallyessential to us.
It gives us a sort ofdestination and a focus for life
(07:29):
.
And the other thing which I canjust share and this was a
beautiful insight and I didn'tknow what it meant, but when I
set off on that route throughSpain, we met someone who had
walked the Camino de Santiagosix times, you know, when we
were just struggling on ourfirst day, it made our jaws drop
to think that someone hadactually done the whole thing
six days, six times.
(07:51):
But he spoke to us and I alwaysremember his words were just
full of wisdom.
He said you know, your firstweek on pilgrimage you will
discover that you have a body.
And the second week you beginto listen to your body.
(08:13):
And the third week you willdiscover that your body is a
temple of the Holy Spirit.
I can remember and I've thoughtabout that so many times, and
it's not as if the pilgrimageyou know falls neatly into those
sorts of things, but thoseelements are all there and I
think, particularly in theWestern culture today we live so
(08:34):
much in our heads.
You know, we're always on ourphones, we're watching TV, we're
thinking and talking aboutthings, but we leave our bodies
behind.
In a sense, or they're anaddition to we, or they're a
addition to we, think they're anaddition to who we are, but
actually, as christians, we sayno.
No, the body and soul are one.
We don't separate them out, andI think what pilgrimage is is
(08:57):
helping us to understand this,is to rediscover the truth of
who we are you, you know, bodilyand spiritually you know.
And and also, as I said, givingus a destination and a
direction.
Because people have suchhorizontal lives, we've
forgotten the transcendentaldimension that we're made for
heaven.
You know, we're made.
(09:18):
So I think, in a strange way, Ithink the Holy Spirit is using
pilgrimage today to wake up someof these things in us.
Joan (09:25):
Yeah, yeah, I was talking to a friend the other day and
actually we've talked about onthis podcast, about how it's
hard for us to be uncomfortableto be taken out of our comfort
zones unless we go on pilgrimage.
He had walked the.
Camino and he said you know it's, it's too easy to live the
comfortable life.
You actually have to go to seekthis, to actually find that,
(09:46):
that union of body and soul, andto recognize these things we
have to be shaken out of ourcomfort zone and I think it's
hard to convince somebodysometimes to do that.
Who is very comfortable, who'snot searching you know, you see
this influx of people on theCamino who aren't religious but
are searching, and they probablyhave a better chance of finding
the answer than the comfortablecatholic who's just living.
(10:08):
You know, oh well, I go to masson sunday and I'm fine like no.
You need to be shaken out of ittoo.
You need to be shaken out ofthis comfort and you need to
start searching.
But how, you know, how do youconvince somebody they need to
go suffer, to, uh, to answer thecall to pilgrimage, you know?
Father Conner (10:23):
but I think you'd have to think of a different
marketing tactic.
You know, come and have somesuffering, it will do you some
good, you don't sell a lot ofpilgrimages that way.
But it's not.
I mean, I've never thought ofit.
You know, occasionally you geta blister or your legs are tied
and things like this, but thesuffering is, that's not the
(10:48):
point of it, right?
Yeah, you know, and I and I,and I think that may happen and
it does happen, and um, but you,you, you discover so much um
which, yeah, you're not gonna,you're not gonna discover by
just sitting on your sofa athome and your couch.
You know, and um, and I wouldeven say there is a difference,
(11:11):
because I used to take a lot ofyoung people to lourdes in the
south of france and differentpilgrimage places would jump on
a bus and or, or sometimespeople would fly to it and then
they'd have this experience.
I think they all had wonderfulexperiences, they loved it, but
there's a difference.
I would almost call that likereligious tourism.
(11:31):
You know where you go, you stayin a nice hotel and
everything's provided, there's anice routine and things.
But, as you said, one of thethings about pilgrimage is that
you might have your idea howit's all going to be, but you'll
discover pretty quickly, maybeon day one or day two or, if not
, definitely by day three, thatthat your version of how it's
(11:55):
going to be just won't work,because all the things which we
think are important, actuallywhen you become a pilgrim you
realize actually they're notimportant, those aren't the
significant things.
And so this sort of revolutionhas to take place, and that's
why it's such a powerfulexperience.
(12:17):
You know, in a sense we aredismantled and then rebuilt, and
it is.
We are dismantled and thenrebuilt, and it is okay.
If you're going to mention thesuffering, I can't deny that
there's no suffering, but thereis a resurrection as well, and
that's what makes the wholething possible.
And so you begin to choose it.
(12:41):
I actually I think I've probablybecome addicted to it now.
I actually I think I'veprobably become addicted to it
now, but that's what I actuallyfind this.
Why have I got addicted to it?
It's because it's, I know itdoes something really good for
me.
It's pulling me out of myselfand we have very strong
gravitational forces which pullus into ourselves, which close
(13:05):
our walls in on ourselves, whichwhich seek for comfort, and
actually that's not the way tolife.
Joan (13:12):
Yeah, yeah yeah, we have to make our choices.
It is, um, the walkingpilgrimage does bring those
things to the forefront, so muchclearer and quicker than
something like a pilgrimage.
So I do work for a pilgrimagecompany and most of our trips
are more fly to a place, get ona bus, right, and it's
interesting to help the pilgrimson those trips embrace the
(13:36):
pilgrim mentality, because it'sharder to see and it's harder to
experience than when you're ona walking pilgrimage.
The elements are still there,but not to the extremes that
they are, and so you might havesomebody go on one of these
pilgrimages and be unsatisfiedat the end because their bed was
too hard or they were rushedfrom site to site and you're
like, okay, this was apilgrimage, this wasn't a
(13:57):
vacation, and so I think on awalking pilgrimage, all of that
is brought to the forefront somuch clearer because you have to
face it immediately, like yourdays not might not go the way
you want it to go, because it'sraining, for example.
You know there's all theseelements in the walking
pilgrimage.
Um, and I'm I'm anxious to hearyou said you're addicted.
Um, I can't wait to hear aboutmore of the walking pilgrimages
(14:20):
you've done.
We've talked to people about theCamino, and I think that's what
comes to people's minds whenthey hear this idea of walking
pilgrimage.
But, being in England, thereare other pilgrimages and I
think I'd love to talk to youabout Canterbury a little bit
before we get to some of theother ones, because to many
Americans Canterbury Tales is abook we read in high school or
(14:43):
college and there's kind of adisconnect between the idea,
even though it's all aboutpilgrimage.
It is like the pilgrimage tale.
I think sometimes there's adisconnect because maybe we
don't know the story of ThomasBeckett, and so I'd love to know
more about like the Pilgrim'sWay.
And why Canterbury?
Why Thomas?
Where is this in Englishhistory and why is it important?
Father Conner (15:08):
yeah, that's.
Thank you for those questions.
I I think right at thebeginning.
Um, during the medieval times,pilgrimage became massive in
England because part of thereason for that was once the
Crusades began.
In the 11th century, thetraditional places of pilgrimage
(15:30):
would have been to Jerusalem.
And that's what people headedfor.
But once the Crusades began,people had to look for other
places to go to, and that's whySantiago, where the relics of St
James were, became veryimportant.
Or in Scotland there's StAndrews, which was a university
(15:55):
city.
It's a golfing place now, butthat was a great place of
pilgrimage to go to the relicsof saint andrew, which arrived
there in the 12th century fromfrom uh, italy and different
places like that.
So in england, england,medieval times was covered with
thousands of shrines, thousandsof shrines and thousands of of
(16:17):
holy wells like these.
These were deep holy wellswhere people would go in into
the water, bless themselves.
Sometimes they were associatedwith saints, and many of them
still exist.
You have to do a little bit ofresearch because as the layers
of time have gone by, a lot ofthese have got lost from the
(16:38):
public consciousness.
But certainly where my parentslive, in Preston, there's a very
ancient shrine which goes backto the 7th or 8th century,
called Ladywell.
And in the north of Walesthere's another place called
Holywell and it's still fullythere.
You can go to it and there'sthis huge, big, there's this
(16:59):
spring of of water, really quitepowerful, and it comes up out
of the earth and it's allassociated with saint winifred,
who lived in the in the 7th or8th century, and, um, you could
go in and wash it and it's, it'sbeautiful.
So these places were verypopular in the medieval times
and and out of all of the greatshrines in England, I think
(17:22):
people would go to Glastonburybecause that was connected with
the story of a visitor of Josephof Arimathea, who of course, we
know from the Gospels, butthere was always a tradition
that Joseph of Arimathea tookJesus on a trip to England at
one point and there's thatassociation with that.
(17:46):
It's very ancient.
Joan (17:48):
Is that why he shows up in King Arthur?
Is that why he shows up in theHoly Grail?
Exactly, yes, okay, excellent.
Father Conner (17:53):
Yeah, that's the connection, yes, and then, of
course, if we've got time, wecan talk about Walsingham, which
is in Norfolk, and there was anoble woman called Rochelle de
Stavavish and she had this dreamof the Holy House in Nazareth,
(18:18):
and so when she woke up, she wasinspired to build the house of
Nazareth in Walsingham and itbecame known as England's
Nazareth, and kings, even HenryVIII, they went on that, they
walked to these places and theywent on pilgrimage.
But Canterbury in the 12thcentury became one of the
(18:39):
biggest shrines and this was, asyou said, because of St Thomas
the Beckett, but also known asSt Thomas of Canterbury, and so
we have this tradition then.
Joan (18:51):
So everybody's walking everywhere and we remember
Canterbury, perhaps because ofCanterbury Tales, but it wasn't
limited.
It's actually a prettyprevalent desire to go on
pilgrimage throughout England.
Father Conner (19:05):
When you think about even the word.
You say vacation.
We call it holiday and theholiday comes from Holy Day and
if you read the Canterbury Tales, it will speak about the season
of spring is the time ofpilgrimage.
This is when everyone used tojust get up out of their normal
(19:25):
everyday life.
Let's go on pilgrimage, let'smeet some new people, and that's
what the Canterbury Tales isall going on about the
conversations they have and someof it.
You know it's pretty grittystuff but at the end of the day
this is very, very incarnational.
(19:46):
When we think about it, wedon't just walk around with our
hands held together and look allpious and holy.
You know, when Jesus walked onthis earth, he lived a pretty
gritty life, going into the pubsand the taverns, speaking with
the sinners, getting thrown intothis situation, walking across
(20:08):
deserts and meeting all sorts ofpeople demoniacs and
prostitutes and Roman soldiersand I think that's part of the
glory of pilgrimage is that webreak out of that little world.
So if you go to Canterbury, it'sgot a very ancient history in
(20:30):
the sense that it was inCanterbury that St Augustine,
who lived in the 6th century.
He was a Benedictine monk whowas sent by St Gregory the Great
to bring Christianity toEngland and he was welcomed by
(20:52):
the King of Kent and they set upa monastery at Canterbury and
that became the first sort ofEpiscopal see.
So the seat of the bishop, stAugustine, became St Augustine
of Canterbury.
This is became the first bishopthere.
So it was always like thecentre of Christianity in
(21:12):
England.
But with time they built thisgreat cathedral there which is
absolutely awesome.
It's just the mostextraordinary building and
builds.
Yeah, I mean you just have tovisit these cathedrals in
(21:34):
Britain to see how people I meansome of these cathedrals were
built over the course of 100years, so the people who were
building it at the beginningnever saw the end of it.
But they had this sense thatthey were building something of
the kingdom of God in the midstof people and it really was.
(21:54):
The intention was that when youenter into these buildings you
are entering into heaven, and sotoday they're pretty stripped
back.
I mean they're still absolutelyawesome, but in the medieval
times they would have beencovered with frescoes and paints
and different patterns andstatues and and it was the sense
(22:15):
of you'd come in from your long, long pilgrimage, your
intentions, which you werecarrying in your heart and you
would approach the altar and youwould approach the shrine of
the saints and things like this,and it was this sense of heaven
and earth being united, youknow, with the singing, the
music, the sense of majesty andgrandeur and things like this.
(22:38):
So they were great high pointsfor people's lives.
It's yeah, and I'm trying tothink well, do you want me to
share a little bit about StThomas of Canterbury himself?
Sure, yes, yeah, that would begreat, was Canterbury.
Joan (22:55):
Was it a place of pilgrimage before Thomas, or do
you think it was just the centerof Christianity in England?
Father Conner (23:04):
No, I think St Thomas actually made it Okay,
but I think because it was thefirst sea, yeah, like St
Canterbury and York in the northof England were the two big
ecclesiastical centers, okay,yeah, yeah, I think I think they
(23:27):
were.
Basically they governed thechurch throughout the kingdom,
those two big places, one in thenorth, one in the south.
So St Thomas Becket well, youcan tell from his name that he,
you know, at this time ofBritish English history that
Normandy, in the north of France, was very much part, well, at
(23:48):
least linked, associated withEngland.
You know there's a lot ofcrossover.
Remember, william the Conquerorwas Norman, and so the
boundaries which we think of nowas England and that's France,
it wasn't quite thatstraightforward at that time.
These boundaries have changedquite a bit through the course
of history.
But St Thomas the Becket wasactually, I think, from a fairly
(24:12):
middle class, middle ranking,but he was noticed as having
particular skills by the bishopsor the ecclesiastical sort of
set up in London and things likethis, and he was introduced to
(24:33):
Henry II's court and he was seenas a great fixer, a political
fixer, and I think Henry IIthought, yeah, they used to love
going out, drinking and havingwild times together and stuff
like this.
And so when Henry II becameking, he thought, right, I know
(24:54):
what I'm going to do, I'm goingto make my friend Thomas
Archbishop.
And at this point he wasn'teven ordained, thomas, wow, he
was just.
He'd been trained up in thechurch by the great churchmen at
the time, but he was apolitician, okay, you know.
So he was quickly ordained andmade Archbishop and things.
(25:16):
And Henry II got a bit of ashock, because it's questionable
, I don't know how much of aconversion Henry had at that,
sorry, thomas had at that point.
But he, he obviously understoodthat he had different
responsibilities.
He wasn't just there to be theking's like rubber stamp,
(25:37):
everything the king did.
And, um, he, he now was in asense speaking on the behalf of
the church and and of god, andand he realized actually he,
having having attacked thechurch's privileges as a
politician, now as a church man,he began to realize, no, I, I
have to protect the church.
That has to be some sort of ofcan't just let Henry II be a
(26:01):
tyrant and just overruleeverything.
So I think that's where thetensions began.
Their friendship became alittle bit taut.
It became difficult, a bitstressed, there were different
efforts to try and help thechurch and the state to work
(26:24):
better together with each other,but it never seemed to work.
Thomas the Becket was exiled atsome point for I don't know
several years.
He lived in the north of France, he was protected and
eventually he came back toEngland and I think things
calmed down a bit.
(26:44):
But of course it wasn't longbefore the tensions grew up
again.
And I think there's that famousline which, if you read, I think
is it TS Eliot's Murder in theCathedral.
You know, there's that greataccount of just Henry II's
exasperation, just overspillingand saying who will rid me of
this turbulent priest?
And those four knights thinkthat they're doing the king a
(27:10):
great favour and actually takehim at his word.
They hunt Thomas of Canterburyin the cathedral and I think
it's yeah, it's just at the endof December, isn't it?
And he's about to celebrateevening prayer and things and
(27:30):
he's knocked to the ground andthere's a bit of scuffle and
things like this.
But I think when you read theaccounts and what historical
information we have, it wasreally.
I mean, if you look at him as a, where was his sanctity coming
from, I think in the last fewmonths of his life, thomas
understood that actually, goingback to Canterbury, his days
(27:54):
were numbered and I think it'samazing and you find this on a
pilgrimage Actually your wholelife could come into focus in a
very, very short amount of time,and I think there's a lot which
is contradictory in thomasbeckett's life.
But in the last few weeks,months, you know his prayer and
(28:15):
his, his sort of centering ofhis life upon christ and his
surrender of his life to christ.
This is really what puts him ina place so that when his
martyrdom comes it is out oflove for the church, but also,
you know, a total surrender ofhimself to Christ, and I think
that's there's somethingwonderful about him.
He's not a papy maché saint.
(28:37):
He's quite, as I say,contradictory as a character.
Joan (28:43):
I love saints like that that I can actually I can find
myself in because I strugglemyself right and we all do.
Our life is a pilgrimage andsometimes we get off the path,
sometimes we're walking on thewrong path, right.
And so I love when saintsreflect that that they're not
these completely pious all thetime, never but that they
(29:03):
struggle being true and it's howthey ultimately choose for
Christ.
That's right At the end, youknow, and I think the
juxtaposition of him dying inthe cathedral, which should have
given him sanctuary, we don'tthink of I mean, especially in
America, we don't think of thisidea of sanctuary in churches.
But you should have been ableto find sanctuary in the church
and been freed from politicalpower, right.
(29:25):
And he actually dies, showingthat when he took on that role
as Bishop he wasn't, there wasno sanctuary in that, right.
He was actually taking on avery difficult position where he
was going to have to contradicthis friend and and put his life
on the line.
And he doesn't even findsanctuary in the building of the
church, but he's killed rightthere.
Father Conner (29:45):
That's right.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So I think after his murder,actually the whole country was
in a state of shock.
I think Henry was in a state ofshock and he regretted it.
You know he did penance for itand things like this and things
like this, but there was thisimmediate outpouring of well,
(30:10):
public acclamation of ThomasBeckett's holiness or sanctity,
and so it wasn't long after thatthat he was canonized.
And then you get all thecharacters which we meet on the
(30:30):
Canterbury Tales appearing andwanting to touch something of
his tomb and to come in to youknow, to reach out to a saint,
you know.
And so what you get along allthese pilgrimage routes, is it
little brass or metal medallionsand pilgrimage crosses and
(30:53):
things like that are created andpilgrimage routes begin to be
established.
Joan (31:01):
I love that incarnational, like we want something, we want
to touch something.
We need these examples in ourlife of holiness we're going to
take this incarnational walk tolike.
there's so much in the Catholicsacramental worldview that's
present in pilgrimage and I'mgoing to limit it to not.
How does the Reformation affectall of this?
(31:21):
Because I know it means theclosing of churches and
monasteries.
But how would you say theReformation affects this
practice of pilgrimage, when Ithink we could falsely see it as
earning our way to heaven or,you know, working.
And so it seems that in theReformation, pilgrimage would be
(31:44):
looked down upon because itseems to be a work.
Reformation, pilgrimage wouldbe looked down upon because it
seems to be a work.
But is that the case?
How do the post-Reformationyears look in terms of
pilgrimage?
Do we still see, I mean I knowWalsingham, for example, becomes
an Anglican shrine, so there'ssome practical results, but do
we also see the waning ofpilgrimage in practice?
Father Conner (32:07):
Well, actually even Walsingham.
It's only in the 19th centurythat it's been rediscovered as a
shrine amongst Africans.
So at the time of theReformation everything was
destroyed, everything, all themonasteries, the Holy House, it
was absolutely destroyed.
(32:28):
And I think the great shrines,let's say, durham Cathedral had
the tomb of St Cuthbert,westminster Abbey had the tomb
of St Edward the Confessor, Idon't know like Canterbury had
(32:51):
Thomas Becket, but a lot ofthese tombs were opened up and
they were in some cases, in someplaces, the relics and things
were all just thrown out.
And just you know.
But you know there were a lotof people who didn't.
This was, I think they're sortof ardent, sort of iconoclasts
(33:14):
and people who wanted to destroyall of this.
They were actually a very smallminority of people and there
were lots of holy people whowere just absolutely scandalized
and shocked, absolutelyscandalized and shocked, and so
I think a lot of the holy thingsand relics and statues and
(33:35):
paintings they were hidden away.
They were taken away and hiddenin places until time eased up a
bit.
So, yeah, there was a massivedisruption.
You couldn't have publicpilgrimages and things like this
.
Um, however I think you know itwasn't, as if one day england
(33:56):
was all catholic and the nextday was, it became like ultra
calvinist and and just totallyeven if, even Even through all
of the centuries, there was alot, you know, which I think a
lot of people still had, thesedeep oceans and things like this
(34:16):
.
And so we know, for example,holywell, which is in the north
of Wales, it's one of those holywells, wales, it's a um, one of
those holy wells, it's it.
You know there were Catholicsgoing there all of the time and
the, the police authorities,they couldn't stop it.
You know, and we know lots ofJesuit priests and missionary
(34:37):
priests were going andcelebrating mass in these places
secretly and things like this.
So in, in a sense, these thingsnever stopped the public, sort
of big jamboree, pilgrimages andthings, that's all finished.
But quite the other peoplefound pilgrimages and because I
(34:59):
mean a lot of people would havedone made their own quiet
journeys to Rome and places likethis.
So the practice of pilgrimagecontinued.
Interestingly, when I walked toCanterbury the main route is
from London to Canterbury Iactually walked from Winchester,
which is an Anglo-Saxoncathedral town, to Canterbury
(35:23):
and we hadn't even planned towalk that pilgrimage route.
But it was the time when therewas a big volcanic ash cloud
which was flying, which wasfilled the atmosphere around
Iceland, and they and no planescould take off.
So we had been planning to walkin the Santiago to Compostela
and we couldn't do it anymore.
(35:44):
And so we were sitting at homethinking I was with my brother
and I was thinking, well, whatshould we do?
This is our.
And so we were sitting at homethinking I was with my brother
and I was thinking, well, whatshould we do?
This is our holiday time, wewant to go on pilgrimage.
So we just went down toWinchester, we bought a few maps
, we had our rucksacks with oursleeping bags, and this is a
great thing about pilgrimage isyou don't need anything.
Once we had two or three mapswhich would cover basically the
(36:07):
150 miles we had to walk.
We just set off.
We didn't know where we weregoing to eat, we didn't know
where we were going to slay, wedidn't know anything about the
route and we just set off and wefound out quite quickly.
We found out quite quickly andthis is why I'm saying about
(36:28):
these ancient pilgrimage routesbecause, little by little, just
tiny little indications here andthere we became aware that we
were walking on ancientpilgrimage routes.
So you could find little streetnames in the countryside
Pilgrim's Way or things likethis, or little crosses hidden
in the undergrowth and thingslike this which were from
(36:49):
different times, or the names ofthe pubs were.
They still hadn't changed thenames of the pubs from the
medieval times.
And so when you're walking,because you're going slower, you
begin to notice things.
And we became aware that,although that is not an official
pilgrimage route at the moment,we felt as if we were, you
(37:12):
could sense it, that we werewalking in the footsteps of
other pilgrims who trampled onthat route.
A wonderful experience, becausewe didn't stay in any hotels or
there's no, no hostels or youthhostels along the way or
(37:33):
anything.
So what we used to do is wefound a lot of these anglican
churches, which all used to becatholic churches.
They had lovely porchways, youknow, and there was just enough
room.
You could get two sleeping bagsin them and we slept in their
porchways at different churchesalong the way.
And most of those churchyardshave a tap, and you know.
(38:03):
So we always felt that if wehad shelter and we had water,
you know, because there wasalways a tap so that people
could water their plants in thecemetery and things like this.
So most nights we were actuallysleeping in graveyards or in
the porchways of churches.
But it was a wonderfulexperience and it made me
realize that you don't needanything complicated.
(38:23):
You know, and sometimes we gotlost and um but but I think
because we didn't plan it muchand because we didn't know what
was happening and it wasn't inour plan, we became very
sensitive to the presence of thelord and jesus just just
(38:44):
walking around, and some of theencounters that we had.
I mean, the first person we meton that walk, it was a little
boy actually.
We were helping him to get hisbike over the fence and we met
his parents and we said, oh,what's your name?
(39:05):
And he said Santiago.
Wow, and that's where we wereplanning to have gone and we
were feeling disappointedbecause we weren't going to
Santiago and the first person wemeet is called Santiago.
I mean, we met his, the family,we we met later on in the pub.
We were just going to drop inand have a nice pint before
finding somewhere to camp andactually they invited us to come
(39:27):
and sit next to them and we sataround and had a meal together
and then they took us back totheir home that night and we had
such a.
It was such a good beginning tothat pilgrimage and after that
we felt, no, we're on the righttracks.
This is, we're just really opento what happens and, honestly,
(39:48):
you meet angels.
You meet angels on theseexperiences, when you, when you
stop over planning andoverthinking and just just try
and live and be present to whatis before you you.
You realize that god has hisplans and his, his, his.
What he desires to give us isso much more than what we could
(40:10):
think or imagine or plan forourselves.
So there's a big element oftrust.
Joan (40:16):
So you relied like that reliance on the Lord that's, I
mean, that's a huge lesson forour life, right, and we can be
so comfortable in our dailylives that we forget we're
relying on the Lord unlesssomething's taken away from us.
But you, that very first day,the Lord, I, you know I've got
your back.
You didn't go to Santiago.
In a way, santiago came to youin this form of this little boy
(40:39):
right and the.
Lord was going to take care ofyou.
I also thought, when you talkedabout slowing down and noticing
things because you would slowdown that how pilgrimage teaches
us to be in the present moment,which can be so difficult in
our everyday life, but to reallylive in the present moment, to
think about the step that'sright in front of us and to open
(41:00):
our eyes and see and hearthings that we would miss when
we were thinking about the next.
You know, a year from now, oryou know, like so often, we're
living in the future rather thanin the present moment.
That's a really powerful lessonof pilgrimage yeah yeah, yeah,
absolutely.
Father Conner (41:18):
I think that's one of my big lessons, because
I'm definitely one of thesepeople who prefer to have things
organized.
If I could just share thislittle experience.
It was actually on the route toSantiago de Compostela.
(41:39):
Again, I was with my brotherand we arrived in Pamplona and I
don't think we were in a good.
We weren't in a good way at all.
We had begun the pilgrimagesleeping in ditches and the rain
was pouring down at night andwe got soaked, we were tired and
I don't it.
Just it wasn't good.
(42:02):
But I was looking forward toarriving in Pamplona, because I
know it's a beautiful city.
It's got a fantastic history.
It was a place where SaintIgnatius of Loyola had his leg
blown off and there were so manythings I wanted to visit.
And I can remember going intothe hostel and going to have a
shower.
I thought, oh, that's so nicehaving a shower.
But whilst I was in the shower,my brother.
(42:24):
He thought, well, he was doinga good deed.
He got all my clothes and hewent and put them into the
washing machine, which was great, very nice, yeah.
But I came out.
I didn't have any clothes towear.
But I came out I didn't haveany clothes to wear.
(42:44):
And just at that moment in thehostel because they're often
mixed dormitories in thesehostels all of these very nice
French women all turned up, andthey were about six or seven.
I thought I was reallyself-conscious.
I jumped into my sleeping bagand I was just like, but I was
fuming, I was so angry inside.
You know that, because therewas my opportunity to visit the
(43:07):
city it's gone.
I had to stay stuck in mysleeping bag.
I felt.
I felt anyway.
But you know, when I waslooking back and it was later on
the evening there's a fewawkward hours when I did get my
clothes back, you know, I beganto laugh about it because that
(43:27):
was a moment which somethinginside me broke, because there
was me thinking I'm going tohave this pilgrimage all in the
perfect way.
And I've spoken to a lot ofpilgrims and they say, somehow
it happens to everyone.
You, you have to get to thatbreaking point, you know, and um
, but then it allows somethingwonderful to happen.
(43:49):
Um, and I, I was thinking of anexample of that and you
remember, with saint francis ofassisi, when he's had this great
conversion and he was from apretty wealthy background and
stuff, and his dad is absolutelylike furious with him that he's
, he's had this religious turnin his life and and he says, dad
(44:13):
, you know I love you andeverything, but you can have
everything.
I know you've given me allthese nice clothes, but you them
.
And he just took off all hisclothes in the middle of the
public square and he was totallyfree, he didn't need anything.
And the bishop was scandalizedand, of course, covered him up
and things like this.
Joan (44:33):
St.
Father Conner (44:33):
Francis, but I thought that was my St Francis
moment in a sense.
I thought that was my StFrancis moment.
In a sense.
It was a moment of somethingbroken me and I thought, oh, I
don't need any of this anymoreand I was able to leave it all
behind and the rest of thatpilgrimage and in fact, all my
(44:54):
years of doing pilgrimages sincethen, something has changed.
You know, I don't I try not toover plan, I just try and go.
Simply, I thinned out myrucksack to just like five or
six kilos, and that includes mymask kit, so it's just bare
minimum, and I've met so manyother pilgrims who have done
(45:15):
that.
There was a guy walking thewhole way from Belgium, all the
way through France into Spain,and he said he didn't have a
penny with him, he didn't bringany money, and he said he'd been
walking for when we had met himfor two and a half months and
every single day he had had ameal.
Wow, you think, well, how doesthat happen?
(45:37):
You know, yeah, so just theopportunity to trust in
providence and to know actually,god is a father who provides,
who, who gives us everything weneed I mean even jesus, you, you
see, when he he saw the fivethousand and they saw how hungry
they were and and things, hedidn't just leave them, he fed
(45:58):
them, them.
So it does give you a wonderfulsense of the providence of God.
And I'll just give one otherstory which I think you might
like.
It was a very, very hot dayagain on that pilgrimage.
We were exhausted.
You can see me, my brother andmyself, we have our moments, but
(46:21):
we were absolutely exhaustedand it was 38 degrees Celsius.
We'd been walking, I think, along, long, long day and we went
to try and get into the churchand the church was locked
Because in Spain everything,they have siesta, so everything
gets shut, and we wanted to goin the church just because it
(46:42):
would be the one cool place togo and sit and just relax and be
at peace and things.
It was locked and we just satin the town square, absolutely
exhausted, fed up and justthinking this is it.
And then we heard the twoshutters of window above our
head.
We were sitting on a bench openlike that, and out came two ice
(47:05):
cold beers and we thought, oh,my goodness, this is amazing.
You know, they were speaking tothe spanish guy who gave us.
He was an elderly man and weasked him his name and his name
was angel angle.
Joan (47:22):
I like angels that bring beers.
That's like that's a good angel.
I like that's it, that that.
Father Conner (47:27):
So this is what happens on pilgrimage and you
know, I I think we're there's,there's surprises around every
corner.
There's just it's beautiful.
Joan (47:36):
Yeah also that lesson of of accepting help, because I
think some of us have adifficulty asking and accepting,
like allowing people to help us, and so, even whether it's
Santiago's parents letting yousleep, you know at their house
or you know being stripped ofeverything, but being allowed to
let others help us, I thinkthat's an important lesson that
(47:58):
it's hard to learn in oureveryday life of living.
Father Conner (48:01):
Absolutely yeah, yeah.
Joan (48:03):
Well, we probably have to wrap up, but I can't help but
ask.
I think you're about to take apilgrimage because you're
addicted.
There has to be another walkingpilgrimage, Are you?
Father Conner (48:12):
about to do part of the Viyagraha for Jijana.
Yes, that's right, yeah, Shijina, yes, that's right, yeah, so,
um, yeah, so, my, all mysiblings, so, um, the five of us
, we're going to walk a section.
I mean, the whole route isactually from Canterbury to Rome
, okay, so that you need aboutthree months for that.
(48:33):
And, um, in fact, I would say,you know, if you're new to
pilgrimage, you know, just beginin a little way.
You can just start with a oneday or a three day pilgrimage
and just it's OK to and that'show, more or less, I began and
just did it in little sections.
So we're just doing, we'redoing a five or six day section
(48:56):
of the Rio Francigena.
But actually we thought, well,if we only got five or six days,
let's do a nice bit, let's notjust walk across flat French
fields.
So we're going to Tuscany, Ilove it.
So we're flying to Pisa andthen we'll walk from Lucca to
Siena, beautiful, which will bethrough these beautiful places
like San Gimignano and SanMignardo, the land of Chianti,
(49:20):
wine, and yeah, so we're goingto walk that.
And actually, what will bedifferent?
I've often walked with mybrother, who's a friar, but the
three others want to come too.
We just got to a point in lifewhere actually people's
responsibilities and thingsthey've been able to work it so
that we can actually.
(49:41):
So this will be the first timethat we've all been on something
just together and we don't evenhave our mom and dad to sort of
sort out the fights and thatwill be an adventure it will be
an adventure and, and you knowone of my brothers, he wants to
stay in five-star accommodation.
The other one wants to live in ahammock and just hang from the
(50:02):
trees and things like this, andI think I think there's going to
be some interesting uh sort ofdynamics and things like this.
But we're, we'll just see howit goes.
So maybe you can all pray forus and uh, but, um, yeah, so, um
, we're looking forward to that.
That that's in the middle ofMay.
Joan (50:20):
Definitely.
Well, we definitely will bepraying Father Definitely, and
that's a beautiful gift.
It'll be lots of lessonslearned, I think even in the
School of Humanity, probably onthat trip.
I guess I wanted to say, likeone last question before we go
Any recommendations for someonethinking about a walking
pilgrimage?
I know you said just go do it,maybe that's the best
(50:42):
recommendation.
Just start small, but do youhave any other recommendations
for someone?
Father Conner (50:53):
Just to have courage, you know, not to be
afraid.
I think the hardest thing isstepping out of your house and
just saying, right, I'm going,yeah, that that's the biggest,
the biggest thing, you know.
But but if you've got a week,yeah, just take the opportunity
and just say, right, we're goingto do this.
And you know, um, you know, gowith a few friends and things.
(51:19):
You, you know it's, it's, makeit, make it an adventure, you
know, and you, you, you pulleach other through it.
And and, as well, don't beafraid to go lightly.
You know, because I rememberwatching.
There was a one pilgrim fromSouth Korea.
She has state-of-the-art gear,a huge rucksack and she but you
(51:46):
could see her battling andbattling, and battling every day
.
I thought that really is likethe image of misery.
And one day I was sitting in asquare in a village just resting
and I saw her walking throughsquare in a village just resting
.
And I saw her walking throughthe village and then she just
threw her rucksack down.
And it was amazing justwatching her go through her
(52:09):
rucksack and just chuckeverything into the dustbin.
And I tell you, if I wasn't onpilgrimage I would have looked
in that dustbin afterwardsbecause there must have been
some nice equipment, nice thingsin there, but she realized she
didn't need it.
Yeah, um, and so that I thinkthat was her breaking point,
because I saw her a week laterand she was flying and the joy
(52:31):
in her face and you know, andyou think that that that's what
we want.
We want resurrection and wedon't, we don't want to take
things which they're nice, butthey're actually weighing us
down, you know.
So, if you want to receive, ifyou want to to receive something
, you have to be prepared to letgo, and and that's ultimately
(52:53):
what we have to do at the end ofthis earthly life.
So why not get into trainingnow?
You know that's what that'swhat pilgrimage is about.
Is is just just um, learning tolet go a bit, and we let go,
not so that we have emptiness inour life, but so that we can
have fullness.
You know, that's that christ is, is our fullness, and he gives
(53:17):
us everything that we need, andwe are his children.
He will provide for us.
So it, you know, I think it'sthe greatest adventure.
So, um, have courage, don't beafraid.
Um, if it's, don't over plan itand and and just go with the
flow.
It's beautiful to see howdifferent people live the
experience of belgium, whicheveryone, everyone lives it in a
(53:38):
different way.
So don't think, oh, I need todo it like father ph, oh, I need
to do it like Father Philip, orI need to do it like this
person, or that.
Just do it as you can.
It's the same with prayer,isn't it?
We pray as we can, not as wethink we ought to, or should, or
things.
Let's just, let's try to bereal.
Joan (53:54):
Amen.
Well, thank you, Father.
This was great.
Thank Well, thank you, Father.
This was great.
Thank you so much for theconversation.
Thank you, listeners, forlistening and tune in again when
we talk about the pilgrimage oflife on NVEA.
God bless.
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