- Time of past OR future Camino
- First one in 1977 by train. Many since then by foot. Next one ASAP.
I write this on Jan 1st....
On the current Roman Catholic liturgical calender Jan 1st is the Solemnity of Mary the Mother of God -- but it used to be (until at least the 1970s, I believe) the Feast of the Circumcision -- and it is still the Feast of the Circumcison on the traditional Anglican Catholic liturgical calender used at my parish....
A learned writer on a learned website that I glanced at this morning, observed that "Having the Holy Foreskin was apparently a big honor (or a big tourist draw).....[Among the] places that claimed to have Jesus' Foreskin was: ... Santiago de Compostela.... By the 19th century, all [seventeen claimed Holy Foreskins] had disappeared or been destroyed, except for the one in Calcata, Italy...." (Whew! I'm not sorry for that, btw! Can you imagine hearing folks demand the cloning of the... No! Let's not go there....)
All of which is a build-up to my plea, and my complaint!
Anglican Catholics (and a considerable number of Protestants, too) have recovered from the wreckage of the 16th C Reformation both a renewed respect for pilgrimage and a renewed curiousity about relics.... Even on the now-largely-secularized Camino of 2019 there are going to be a considerable number of people -- simple, conventionally religious people of the Latin Western persuasion, like me -- who would go way out of their way to gawk at/contemplate/venerate Holy Relics..... Holy Foreskin? Piece of the True Cross? Hipbone of St. Saturninus? Far out! This Anglican Catholic, for one, would take pains to check 'em all out!
So: Why has no-one yet published a serious modern guide to the Holy Relics of the Camino Frances? There must be an enormous number of them! ... I'd buy that sucker faster than the latest edition of the Gospel According to Brierley!
Pax. And Happy New Year!
On the current Roman Catholic liturgical calender Jan 1st is the Solemnity of Mary the Mother of God -- but it used to be (until at least the 1970s, I believe) the Feast of the Circumcision -- and it is still the Feast of the Circumcison on the traditional Anglican Catholic liturgical calender used at my parish....
A learned writer on a learned website that I glanced at this morning, observed that "Having the Holy Foreskin was apparently a big honor (or a big tourist draw).....[Among the] places that claimed to have Jesus' Foreskin was: ... Santiago de Compostela.... By the 19th century, all [seventeen claimed Holy Foreskins] had disappeared or been destroyed, except for the one in Calcata, Italy...." (Whew! I'm not sorry for that, btw! Can you imagine hearing folks demand the cloning of the... No! Let's not go there....)
All of which is a build-up to my plea, and my complaint!
Anglican Catholics (and a considerable number of Protestants, too) have recovered from the wreckage of the 16th C Reformation both a renewed respect for pilgrimage and a renewed curiousity about relics.... Even on the now-largely-secularized Camino of 2019 there are going to be a considerable number of people -- simple, conventionally religious people of the Latin Western persuasion, like me -- who would go way out of their way to gawk at/contemplate/venerate Holy Relics..... Holy Foreskin? Piece of the True Cross? Hipbone of St. Saturninus? Far out! This Anglican Catholic, for one, would take pains to check 'em all out!
So: Why has no-one yet published a serious modern guide to the Holy Relics of the Camino Frances? There must be an enormous number of them! ... I'd buy that sucker faster than the latest edition of the Gospel According to Brierley!
Pax. And Happy New Year!
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