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That's fantastic - thank youYes, you can dedicate to both your parents.
Jostony,
I am with you all the way in understanding: I like your thoughtful considerations. It is perfectly possible to achieve what you want. Just explain to the pilgrims office clerk, and you will get a Compostela with your name and "In vicario pro" written on it, and the name(s) of who you walked for/carried in your mind. You carried them with you: It is a beautiful gesture by you- Respect.
Never forget to love your parents dearly: In pain and passion, literally (birth labor and love time), they brought you here to life with the rest of us living beings. Which is truly a blessing. And I think you are.
Thank you. That is good to hear. I might type names out as my handwriting isn't great!As others have stated,yes you can , and I always write the names ahead of time on a paper so the spelling of the names is correct. They do a beautiful job doing this on the Compostelas
Sorry to raise a personal question but I would welcome some guidance. One if not the main reason I have committed to walk my Camino is in memory of parents, following my mother's death last year having suffered many years with Altzeimers and losing my beloved father to cancer some years back . Can anyone tell me whether it is possible to ask the Pilgrim's office in Santiago to annotate my parents names under mine on the Compostela? If so would they be prepared to write both their names or would I be limited to only one?
Thanks for your helpful replyMy first Camino Frances, in 2013, I did for myself and celebrated my 60th birthday at the Friday pilgrim Mass at the Cathedral. That was a wonderful way to commemorate the first-half of my life.
In 2014, I did it again. Only THIS TIME I dedicated the Camino to the memory of my brother, who died in 1991, at age 34. If you speak to the folks at the Pilgrim Office counter about this, you can receive a second, memorial certificate (another variety of Compostela for the deceased if you will). Also, if you carefully read the Cathedral's web site regarding issuing the Compostela,ma check any FAQs, it does say that one can ask for and receive a Compostela for a deceased person.
I think this is a wonderful way to memorialize your mother. In my case, my mother and father were both thrilled. I surprised them with the certificate, which was generously printed in English. Mom framed the certificate and it hangs In my parents living room.
I hope this helps.
Thank-you for asking this question. We are going to walk next year in memory of my mother-in-law, whom we also lost last year. Although my mother-in-law wasn't my actual mother, I was fortunate enough to have been very close to her and always considered her a 2nd mom. I understand some of what you are going through.
In our case, we walked part of the Camino last year - we almost postponed because my mother-in-law was sick, but she insisted that we go. She was very supportive of our plans - I don't know that she quite understood what we were doing, but she was supportive nonetheless. That was the kind of person that she was. Well, she passed away while we were on the Camino, so we had to cut our Camino short and come home. Before we had even reached home, we knew that we would come back and we would walk in her memory. I didn't know that a person could officially walk in someone else's memory though and have that person's name on their compostela.
I am so encouraged to hear that others carry parents and loved ones with them. For me, loss came early. My only brother died in a single-car accident when he was only 18. I was 19 at the time. That burden was so heavy for so many years, and the implications of losing an only son (for my parents) meant so many sadnesses: the family name, no longer carried; the joy of his companionship and humor throughout the years; missing out on his first: the wife, the children, the travel through the years.
When Mom died in 2011, my stepdad asked me to get her things all cleaned up within the three-week period. After being the only one at the hospital during the emotionally difficult event, to then have the task of organizing the service (and then, cleaning up) was almost unbearable. And there, in a special trunk, were my brother's things: his little boy scout cap; his graduation photos, his letters to a girlfriend (unrequited love at its purest).
Fast-forward seven months: my father, with him I was also very close, died in May of 2012. The two-week period between Mom's ceremony and Dad absolutely tanking meant that the seven-month hospice program was more than difficult.
I am not sure that I will do my camino for them: I may do them for myself, my rebirth into normalcy. It has taken me just. about. this. long. to feel okay again! Thank God for all good things. I wish you the best of luck, and buen camino!
Jostomy: in the spirit of remembrance, and with great joy and excitement, I want to share this news with you....I JUST BOOKED MY TICKET! I will depart Portland, Oregon on 28 September 2015, and will arrive in Madrid in about a 24-hour period! I have booked a return on the 14th of November; I wanted to give myself a lot of time for my Camino, but did not want the worry or expensive of not having a return ticket. Cool, right?
Good on you.Jostony,
I should say: My next camino will be in the name of another person. I will apply for a "Vicario pro"
The story is so bad/sad, I will not get into horrific details here...
Thanks for clarying this for me. This sounds perfectI was happy to be able to share this information with others on the forum. Here is one valid source of information from the Pilgrim Office web site: http://peregrinossantiago.es/eng/pilgrimage/plenary-indulgence/
I want to clarify that there is no "Compostela" for the deceased person, per se. The Pilgrim's Office can produce a separate document with the Catherdral seal, that attests to the pilgrimage made by the live person, in memory and on behalf of the deceased person. This certificate is very attractive and looks similar to a Compostela, but is not actually a Compostela. However for the purpose of memorializing and obtaining a plenary indulgence for a deceased person, it suffices.
I hope this helps.
When I went out to the Camino was after my mother's unexpected death. Not only unexpected but quite shocking in how the news was delivered to me. My mom was from Santander, left Spain when she was 9, to find herself a refugee in France. She only was able to go back after Franco's death. She then managed to recouperate her citizenship and I then applied for mine. Love my red passport!
Since she was from Santander I wanted to walk del Norte, but back then (2007), distances between albergues were too long for me, so I headed to SJPP and walked until Burgos, when I had to come back to work. I heard her every step of the way. Kept wondering if my grandparents's footsteps had perhaps been exactly where I was standing. After getting to Burgos I took to the bus to Santander and left the small rock I took from where she is burried in the Cathedral of Santander cloister: my Grandparents were married there, and again celebrated their 60th anniversary (post Franco, with my mom and I in attendance) there.
I did not know you could get a compostela in memory of someone. Had I known, would I have started in Leon to get to Santiago in the time I had? I don't know. I'm glad I started in SJPP, because, with hindsight, that makes it also MY camino and not just one I am doing in memory of a person I loved. Because the toughest part of my greiving process was becoming my own person, not just the person my mother tried to shape to her ideal.
This spring I am walking the Primitivo and will make it to Santiago (and as I type this I remember I am wearing a Drarchy ball to help with my plantear fasciitis ;0) ) - I'll think about asking for one. One thing is certain to me though: if I was walking in someone's memory, I would stop having that conversation with my monkey mind about "are we there yet" and just walk. Perhaps I'll do it in memory of my boarding school advisor and math teacher: I have disappointed my mother many times, but him ... I couldn't let him down. He's the person in whose memory I have planned a bequest for after all.
Five million years of that attitude is how we got here! When I trace a genealogical line back a couple thousand years, I realize that it is a blink in the line that goes back to australopithecus. A lot of survivors got me here, so I owe something to those in the future.we do have to continue to live our lives
I agree. Well said.Thanks Jostony. It's hard, but we do have to continue to live our lives. Whenever I start to get too down about loss of my mother-in-law, I think about how best to honor her memory - which is to keep on living the best life I know how. That's all she ever wanted for any of us, so we owe that to her.
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