Modern Pilgrims, Ancient Calling - a Panel Conversation

hfenton said:

Mony,
I enjoyed the discussion between the three of you and was particularly struck by the analogy of Dorothy as a pilgrim and that she didn't reach the Emerald City on her own; she was accompanied by a ragtag group of fellow travelers/pilgrims each in search of something they thought was uniquely missing in their lives.

I was also interested in the idea of pilgrimage reversing the order of who serves and who is served; that a pilgrim steps into a role of accepting help from others, of allowing others to give, of becoming vulnerable. In this sense pilgrims enable others to become "pilgrim angels," and later, along the way, pilgrims once on the receiving end of kindness find themselves in a position to reciprocate.

The same day I found your discussion I heard an interview with Rick Steves on the topic of travel as a spiritual act, a riff on his book, Travel as a Political Act. See the link below.


During the discussion, Rick identified three reasons why we travel, or three types of travel:
1. the tourist who travels for fun, to do fun things.
2. the traveler who travels to learn about another culture or historical events; to gain an appreciation for others.
3. the pilgrim who travels with the intent of learning about self from a distance in a different environment; to find answers to the age old questions where did we come from, why are we here, and where will we go.

It should be obvious to all that these categories aren't hard and fast. A tourist in a foreign country may learn something about its culture that they begin to appreciate it to the extent they become a "traveler." And, as a further development, that same individual may in turn discover something about his or herself such that they reconsider what makes them who are. In this case we have the making of an "accidental pilgrim."

Discussions about what it means to be a pilgrim and what is pilgrimage seldom settle on fixed responses and, like many things in life, the discussions reveal the rich breadth and depth of the many notions people have, and that they wouldn't be wrong.

Buen Camino.
Howard

Click to expand...