40,000, 50,000 pilgrims, certainly a lot more, the numbers go up like the stock market or profits of the oil companies. The use of the road has been a permanent and fast increasing value for 10 years, the small halts bloom again, the quality rural reception and the shabby scams are starting again. The adventures of the soul too.
Paris, Compostela: 1500, 1600 km according to the routes, two months, two and a half months for a walker with boots of seven leagues (the league is about 4.5 km, so 30 km / day); the same for the return:
A six-month trip!
It is from door to door that it is done. We leave on foot from home and walk back. Everything else is therapeutic or recreational walking. Departures from Puy en Velay, Vézelay, Saint Jean Pied-de-port, Arles, avoid some of the essential: be connected to the corner of land that occupies and bathes us with its scent. Returns by plane or train are cans: it is the return that allows the interior modification. There is no more goal and we return to 30 km / day to the ordinary, our ordinary. The interior modification is at this price.
A pilgrim had gone from Friborg to Switzerland with a donkey. He had planned the six-month trade-union for the return trip and the budjet that goes with it. He had a lot of success with his donkey, of any kind, so he dragged a little, a lot, too much. It took six months to go. Return by plane and sale of his donkey, which, meanwhile, had become his friend. He cried abundantly this beautiful fellow of 35, it took months and months to not really recover. It can be said that he received the “gift of pilgrimage” by “hook-up” and that farewell to the donkey he had to make became a farewell to the donkey in him.
All those who made the one-way ticket have the same reaction: the feeling of lack and incompleteness. Not everyone gets a real gift package.
The worst is those who do it in small pieces. Fifteen days between Vézelay and Cahors, then ten, six months later, between Cahors and Saint Jean Pied-de-port, then again fifteen to Burgos and thirty to reach St Jacques. Some photos, and return by plane. Then, they pontificate their pilgrimage. And even in these cases, the gift package can happen. These gifts follow only one rule: you have to buy your ticket. Maybe you know this story.
Cohen and Yahveh
Cohen dies in Jerusalem. As he has practiced all his life, he comes before Yahweh.
Yahveh, Yahveh, you know me!
– Yes Yes,
… you know my family,
– Yes Yes,
… you know my neighborhood,
– Yes Yes,
… you know my children!
– Yes Yes,
All my life I prayed you to make me win the lottery, all my life !!!
Yahveh raises his eyes and arms to heaven!
– But Cohen, if at least you bought a ticket!
With the pilgrimage, we buy a ticket. All are winners, small or big lots, it is the heart that leads the dance.
V.I.T.R.I.O.L
Visita Interiora Terrae, Rectificandoque Invenies Occultum Lapidem
“visit the interior of the earth, and in rectifying you will find the hidden stone”
Jean-Claude Flornoy died on May 24, 2011. His funeral will be held Saturday, May 28 at 11am in Sainte-Suzanne (Mayenne).
At his request, a dignified procession without too much sadness will leave the Bateleur near the entrance of the castle. The pilgrimage continues. (source)
Eight years already that I lost this childhood friend. Eight long years without news of my benefactor.