Pilgrimage as a metaphor - reflection

Reflections on pilgrimage as a
metaphor
A Lenten re
fl
ection by Fr. Robert P. Maloney, C.M.

Over the centuries pilgrimages
have enjoyed immense popularity
among Catholics. Many of us know
people who have made their way
to Fatima, Lourdes, Guadalupe,
Luján, or Rue du Bac. Millions will
walk through the Holy Door at St.
Peter’s or trace the Way of the
Cross in Jerusalem.
Of course, Catholics are not alone
in fostering pilgrimages. Jews
fl
ock
to the Holy Land. Moslems travel
to Mecca. Hindus journey to the
Ganges.
Image: Square in front of the Basilica of Fatima (public domain, Wikimedia Commons)

Pilgrimage is a metaphor for the
whole Christian life. Its biblical roots
run deep. The authors of Exodus
and Deuteronomy depict a pilgrim
people whom Yahweh loves and
forms as he leads them toward the
promised land.
Many of the psalms are pilgrim
songs, ringing out God’s praises as
his people “go up to the house of
the Lord” (Pss 42:5; 43:4; 122:1).
Luke’s gospel, beginning with 9:51,
focuses on following Christ to
Jerusalem, and Luke’s second book,
the Acts, describes Christianity as
“the Way” (Acts 9:2; 18:25; 24:22).
Image: The Camp Before Mt. Sinai by James Tissot (detail).
Courtesy of The Jewish Museum, New York.

This Lent, let me suggest to you
three re
fl
ections about pilgrimage
in its metaphorical sense.
Image: Vincent as pilgrim. Carved panels, in cassock, cape, hat,
carrying bag and pilgrim's staff; background of charitable works;
Vincentian seal above. Original in Germany.

It is a desert experience like that of
the people of God in the Exodus or
that of Jesus at the beginning of
the synoptic gospels. Its goal is to
immerse us more deeply into the
mystery of the death and
resurrection of the Lord as we
journey toward the Kingdom of
God.
Lent itself is a pilgrimage.
Image: from the book Ridpath’s Universal History, 1894. No restrictions.

Since most of us will not be
journeying literally during these 40
days, the question is:
What will we do, metaphorically, to
alter the humdrum circumstances
of our everyday lives so that we
might have a heightened
consciousness of our baptismal
commitment to follow Christ even
to death, and thus share in the joy
of his resurrection?

Once, in the not-too-distant past, fasting altered
our daily regime during Lent and focused our
attention, even physically, on the deeper
renunciations involved in the following of Christ.
Now that fasting is rarer, what might we do to
change our environment and sharpen our focus?
Might we carve out more substantial periods of
desert-like silence? Might we rise earlier to ponder
the scriptures and turn them over in our hearts like
Mary the Mother of Jesus? Might we engage in
voluntary fasting, or quit smoking, or moderate our
use of alcohol? Might we turn o
ff
the television or
the radio or the video player in the evening in order
to have time for lectio divina?

That is the principle meaning of the
metaphor and it is precisely what
Lent seeks to recall to us.
Do we really sense that we are
pilgrims in life?
Of course, not just Lent
but all of life is a
pilgrimage.

While deeply appreciating the beauty and value of
created things, can we say with conviction, as did
St. Paul (1 Cor 7:29-31):
“From now on those with wives should live as
though they had none; those who weep should live
as though they were not weeping, and those who
rejoice as though they were not rejoicing; buyers
should conduct themselves as though they owned
nothing, and those who make use of the world as
though they were not using it, for the world as we
know it is passing away”?

Are we eager, and at the same time patient, on the
journey: eager to reach the goal, but patient
because we trust that, though the desert is
trackless, wide, and arid, the Lord accompanies us?
St. Vincent states that patience is the “virtue of the
perfect” (SV X, 181). If that is so, then it is surely
also a virtue to be cultivated by all of us who are
sinners, wayfarers, conscious of our limitations. Are
we patient with ourselves as we come to understand
better, on our pilgrim way, how imperfect we are?
Image: Vincent de Paul in Ethiopian vestments, holding book and
monk's staff; original in Lazarist House chapel, Addis Abeba

One of the privileges I have had, in
my ministry, is to visit so many
Vincentians, Daughters of Charity
and members of our lay groups,
younger and older, precisely as
they accompany the most
abandoned.
In our Vincentian Family, we
choose to make our
pilgrimage in company with
the poor.
Image: Facebook/Daughters of Charity International Project Services

I want to encourage all the members of
our family today to listen ever more
attentively to our neediest fellow
travelers, to work beside those who
experience helplessness in the face of
violence, natural disasters,
unemployment, or similar crises, to love
them deeply as brothers and sisters, to
stand with them in their struggle for
justice, to support them in being agents
of their own human promotion, to be
their soul friends, evangelizing them and
being evangelized by them.

Do the poor perceive us not merely
as aid-givers but as friends whom
they have grown to love on the
journey, as bearers of the genuinely
good news of God’s closeness?

Those are my thoughts this Lent.
This season reminds us that our
pilgrimage, like the Lord’s, will
surely involve su
ff
ering, especially
as our journey becomes more
closely entwined with that of the
poor. I join with you in praying that
su
ff
ering love may be an energizing
force along the way and that as it
develops into dying love it may
burst into the joy of resurrection.
Your brother in St. Vincent,
Robert P. Maloney, C.M.
Superior General
Image: freebibleimages.org/www.LumoProject.com

Maloney, Robert P. C.M. (1999) "Letter of the Superior General: Lent 2000,"
Vincentiana: Vol. 44: No. 1, Article 3.
Available at: https://via.library.depaul.edu/vincentiana/vol44/iss1/3
Images: pexels.com, Wikimedia Commons, freebibleimages.org, Depaul Image Archive
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Pilgrimage as a metaphor - reflection

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