"Come with me," she said and walked quickly carrying a ring of truly enormous, jingling iron keys, to a tunnel directly under the high altar where a low, arched and gated stone passageway led to a silver-and-gold reliquary. We were in the heart of Santiago de Compostela, at the source of what had inspired eleven centuries of pilgrims in a reawakening of faith in Europe. Here lay the mortal remains of the soul who inspired the most fabled pilgrimage, after Jerusalem, and over which the cathedral was built. The tomb held the Apostle Saint James or a Roman dignitary. It did not matter.
The nun pointed to a spot next to the bejeweled box and asked, "Would this be alright?" Instantly understanding the gravity of what the nun offered, we nodded. It was.
When we left Santiago a week later, the little flame of Stefanie's uncle, my brother's candle, still flickered dimly beside a vase of roses next to Saint James.
To make the pilgrimage we hiked about 200 kilometers across Galicia - Hobbit country - in about twelve days, sometimes cold, sometimes wet. Never dispirited. Sometimes wandering off to look at ancient churches ("I heard the dogs barking in the fog," the verger gasped clutching his keys and running to catch up, "and I knew you wanted to see the church.") As well as searching out massive installations, now virtually empty, from the great monastic age.
The pilgrimage was a derivative idea. After "Bushey" Shrubb - my old Royal Navy NATO shipmate - put the idea in my head, it wouldn't let go. Bushey and his late wife Josephine had walked to Lourdes using a donkey to carry their kit, and to Santiago with the same donkey and when I heard I was driven to make the hike, too. My wife Bobbie was not so enthusiastic but let me go with Stefanie as my minder, on her winter break from the University of New Mexico where she was deeply engrossed in forensic anthropology.
Eric (right) and Bobbie Berryman looking like an Alpine trooper at the end of their 'camino,' Oct. 2007
(Image by Eric Dietrich-Berryman) Details DMCA
Later in 2007, during a golden October, Bobbie and I hiked the same camino stretch. Once again, the botafumeiro was on display during the noon Mass. There were many more pilgrims this time and only countries of origin were identified, no personal details. A little Spanish girl came through the crowd to ask Bobbie to sit with her family. It's said that pilgrims get the arrival Mass they deserve.
(Article changed on May 13, 2019 at 14:11)
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