If God is everywhere, why go on a pilgrimage?

(The Catholic Spirit | Liz Kelly for The Catholic Spirit | June 19, 2014)  I once read that Minnesota has one of the highest numbers of perpetual Eucharistic adoration chapels in the country. Truly, God is with us.

If that’s the case, do I really need to haul myself at great effort and expense — enduring, God forbid, other pilgrims! — to some dusty foreign land to pay him homage, to make known my needs for healing, forgiveness, grace? The answer of course is, no — and perhaps, yes.

Consider: Jesus was a regular pilgrim. The Gospel of Luke tells us he would make the journey to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover every year with his parents.

The earliest pilgrimages were very much like we might imagine this journey was for Jesus: a caravan of company walking for days together along dusty mountain roads, no doubt their minds humming with the familiar prayer of the psalmist: “‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!’ Our feet are standing within your gates, O Jerusalem. . . . To it the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, As was decreed for Israel, to give thanks to the name of the Lord.”

Binding our hearts

To walk where Jesus walked, and pray where he prayed, and learn more intimately the heart of that healing carpenter from Nazareth, a pilgrimage, particularly to the Holy Land, does mark us in a unique way.

When we make a pilgrimage, we are binding our hearts to every pilgrim-saint who has journeyed before us and to every longing of the human soul to seek more deeply, more authentically the face of God.

As Father Murray Bodo writes in his excellent book, “The Place We Call Home: Spiritual Pilgrimage As a Path to God,” “Pilgrimages are not about one place being more holy than another, for God is everywhere. Making pilgrimages involves a response to something inside us that longs to move toward, that seeks the holy beyond.”

And, the good news is, this can happen even on a tour bus with Wi-Fi.

The pilgrim’s credo

I am not in control.

I am not in a hurry.

I walk in faith and hope.

I greet everyone with peace.

I bring back only what God gives me.

The Holy Land

As Christians, we would have no other pilgrimage — to Lourdes, to Ars, to Guadalupe, to the Station Churches of Rome during the Lenten season, to walk the Camino, to climb the Holy Steps on our knees — without the birthplace of our pilgrim souls: Jerusalem.

For such a tiny bit of geography, Israel in general and Jerusalem in particular, has a history fraught with every kind of tension — religious, political, economic. This in some ways is what makes it uniquely fitting to the pilgrim heart. For you will not awake at 4 a.m. in Jerusalem to the sound of church bells, but to the Muslim call to prayer, those low and moaning tones lifted to Allah drifting out over a sleeping city.

And, at the Wailing Wall — the place according to Jewish tradition where Abraham was asked to sacrifice Isaac — you will see that men and women are separated, the women only recently granted a small portion to approach this holiest of Jewish ground with their prayers. Jerusalem is a powerful clash of orthodoxies. It heightens in fresh ways the truly radical teaching of Christ.

And so we go, not to escape the travails of everyday life, but to give them perspective.

We go, not to take a vacation or recreate, but to allow God to re-create our deepest selves.

We take our broken hearts and broken bodies across oceans and over thousands of miles, sitting for hours in cramped airplanes and airports, to distant shrines and ancient ruins, to places where the language and culture may be unfamiliar and uncomfortable — not to remind God, but to remind ourselves that we are part of an eternal narrative, a glorious true story of hope, resurrection and redemptive victory.

We endure the jostle of crowds and the chatter of tour guides even in these, the holiest places on earth, because it helps us to remember the proper horizon of our lives is not health, wealth, comfort, success, being well loved or highly regarded — but a sweeping need for healing and grace and the eternal good news, all of which Jesus wants to provide in abundance.

Preparation helps

The Church teaches that “pilgrimages evoke our earthly journey toward heaven and are . . . special occasions for renewal in prayer.” Indeed, central to any pilgrimage must be prayer — prayer that begins long before you decide which shoes to pack.

My preparation — one I highly recommend if possible — included completing the Ignatian Exercises over the nine months prior to my departure. The Exercises invite you to meditate in a very concentrated way on the life of Christ.

My spiritual director would tell me: “Look at what Jesus is doing in your meditation, dwell with him.” It is a fitting definition for any “pilgrimage” great or small: We go to dwell with him.

Kelly is the author of five books, including “Reasons I Love Being Catholic,” and recently returned from her first pilgrimage to the Holy Land.

Video: "Jesus: A Pilgrimage" a conversation with Fr. James Martin, SJ

This video is so down-to-earth, transparent, humble and honest.  

We highly recommend you watch this video and read Fr. James Martin's, SJ book "Jesus: A Pilgrimage".

Pilgrimage: music and memories

by Allison D'Ambrosia; March 20, 2014 (Sophomore; St. Mary's College)

Over spring break, 55 of my closest friends and I went to France. I’m part of the Notre Dame Liturgical Choir, and every other year, the choir goes on an international tour. This year: France. We went to many cities including Beyeux, Chartres, Le Mons and Paris. I don’t know how to pare down all the stories, laughs, walks, metro rides, singing and breath-taking moments that happened in just one week — but I shall try.

We began as five moms, one dad, two directors, three grad student conductors, one priest and 55 college students all sitting at O’Hare airport, equipped with our four blue things: passport, plane ticket, choir robe and tour binder, filled with the music that will ring in my head for many weeks to come. This was the very beginning of our adventures and the snapping of pictures that never seemed to end over the next week.

I only have time (and room) to name just a few of my favorite memories from the trip.

A tradition of the choir is to have a community “Tour Journal,” which is passed around during the week for people to write down stories, quotes, experiences, etc. they want to share and remember. As we were riding from site to site, I loved sitting on the bus reading people’s thoughts and stories.

One entry in particular struck me as this entry was alike my own feelings. We sang at a Carmelite convent church in a town that was very affected by the air raids of World War II. After we sang for mass, we gave a brief concert. One of the pieces we sang is Mendelsohn’s  “Richte Mich, Gott.” I was shocked by how overcome I became while singing this piece, which we had rehearsed 100 times and had already performed eight. But singing in German in a place that had experience so much suffering and trauma at the hands of the Germans, I felt incredibly uncomfortable. Some of the audience members seemed a tad taken aback by our song choice as well, yet we kept on singing.

In a sense, the beauty of the piece and the emotion with which we sang it overcame the awkwardness of the location. I feel like we were able to portray the hurt and devastation — even if it was only by a minuscule amount — by our performance, which somehow ironically removed the gap between audience and performer. The lyrics, from Psalm 43, made sense in the context. We sang: “Rescue me from those who are deceitful and wicked. You are God my stronghold.” This, for me, was one of the most moving performances during our entire tour.

The views expressed in this Inside Column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.

The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.

Pope Francis to make pilgrimage to Albania on September 21, 2014

(Vatican Radio) At his Angelus address on Sunday, Pope Francis announced that he will be visiting the city of Tirana in Albania on Sunday 21 September. “With this brief visit,” he said, “I want to confirm the Church of Albania in the faith, and bear witness to my encouragement and love for a country that has suffered for so long in consequence of the ideologies of the past.”

Pope Francis making Mexico pilgrimage in 2015

(CNA/EWTN News).- President Enrique Peña Nieto on Saturday announced that Pope Francis has accepted an invitation to visit Mexico.

“Without doubt, this is cause for great joy,” President Peña Nieto declared after telling reporters the Pope “has accepted the invitation.”

The president made the announcement after his private meeting with the pontiff in the Apostolic Palace.

The dates for the visit are not known, but could come near the Pope’s hoped-for visit to Philadelphia for the World Meeting for Families in late September 2015. Such a visit to the U.S. has not been confirmed by the Vatican.

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Pope Francis looks to Philippines & Sri Lanka for next pilgrimage

Aboard the papal plane, May 27, 2014 / 05:43 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- On his return flight from the Holy Land, Pope Francis announced that he will visit Sri Lanka and the Philippines in January 2015.

“There are two Asian trips planned: one to South Korea and then next January, a two-day trip to Sri Lanka and the Philippines, to the area affected by the tsunami,” Pope Francis said during an in-flight press conference May 26, according to the Italian newspaper La Stampa.

Pope Paul VI visited the Philippines in 1970. St. John Paul II visited the Philippines in 1981 and again in 1995 during a trip that included Sri Lanka, Australia, and Papua New Guinea.

In February, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith of the Sri Lankan capital of Colombo had invited Pope Francis to visit the country.

“I welcome this invitation, and I think the Lord will grant us the grace,” the Pope told Sri Lankan pilgrims at the Vatican Feb. 8.

Pope Francis also acknowledged that “many tears have been shed” by the...

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Pilgrimage to Italy meaningful to visitors

By Judy Horan / World-Herald correspondent

Trappist nuns carefully watch over a more-than-2,000-year-old veil in the ancient Italian town of Manoppello. The veil, said to have covered Christ during his burial and resurrection, is believed to show the image of his face. It is displayed in the Basilica of the Holy Face.

For University of Nebraska-Lincoln philosophy major Ben Mattern, who recently was part of a group that traveled to Italy, seeing the face on the veil in person was an awesome experience.

“If you lay this cloth up against the Shroud of Turin, they match perfectly,” Mattern said. “We spent the morning for three hours praying and reflecting on the cloth. We had Mass there. It was a very big moment for everybody in our group.”

Mattern was one of 44 college students, mostly from UNL, who signed up for the March 20-30 trip, the fourth pilgrimage to Italy sponsored by the Newman Center.

“When you come into the church, the veil is completely transparent. You can see through it, but when light hits the silk, the image of Christ’s face is clearly seen,” said the Rev. Ben Holdren, associate pastor of St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church, who led the pilgrimage. “Nobody knows quite sure how the image is there.”

Holdren also is assistant spiritual director for the Newman Center, a student organization attached to the church on UNL’s campus.

He said the Newman Center and St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church are busy places for “huskercatholic” students. (Students can be seen wearing T-shirts with “huskercatholic” on them). About 1,200 students walk through the doors Sunday for Mass. More than 600 students participate in Bible studies.

Another face that awed Mattern on the pilgrimage was the smiling face of Pope Francis in Vatican City.

“One of the biggest highlights was seeing the pope and seeing his great joy for all of us. The Holy Father had this huge smile on his face. He loves seeing us as much as we loved to see him,” the UNL senior said.

Sophomore Kathryn Kopetzky, an education major at UNL, sat about 5 feet from the popemobile as Pope Francis rode by, greeting visitors before his papal address.

“Being that close to Pope Francis was so incredible,” she said. “I’ve seen videos and pictures of him, but it was different just being that close to him, seeing him in real life and seeing he was an actual person.”

Pope Francis addressed the group in Italian, and priests from countries that were represented translated.

Mattern found joy at St. Peter’s Basilica, the center of the Catholic faith, despite waiting in St. Peter’s Square for three hours in pouring rain.

“My group was surrounded by Italians and French people, and we were having a good time and talking and laughing,” he said.

“Joy spread all around, in spite of the fact that we couldn’t communicate with each other. It was so much fun. One person would start a song, and others would join in. The joy was infectious.”

Kopetzky was struck, while at the papal audience, by how Catholicism brings the world together.

“The pope was translated into about seven different languages,” Kopetzky said. “They were from all over the world, but were united being Catholic.”

The group from Lincoln celebrated Mass at the Tomb of John Paul II in St. Peter’s Basilica.

“He was the pope for most of my life growing up,” Kopetzky said. “The pope was kind and loving. He always said, ‘Do not be afraid,’ and that stuck with me. I’ve always had a love of him.”

Holdren said the visit is about making Christianity tangible.

“We can actually go to the place where the first Christians would have had Mass in underground catacombs,” he said. “We can actually physically see the bones of St. Peter and climb the stairs that Jesus would have climbed when condemned by Pontius Pilate.”

Mattern climbed the same Holy Stairs that Christ had climbed. The Lincoln student ascended the steep staircase on his knees along with other pilgrims. There are 28 steps.

“It’s incredibly painful, but we made it up by the grace of God,” said Mattern, who stopped to pray on each step while climbing. Despite the pain, he managed the climb in 30 minutes.

“It’s a very spiritual experience.”

For Mattern, the pilgrimage was a way of getting away from routine life to spend time with God.

“I needed some time away from the daily grind of life to spend time with Him so he could reveal to me all the changes in my life I needed to do,” he said. “The 10 days were very spiritual. A lot of things were revealed to me that I need to work on. Some were hard to hear, and some were great to hear.”

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Video message of Custos of Holy Land on Pope Francis pilgrimage to the Holy Land May 24-26

"I cried over reports of crucified Christians," says Pope Francis

(CNA/EWTN News).- In his daily homily on May 2, Pope Francis said that he wept over recent news of Christians allegedly being crucified, reflecting that there are still many martyrs in today’s world.

“I cried when I saw reports on the news of Christians crucified in a certain country, that is not Christian,” the Pope said, according to Vatican Radio, during morning Mass in the chapel of his residence.

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Tekton pilgrimage priest walks in on burglar stealing relics

Rev. Andrew Dudzinski is a priest who has traveled with Tekton Ministries in the past.  He is also Pastor of St. Mary Catholic Church in Muncie, IN.

Police in Muncie say a burglar took what's believed to be a bone fragment  (relic) from a 15th century saint when he broke into a church rectory.

Police say a priest at St. Mary Catholic Church found the man rifling through his belongings when he returned to the rectory after a service Sunday afternoon. The priest told police that the man pulled out a hammer before fleeing.

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Pope at Easter Vigil: 'Return to Galilee' and rediscover God's grace

Below is the full text of Pope Francis’ Easter Vigil homily:

The Gospel of the resurrection of Jesus Christ begins with the journey of the women to the tomb at dawn on the day after the Sabbath. They go to the tomb to honour the body of the Lord, but they find it open and empty. A mighty angel says to them: “Do not be afraid!” (Mt 28:5) and orders them to go and tell the disciples: “He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee” (v. 7). The women quickly depart and on the way Jesus himself meets them and says: “Do not fear; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me” (v. 10).

After the death of the Master, the disciples had scattered; their faith had been utterly shaken, everything seemed over, all their certainties had crumbled and their hopes had died. But now that message of the women, incredible as it was, came to them like a ray of light in the darkness. The news spread: Jesus is risen as he said. And then there was his command to go to Galilee; the women had heard it twice, first from the angel and then from Jesus himself: “Let them go to Galilee; there they will see me”.

Galilee is the place where they were first called, where everything began! To return there, to return to the place where they were originally called. Jesus had walked along the shores of the lake as the fishermen were casting their nets. He had called them, and they left everything and followed him (cf. Mt 4:18-22).

To return to Galilee means to re-read everything on the basis of the cross and its victory. To re-read everything – Jesus’ preaching, his miracles, the new community, the excitement and the defections, even the betrayal – to re-read everything starting from the end, which is a new beginning, from this supreme act of love.

For each of us, too, there is a “Galilee” at the origin of our journey with Jesus. “To go to Galilee” means something beautiful, it means rediscovering our baptism as a living fountainhead, drawing new energy from the sources of our faith and our Christian experience. To return to Galilee means above all to return to that blazing light with which God’s grace touched me at the start of the journey. From that flame I can light a fire for today and every day, and bring heat and light to my brothers and sisters. That flame ignites a humble joy, a joy which sorrow and distress cannot dismay, a good, gentle joy.

In the life of every Christian, after baptism there is also a more existential “Galilee”: the experience of a personal encounter with Jesus Christ who called me to follow him and to share in his mission. In this sense, returning to Galilee means treasuring in my heart the living memory of that call, when Jesus passed my way, gazed at me with mercy and asked me to follow him. It means reviving the memory of that moment when his eyes met mine, the moment when he made me realize that he loved me.

Today, tonight, each of us can ask: What is my Galilee? Where is my Galilee? Do I remember it? Have I forgotten it? Have I gone off on roads and paths which made me forget it? Lord, help me: tell me what my Galilee is; for you know that I want to return there to encounter you and to let myself be embraced by your mercy.

The Gospel of Easter is very clear: we need to go back there, to see Jesus risen, and to become witnesses of his resurrection. This is not to go back in time; it is not a kind of nostalgia. It is returning to our first love, in order to receive the fire which Jesus has kindled in the world and to bring that fire to all people, to the very ends of the earth.

“Galilee of the Gentiles” (Mt 4:15; Is 8:23)! Horizon of the Risen Lord, horizon of the Church; intense desire of encounter… Let us be on our way!

Delta with all new seating section

(Fox; AP photo) Delta Airlines has teamed up with LinkedIn to launch a program which matches up leaders in various fields on their way to major industry events and up-and-coming professionals whose applications meet a special set of criteria.  Both get a free first class seat and are encouraged to exchange ideas and gain valuable knowledge along the way.  Delta has named this new seating section "innovation class".

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Canonization date set: April 27, 2014, Divine Mercy Sunday - Book with us today!

Tekton Ministries is excited to announce the Canonizations for Blessseds John XXIII and John Paul II on April 27, 2014 -Divine Mercy Sunday- in Rome.  We pray in thanksgiving to God for the lives of these two great popes and look very forward to forming pilgrimages to Rome and Assisi to participate in this historic event.  Book your pilgrimage today!  www.tektonministries.org

Vocation Directors- Listen up!

If you're a vocation director and don't think making pilgrimages is important for young adults, then watch this video!  Many young adults have been touched by God on pilgrimages and answered calls to the priesthood and religious life.  Forget you billboards and book a pilgrimage. (lol)  Just sayin'.

Museum pieces, no; they inspire us to grow in holiness

How many tour companies can assure you that you will have a priest on almost every single pilgrimage who offers confessions and daily Mass?  Not many.  But we do.

Part of that is the collaborative work of our ministry with priests.  Part of that is that we take prayer seriously on our pilgrimage as an authentic, Catholic pilgrimage provider.  But our priests have to be encouraged to make/lead pilgrimages.  Not only is a pilgrimage good for the priest himself but for his people as well.

Some think of Catholic shrines as museums.  As one priest said to a group of interested pilgrims the other night, "They're not there to be museum pieces but to inspire us to grow in holiness."

Well said Father!

Please encourage your parish priest to lead a pilgrimage with us.  Talk to him and have him call us.  Or we'll call him. Either way, let's get our priests on a pilgrimage!

Destination weddings, Catholic-style

Non-Catholic couples often decide on "destination weddings".  What are they?  They are weddings in which the bride and groom choose an exotic resort or a favorite place they share in order to get married.  Catholics can also do so but in a Catholic Church near or in that location.  But what about this idea?  A Catholic pilgrimage as a way of celebrating a destination wedding?

That was the case for two Italians who met on a pilgrimage and fell in love.  They made the decision to return to the place they fell in love and, there, be united in holy matrimony in the midst of their family, friends, fellow pilgrims and even pilgrims who happened to be visiting the Church at the time.  The Church of St. Catherine, located near the Church of the Nativity, was host for the wedding which was a simple, spirit-filled celebration of the Lord and our pilgrimage to him- and in this case, as a man and woman joining together in the sacred bond of marriage began to do so together.

Congratulazioni! Per Cent'Anni!

Check out this short video from TerraSanctablog.org then like and share it.

Just when you think you know it all...

Just when I think I know it all, something happens that makes me realize that, in fact, I know very little.  

It happened to me last night.  Over a delicious rib-eye dinner with a priest-friend, he began to tell me about the Shrine of St. Anne de Beaupré.  The more he described its beauty and the peacefulness of the place, the more I realized, "Yeah, I've never even heard of that shrine."  

Interesting huh?  Especially since it happens to be one of the oldest pilgrimage sites of North America, going back to 1658.  Many miracles, officially recognized, have occurred there. Though not a big pilgrimage place to start, more than 1.5 million pilgrims make their way north of Quebec City to pray for themselves and their loved ones.  

Not only that, but from the pictures, the place is just downright beautiful.  Located on the historic St. Lawrence River, the Basilica is surrounded by some of the most beautiful country around.  The shrine can even be reached by boat from the river.  

The most popular pilgrimage season is during the summer around the feast day of St. Anne but from all the photos, I think I'd want to go in the Fall.  The many trees and rolling hills, the big skies and cliffs along the river make for something amazin' to see.  If going across the ocean isn't your thing this year, our new 7 day pilgrimage to the Catholic Shrines of Canada might be in the works for you.

Assisi-bound!

Pope Francis is headed to his namesake’s hometown. When? Why, the patron’s feast day of course- October 4, 2013.  

Announcing earlier this month that he would like to make a pilgrimage to Sicily in September, now the Holy Father would like to make a pilgrimage to Assisi.  (My guess is he’ll do both on the same pilgrimage as a way to save a couple bucks.)  One doesn’t have to reach very far to conclude that he’ll probably offer himself and his papacy to the poor saint from Assisi’s intercession.  

On a related note, since being elected I’ve wanted to know the story behind the Pope’s choice of the name Francis.  It comes to us in his own words in an article published by Zenit.  The articles concerning his pilgrimage and his name happen to be the same.  

Daily News/Photo

After his election, Pope Francis explained in his first audience with journalists in Rome, why he chose the name of the “Poor One of Assisi.” Upon confirmation that he had received the majority of votes to the papacy, Cardinal Claudio Hummes, Archbishop Emeritus of Sao Paolo and friend of the Holy Father, told the newly elected Pope: “Don’t forget the poor.”

“And those words came to me: the poor, the poor,” Pope Francis told journalists on March 16th. “Then, right away, thinking of the poor, I thought of Francis of Assisi.  Then I thought of all the wars, as the votes were still being counted, till the end.  Francis is also the man of peace.  That is how the name came into my heart: Francis of Assisi.”

"Oh no pro nobis" - Kid singing Ave Maria

While viewing Google+ posts, I came across this video posted by Michael Sestak.  He titles it, "Little Child Sings 'Ave Maria' for a Pilgrimage".  He was quick to joke about the pronunciation of "Ora pro nobis" as "Oh No pro nobis". Cute video.  I like that he's got it down for whenever he makes his first pilgrimage.

Cross landing: 63 days remaining until WYD '13

Cross landing: 63 days remaining until WYD '13.

In this photo from CNS/Reuters found on catholicnews.com, sailors from the Brazilian Navy deliver the World Youth Day cross to a representative group of young Catholics who will continue the global procession that has carried this crossIt has taken part in WYD in Paris (1997), Rome (2000), Toronto (2002), Cologne (2005) and Sydney (2008). It also travelled around Africa(2006), Oceania(2007), Australia (2009) and Spain (2011) according to centrosanlorenzo.com which houses the cross.

Now in 2013, as young pilgrims make final preparations for Rio 2013, the cross has landed upon the shores of the new Pope's home continent.  I'm sure this duty was not one that these sailors had in mind when they signed up to defend their country on the seas.  Yet what a significant and symbolic role they played as they brought the cross from sea to land, government cooperating with religion, a way of truly defending their country againt evil.