I have heard that question a number of times since we began planning a Celticas Spiritus trip late last Spring. So, I thought I would share some reflections about the nature of pilgrimages and why we took a group of pilgrim-tourists out wandering through South-eastern Nebraska, parts of Kansas, and even into Missouri--all to places where I had never been. It was a fun and informative journey with new friends, and a deepening relationship with others I already knew.
"Now, tell me again what you are doing...?" the deacon at St. Mary's Anglican Church asked as we came in before worship. "We are on a pilgimage...a kind of retreat," I tried; and someone else added "We are on a tour exploring places where Celtic people immigrated in the Midwest." Yes to all of these things.
We are a Christian people and for centuries, Christians have left the places where they lived and worshipped to travel with people we don't know (or don't know well) in order to get to know themselves better and to explore their relationship to God and others. Jesus practiced this wandering and teaching, traveling to a variety of places to meet with people in their everyday lives. As he did so, he was able to share with them about his understanding of God and how people should relate to God and to other people.
The Jews were also a wandering people. They had wandered in the desert for forty years, always being a people without a home. Through their history, they became both immigrants and captives in foreign countries. These experiences helped them to develop an understanding of the importance of hospitality--especially in the face of hostility toward immigrants. Our journey took us to places where immigrants to our own country also experienced both of these things. We were blessed only with amazing and generous hospitality wherever we traveled, and our companions were a congenial collection of people.
Across the Nebraska Conference we have been hearing the call of "The Church has left the building!" Our Celtic Pilgrimage gives a new meaning to that phrase, and has served as a reminder that God is present with us in all of our wanderings. Pastor Larry quoted Susanna Wesley in his sermon this morning, praying her prayer: "Help me, Lord, to remember that religion is not to be confined to the church...nor exercised only in prayer and meditation, but that every where I am in Thy Presence." God wandered with us as we travelled 400 and some-odd miles, present in the formal blessings wrapped around the experience and the informal ones of friendship-making.
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