Pilgrim God

THE PILGRIM GOD

"We stole away because we wanted for the love of God to be on pilgrimage, we cared not where".

That is what three Irish monks are alleged to have said to King Alfred of Wessex when they turned up upon the shores of Cornwall. For seven whole days and nights they had drifted aimlessly across the open sea from Ireland in a fragile boat made of hides, with few possessions and without oars.

Such journeys were a regular feature of the Celtic monastic life. Since their monasteries were loose in organisation monks were able to come and go as they pleased. It was only later, under the influence of the Benedictine Vow of Stability, that monks remained in the same monastery for all their life.

Thus St. Columbus left Ireland for Iona in Scotland; St. Patrick left England for Ireland; St. Aidan left Iona for Lindisfarne; St. Gildas left Strathclyde for Angelsey in Wales and St. Samson left Llantwit Major in Wales for Devon and Cornwall.

However, perhaps the greatest traveller of them all was St. Columbanus who left Bangor in Ireland and journeyed through France and Switzerland before finally settling and dying at Bobbio in Northern ltaly.

Why then did the Celtic monks travel so much?

The Celtic monks did not travel like the wandering scholars of the twelfth century in search of new ideas or intellectual stimulus.

Nor did they travel like the medieval pilgrims visiting shrines associated with the saints, such as St. James at Santiago de Compostela in Spain, and then return home.

Neither was it their primary purpose to establish new churches and monasteries, though undoubtedly they did this as a consequence of their travels. In fact, there are in Europe today over 250 churches bearing the names of the Celtic saints who established them.

Why then was travel or pilgrimage such a feature of Celtic spirituality?

The clue to the answer lies in the Book of Lismore, which is a medieval compilation of the lives of the saints. In it the writer distinguishes between three different types of pilgrims.

The first is the person who goes on a physical journey but has no change of heart. This is described as a waste of time and energy since "it is not by path of feet, nor by motion of body that one draws nearer to God, but practising virtue and good deeds".

In other words such pilgrims are like those who go today to visit the Holy Land, but do not let the experience change their way of life. They come back the same person they were before they left, totally unmoved by the experience. They are mere tourists on a sightseeing expedition with no spiritual significance.

The second type of pilgrim is the person who wants to leave everything familiar and comfortable behind but is forced by duties to remain at home.

In other words such pilgrims are like those pilgrims of today who want to go to the Holy Land, particularly in Holy Week in order to draw closer to our Lord by visiting the places associated with the last week of his life upon earth, but because of various commitments they are prevented from going. Nevertheless they are still prepared to make an

inward or spiritual pilgrimage.

That is what most of us are obliged to do during Holy Week. We make a spiritual pilgrimage. We try to draw closer to our Lord by recalling the events of His last week upon earth, though obviously, w€e would much prefer to be in Jerusalem.

Such a pilgrim is commended by the writer of the Book of Lismore because he is seeking to travel in spirit.

The third type of person who goes on a pilgrimage is the person who leaves for God, forsaking a life of comfort and ease for one of austerity and virtue. This is the highest calling of all. Such people, says the writer, can claim to "have made pilgrimage and exile in the world just as the elders went before".

In other words they are literally seeking to follow the example of the apostles, the patriarchs and indeed of Jesus himself of whom it is said in the New Testament: "the foxes have holes, the birds have their nests, but the Son of Man hath nowhere to lay his head".

The Celtic saints then were engaged, not just upon a physical pilgrimage but also upon a spiritual pilgrimage. There was both an outward and inward side to their journeying. As they physically journeyed into the unknown they inwardly sought to journey closer towards God through the practice of self denial, whereby they left the security of the past

behind, learning to trust only upon God.

The technical word used by the Celts to describe such a journey was 'peregrinato'. This has been translated as a wandering form of exile or pilgrimage.

Since the Celtic monks only journeyed forward, never to return from whence they came, it automatically involved the necessary pain of exile.

This is well expressed in the twelfth century Celtic poem, which depicts St. Columba sitting on a rock at Iona, looking longingly across the sea towards his former homeland of Ireland.

"Great is the speed of my coracle

And its stern turned upon Derry:

Grievous is my errand over the main,

Travelling to Alba of the beetling brows.

Were all Alba mine

From its centre to its border,

I would rather have the sight of a house

In the middle of fair Derry.

It is for this that I love Derry,

For its smoothness, for its purity:

All full of angels

Is every leaf on the oaks of Derry.

My Derry, my little oak grove,

My dwelling and my little cell,

O living God that art in heaven above,

Woe to him who violates it!"

That same pain of exile is again caught in an eleventh century poem concerning an unknown saint

which reads:

"I ever long for the land of Ireland

Where I had power,

An exile now in the midst of strangers,

Sad and tearful".

This Celtic image of the pilgrim God, who calls us forward to follow him, reminds us all that we are engaged upon a form of pilgrimage. It was St. Columbanus who said that we are only "guests of the world". Our real homeland is to be with God in heaven and to enjoy him for ever.

While it may not be appropriate for us to leave home and loved ones behind and engage in a physical pilgrimage, we can nevertheless acknowledge the spiritual truth, that as Christians, we are engaged upon a spiritual pilgrimage.

Its all too easy in this materialistic society of ours to lay up treasure upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt and to lose sight of our eternal destiny.

You and I are engaged upon a spiritual pilgrimage whereby we are challenged to walk by faith and not by sight. We are challenged to a continuing going forward whereby we deepen our commitment and trust in God.

Alas, all too often, like a person learning to swim, we prefer to cling to the side of the swimming pool and not let go. We cling tenaciously to the present where we feel safe and secure, rather than venture forth into the unknown. But, "as it was in the beginning is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen" is the sound of the death knell in the

spiritual life. Unless we are prepared to let go and let God we shall never grow in faith. We have no alternative but to press forward.

I am reminded of the words of that hymn by Sidney Carter which goes:

"One more step along the way I go

One more step along the way I go

From the old things to the new

Keep me travelling along with you".

Even when we let go, there is always the temptation to return from whence we have come. To return to the womb of the past where we felt safe and secure. But that is only to retard our spiritual growth and development.

The Celtic tradition reminds us that a necessary consequence of pilgrimage must be the pain of exile. This we must

also be prepared to embrace if we are to become the unique person God has created us to be. This is what is involved in denying self, taking up one's cross, and following Christ.

Yet we need not be afraid. We do not go forward alone in our search for God. He is there with us as we journey in faith. This paradox is well expressed in this ancient Irish poem:

"To go to Rome

Is much of trouble, little profit;

The king whom thou seekest here,

Unless thou bring him with thee, thou wilt not find".

Mervyn Wilson also expresses this same paradox of God being with us in our search for him, in the

following poem written in 1991:

"You who would travel the highway of faith

Do not look back, do not stay,

You have grasped the great circle

Trust God, the world will own his day.

Do not try to recapture, but do not devalue

The vintage once you knew.

The gospel ever explodes yesterday's vessel,

The wine comes fresh for you.

Two meet, three meet at a turn of the road

Travelling with the one Lord.

Each must move on within the same circle

True together to his word.

You who would travel God's great highway

Unmapped, ahead, heaven's way,

With the one, with many never at rest,

Do not look back nor stay."

And what will we find at the end of the journey?

I cannot do better than use the words of that Anglican poet, T.S. Eliot who wrote:

"We shall not cease for exploration.

At the end of all our exploring

Will be to arrive where we started

And know the place for the first time".