pilgrims
These days (it started last January 20) the barangays are making a pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady of Candles, the Mother of all Jareños. In the past it was our Mother who visited the barangays. Now we’re turning the table around – now it is the barangays who are visiting her in her home, the cathedral of Jaro.
What is so special about this visit?
It is special because it is not just any visit but a pilgrimage. What is a pilgrimage?
The English word pilgrimage comes from the Latin word peregrinatio (the same word is still used in Spanish and French). It is composed of two words: per which means through or across and ager/agri which means fields, country or land. A pilgrimage is a movement, a journey, a “passing through,” and since one is just “passing through” it connotes that that movement is something temporary or a state of being abroad.
This is the reason why for a Christian a pilgrimage images our earthly life – it is temporary, it is a state of being and living abroad, it is a passing through in order to reach our destiny which is heaven our true and lasting home.
A pilgrimage can be done alone, but to image life better and meaningfully, it is done in community or as a group. We are after all living in this temporary life as a community and not apart from one another.
The pilgrimage, though an external journey it is important that there too is corresponding inner journey that happens. To be meaningful one has to go deeper than just the externals of travelling. The joy and the inconveniences, the insecurity and the thrill of doing something different and even new, the delight of walking and the pressures and stress that accompany a journey with others, experiencing both the difficulty and the enjoyment of it, are all experiences that make up our journey through life. But we can only appreciate the pilgrimage when it is both external and internal - a temporal journey that has resonances and even strong similarities with the spiritual.
We have started our BEC Program last year and we are doing our best not to lose our initial enthusiasm. The experiences of the pilgrimage have a lot to teach us as we start the program. The first lesson learned in a pilgrimage and to be learned in our journey towards Basic Ecclesial Communities is waiting in patience. We are after all the only people who set appointments by saying, “around 6:00 o’clock” – which, by the way is interpreted, as the time between 5:30 and 6:30 and when one arrives at 6:40 we usually get really mad and shout, “but it’s already 7:00!” (Love it or hate it, but that’s Filipino time!)
There are some of us who are just too slow for anything. There are those who hesitate and change their minds when it is almost too late, and there are those who are just too fast to keep up with. In the end we just have to learn to wait in patience, and those who are too slow, have to learn to keep pace.
It’s the same way with people in a Basic Ecclesial Community. People don’t grow like a flock of white leghorn brooders in a poultry farm, I mean growing in maturity, spiritual insight, even in priorities and in their love for God or the church, altogether that is. Conversion after all is the work of God, and usually, as the song goes, “he makes all things beautiful . . . in His time!” We just have to learn to wait for each other, we just have to learn to be patient.
Another lesson learned in a pilgrimage and to be learned in a BEC is to take the risk of doing something new, something outside your normal routine, something no longer within the confines of what you have considered secure. Our usual route from home or barangay to the cathedral is almost always through a car or a jeep. But now you have to walk like all the rest, and walking through a busy street can be quiet fascinating and most often consternating, filling us with anxieties of every kind. “Will it rain?” “Will a big truck ram on us?” Even the feel of the asphalt as your feet hit the road can be a new and disconcerting experience.
And so also with the BEC. It will take a major leap for most of us just joining a faith sharing group – talking about something personal and hearing things so personal! And be prepared because the usual routine, the usual mindset, even the usual way of looking at our neighbors will be changed. It’s like getting a new pair of glasses after getting used to an old, decrepit and already having an incorrect line of vision.
There are still many things I want to say but that would be robbing you of the beautiful experience of a pilgrimage. Just be sure that as you travel from here to there, you also begin that more important journey inwards to your heart and the recesses of your soul. By the way, miracles happen in a pilgrimage . . . that is if you let it happen.
So join the pilgrimage in your barangay from January 26 to 30 at 6:00 PM (around 6:00, that is), and be part of a community walking, travelling, journeying together to the home of a beloved Mother. Mass will start upon arrival at the shrine and a little program (the saludo a la Virgen) in songs and dances will be made in her honor (presented by the barangay and some schools). Snacks too will be served. If you have anything to share (food, that is) you can also bring it along, share this with your neighbor and experience the joy of coming together at this special place where all can feel that they are sons and daugthers of one loving mother. Viva la Virgen de la Candelaria!!!
What is so special about this visit?
It is special because it is not just any visit but a pilgrimage. What is a pilgrimage?
The English word pilgrimage comes from the Latin word peregrinatio (the same word is still used in Spanish and French). It is composed of two words: per which means through or across and ager/agri which means fields, country or land. A pilgrimage is a movement, a journey, a “passing through,” and since one is just “passing through” it connotes that that movement is something temporary or a state of being abroad.
This is the reason why for a Christian a pilgrimage images our earthly life – it is temporary, it is a state of being and living abroad, it is a passing through in order to reach our destiny which is heaven our true and lasting home.
A pilgrimage can be done alone, but to image life better and meaningfully, it is done in community or as a group. We are after all living in this temporary life as a community and not apart from one another.
The pilgrimage, though an external journey it is important that there too is corresponding inner journey that happens. To be meaningful one has to go deeper than just the externals of travelling. The joy and the inconveniences, the insecurity and the thrill of doing something different and even new, the delight of walking and the pressures and stress that accompany a journey with others, experiencing both the difficulty and the enjoyment of it, are all experiences that make up our journey through life. But we can only appreciate the pilgrimage when it is both external and internal - a temporal journey that has resonances and even strong similarities with the spiritual.
We have started our BEC Program last year and we are doing our best not to lose our initial enthusiasm. The experiences of the pilgrimage have a lot to teach us as we start the program. The first lesson learned in a pilgrimage and to be learned in our journey towards Basic Ecclesial Communities is waiting in patience. We are after all the only people who set appointments by saying, “around 6:00 o’clock” – which, by the way is interpreted, as the time between 5:30 and 6:30 and when one arrives at 6:40 we usually get really mad and shout, “but it’s already 7:00!” (Love it or hate it, but that’s Filipino time!)
There are some of us who are just too slow for anything. There are those who hesitate and change their minds when it is almost too late, and there are those who are just too fast to keep up with. In the end we just have to learn to wait in patience, and those who are too slow, have to learn to keep pace.
It’s the same way with people in a Basic Ecclesial Community. People don’t grow like a flock of white leghorn brooders in a poultry farm, I mean growing in maturity, spiritual insight, even in priorities and in their love for God or the church, altogether that is. Conversion after all is the work of God, and usually, as the song goes, “he makes all things beautiful . . . in His time!” We just have to learn to wait for each other, we just have to learn to be patient.
Another lesson learned in a pilgrimage and to be learned in a BEC is to take the risk of doing something new, something outside your normal routine, something no longer within the confines of what you have considered secure. Our usual route from home or barangay to the cathedral is almost always through a car or a jeep. But now you have to walk like all the rest, and walking through a busy street can be quiet fascinating and most often consternating, filling us with anxieties of every kind. “Will it rain?” “Will a big truck ram on us?” Even the feel of the asphalt as your feet hit the road can be a new and disconcerting experience.
And so also with the BEC. It will take a major leap for most of us just joining a faith sharing group – talking about something personal and hearing things so personal! And be prepared because the usual routine, the usual mindset, even the usual way of looking at our neighbors will be changed. It’s like getting a new pair of glasses after getting used to an old, decrepit and already having an incorrect line of vision.
There are still many things I want to say but that would be robbing you of the beautiful experience of a pilgrimage. Just be sure that as you travel from here to there, you also begin that more important journey inwards to your heart and the recesses of your soul. By the way, miracles happen in a pilgrimage . . . that is if you let it happen.
So join the pilgrimage in your barangay from January 26 to 30 at 6:00 PM (around 6:00, that is), and be part of a community walking, travelling, journeying together to the home of a beloved Mother. Mass will start upon arrival at the shrine and a little program (the saludo a la Virgen) in songs and dances will be made in her honor (presented by the barangay and some schools). Snacks too will be served. If you have anything to share (food, that is) you can also bring it along, share this with your neighbor and experience the joy of coming together at this special place where all can feel that they are sons and daugthers of one loving mother. Viva la Virgen de la Candelaria!!!
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