What I Learned on Pilgrimage: Travels with the Lord Through the World

By Rev. John J. Lombardi

What I Learned on Pilgrimage: Travels with the Lord Through the World is a travelogue of spiritual adventure of one priest’s journeys through this world. The book narrates many varied trips and pilgrimages of service and spirituality and how one can learn about oneself and other lands and peoples. From backpacking in Europe to serving with Mother Teresa in Calcutta, India, through helping the poor in the Andes Mountains, to a pow-wow in the Big Sky country and visiting D-Day beaches and walking on the famous Camino in Spain, we may learn about the world, colorful cultures, self, and God. You will meet many personalities and pilgrims and, perhaps, whet your own inner-adventurer appetite for travel and godly adventure!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 12, 2019
• ISBN: 9781796039207

Rev. John J. Lombardi

Rev. John J. Lombardi is a Catholic priest of thirty years of the Archdiocese of Baltimore, and is pastor of St. Peter Catholic Church in Western Md. He enjoys the mystical life of the Catholic-Christian Church, outdoor activities and social outreach, and pilgrimages to both local and foreign lands to serve the Lord especially in the poor and needy. He loves the balance in discipleship between spirituality and activities and wants to pass this on to you!

Book preview

What I Learned on

Pilgrimage: Travels with the

Lord Through the World

Rev. John J. Lombardi

Copyright © 2019 by Rev. John J. Lombardi.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2019906987

ISBN:              Hardcover              978-1-7960-3922-1

                        Softcover                978-1-7960-3921-4

                        eBook                     978-1-7960-3920-7

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Scripture quotations marked NAB are taken from the New American Bible, Revised Edition = Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, 2011, United States Conference Catholic Bishops

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 08/20/2019

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CONTENTS

List of Pilgrimages/Journeys

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Prologue : Three Pilgrimage Snapshots

Chapter 1     Backpack—Let’s Go Europe and Haiti

Chapter 2     India 1993—An Exotic Adventure

Chapter 3     Israel and Mother Russia

Chapter 4     Montreal … Go Galápagos!

Chapter 5     France, Italy, Poland

Interlude : Pilgrimage Bytes and How I Go

Chapter 6     Pilgrimage to Lourdes

Chapter 7     New Orleans and Service, 2006

Chapter 8     Africa I: 2007

Chapter 9     Hawaii—the Leper Priest

Chapter 10   India—2005 and 2009

Interlude : Distinctive Personalities— Two Profiles

Chapter 11   The Camino of Spain

Chapter 12   Peru Pilgrimage 2010

Chapter 13   Powwow Pilgrimage

Chapter 14   Pilgrimage Walk—Hancock to Baltimore, 2012

Chapter 15   Papal Pilgrimage—Philadelphia 2015

Interlude : Pilgrimage Directives

Chapter 16   Africa II

Chapter 17   France Pilgrimage/Religious Freedom Walk 2014

Chapter 18   Celtic Crossing—Walking in Ireland

Interlude : Travel Alchemy

Chapter 19   Annapolis to Ocean City 2016

Chapter 20   Alaska Frontier 2016

Chapter 21   Italy and St. Francis 2017

Chapter 22   Pakistan Adventure, 2018

Epilogue : Coming Back to Reality

LIST OF PILGRIMAGES/JOURNEYS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

My deepest appreciation to those who labored to bring this project to life: Sandra, for your dogged persistence in finding missing bits and pieces; Amanda, who kept me sane and organized (not an easy task): Susan Miller and Paula Tiller for assiduous editing; Margie, bless you for your editorial expertise and tenacious, exhaustive research—you smoothened my narrative and kept me honest and consistent!

INTRODUCTION

Go into the whole world…

—Mark 16:15

These … having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared for them a city.

—Hebrews 11:13–16

The greater danger for most of us is not that we aim too high and reach it, but that we aim too low and meet it.

—Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

It may seem obvious, but we are, in a way, traveling through this world to another world. That’s what a pilgrim does—lives a conscious life on this plane of existence while en route to heaven. As we also are going to this other world while in the here and now, we can explore, have adventures, and transform ourselves.

So let’s be, or become pilgrims.

Pilgrimages are fun; no, they are faith filled. Well, they are both.

I want to introduce you to pilgrimages by means of lessons I’ve learned along the way. Then I’ll share how you can make pilgrimages too.

Therefore, based on the subtitle of this book—Travels with the Lord through the World—let’s look at these parts.

Travel 101

Traveling in general. Travel shakes you up in good and challenging ways. Traveling changes a person and can transform one’s life. I sometimes tell fellow travelers that pilgrimage is a religious adventure or, more colorfully, a spiritual boot camp or both. Making a pilgrimage includes a lot of thrills, perhaps even chills, bedazzlements, bustling movements, and emotional ups and downs interspersed with intense adventures all packed within a week or two! This means spiritual travel with a group that could number eight, twelve, or twenty—and hopefully with plenty of deodorant, since most of these trips usually take place in the sweltering summer.

Pilgrims leave familiar comforts of family, home, and community for the foreign such as small European showers, old-fashioned Third World bathrooms, lack of electricity, strange food, new languages, and unusual, certainly unfamiliar customs, all while learning about the local people we encounter along the way. We as pilgrims sometimes endure hardships and embrace a steep learning curve, affirming an axiom from an old Clint Eastwood movie (paraphrased by a friend): adjust, overcome, and improvise. We definitely need resilience, courage, patience, and many other virtues while traveling, which give us the impetus to leave the usual workaday path and strike out into the unknown.

Travels transform. I once learned that a former pilgrim-companion Hannah went on mission with the Peace Corps in the African nation of Zambia, where we visited in 2007. I remember her words at the time: I must come back to this place someday! She went there, serving a two-year stint for our country and the Lord as promised. And then, there’s Jocelyn, with whom I traveled to Peru in 2001. She is now Sister Angelique, walking with the Lord now as a barefoot Franciscan, a Poor Claire in southern Virginia. Yes, traveling will most definitely change you.

So traveling is venturing not only into God’s countries near and far but into the beguiling geography of self, as the famous monk and traveler-pilgrim Thomas Merton once described.

In this book, we will learn not only about Madagascar, Spain’s Camino, and South American jungles but also about ourselves—through the varied pilgrim plights and joys—which help us to grow and live our faith in new, unforeseen ways. Introverts are good at the prayer parts of pilgrimages and daily mass, where they get their spiritual gas. Then again, extroverts are good at team events, packing vans, and organizing pizza fests. We need both personality types in such groups, and pilgrimages will certainly manifest such traits.

Through travels and pilgrimages, we may ask questions of ourselves, as evidenced by the American literary monk, Thomas Merton:

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following Your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please You does in fact please You. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this, You will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore, will I trust You always, though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for You are ever with me and You will never leave me to face my perils alone.

What are my strengths and weaknesses? For myself, I work on patience and try not to overdramatize things.

How can I grow in the Lord more fully? Bob and Eun Yea Williams, friends from many pilgrimages over ten years, still do morning and evening prayer together daily after learning to do them on their very first pilgrimage.

What is my calling in life? This question-meditation was given by Patrick, tour leader in Assisi in 2017, as he invited pilgrims to discern at the famous thousand-year-old San Damiano Cross. This cross actually spoke to St. Francis and directed him in his pursuit of holiness and to rebuild my church.

Traveling with others and the team spirit it engenders and builds are far different from a retreat off by ourselves, whereas in the daily mystical microwave intensity of travel pressures and varied personality types and fangled events (not to mention being tired), we will be sandpapered and purged by tribulations in ways we never will be by ourselves, or simply praying alone, as good as those experiences are. And yet it’s always good to come back home after the religious roller coaster of traveling abroad.

Americans, when you think about it, wholly embrace the notion of pilgrimages and the adventures associated with travel. We proudly recall in our history the exploits of Lewis and Clark, who ventured with undaunted courage into the unknown west of our beloved and beautiful country.

We may recall the transcendentalist Henry Thoreau, who made a short and sweet pilgrimage to his nearby Walden Pond. There he learned more deeply about his inner life and nature’s God. As we can learn too.

Meanwhile, let’s not forget those indefatigable French Jesuits in the seventeenth century, who settled the first churches and created the nascent spirituality of New York and the New World.

And lastly, there are the annual pilgrimages of footloose Americans every summer, whether traveling west to Arizona, north to the Maine Woods, or south to the Florida Keys.

So why stay home? To live is to travel and to learn!

With the Lord. God is the reason I now pilgrimage. I have traveled as a pilgrim on all the adventures described in this book. As earlier stated, the root meaning of the word pilgrim means to go through a land (as quoted in the Bible-book of Hebrews). That’s what the original Hebrews did—traveled through this world to the next one and taught us to do the same. We should pray as we make our way. One of my favorite memories of pilgrimage is Greccio, Italy, where St. Francis began the first Christmas crèche. While visiting that shrine one night, just at sunset, our teen pilgrims began praying and singing chants beautifully, unasked. They knew. The teens realized that they were pilgrims, not just travelers or tourists.

As Christians, we may define pilgrimage as a religious adventure to a spiritual place for holy reasons. Sometimes it’s overtly religious like this past summer going to Rome and Assisi in 2017 (it was a one-hundred mile religious freedom pilgrimage). Yet at other times, the term spiritual place may be taken loosely, such as our Montana Pow Wow pilgrimage with the Crow Nation or our trip to Alaska, appropriately nicknamed the Last Frontier. We seek the sacred in varied churches, chapels, airports, restaurants, and pristine national parks. We somehow make the pilgrimage come alive amid secular surroundings—able to hear the faint voice of God, proclaiming His presence and affirming His creation.

On many pilgrimages, we variously served the poor and less fortunate in newly visited places, and many times, we arranged service projects with Mother Teresa’s sisters throughout the world. The sisters provide great connections, and besides, they are a marvelous group of sacred servants. In other places, we might sing religious songs in air or train terminals and give out prayer cards while feeding the hungry on the streets where we traveled.

In short, we journeyed with God (or tried to) through Him and with Him ever more deeply into our destination. He is the reason for each pilgrimage, for His glory is revealed in our travels.

Through the World. Jesus commands us in His Great Commission to Go into the whole world (Mk 16:15). I used to take that metaphorically, as in He doesn’t mean for me to go out into all the world, does He? Eventually, through many gifts, invitations, and enticements of travel, I have taken advantage of opportunities and been able to do just that. So many places I’ve seen—mysterious Russia, the Galápagos Islands (those blue-footed boobies were great and amusing, just like in the pictures!), the Lord’s land of Israel, the awe-inspiring Victoria Falls of Zambia, the wonderous Éire (Ireland), such lovely beaches of the Indian Ocean (Madagascar), Mother Teresa’s Calcutta, and so many other locales that I could only dream of seeing once upon a time. God’s glory is revealed in many parts of our wonderful earth. One may call it getting the travel bug, becoming a travel whisperer, or giving in to a serious case of wanderlust, but I am so thankful to experience these examples of His creation.

When I was young, my parents wisely subscribed to the National Geographic magazine and the World Book Encyclopedia. I loved those things! This literature introduced me—through pictures, myriad stories, biographies, and travel narratives—to a vast, beautiful, mysterious, colorful, sometimes mystical world that provoked me, inspired me, and effectively lured me to seek adventure and learning, providing excitement about places I’d never heard of before.

Many years later, I remember listening to a friend who had recently traveled to Kathmandu, Nepal. At the time she spoke, Nepal seemed a foreign, Shangri-la–like place—so faraway, exotic, and impossible ever to reach, existing only in an Indiana Jones type world. But then I grew open to the opportunity of travel and pilgrimage to travel, and it happened. A few years later, I actually visited Nepal while on sabbatical in India. It was, so to speak, then just around the block north of India, rather like going to the Adirondacks in upper New York State from Maryland. I made it by puddle-jumping, one step at a time—departing from home, flying into India first, then hopping a flight to the top of the world. It gradually became doable, manageable, reachable, and it’s actually crazy not to go!

Now, thirty years into my priesthood, I see it as a privilege and even a duty to introduce others, especially the youth, to these lands and experiences because God wants us to sojourn as these lands and sacred experiences are truly reachable (more on that later!). They are faith- and fun-filled missions wherein Jesus awaits us within His varied people, with holy surprises and many blessings that stream forth.

Maybe you want to stay at home where you are safe, clean, and comfortable. That’s all right, but just think for a moment—through this book, you can join in the most incredible spiritual adventure of a lifetime. See what enlightenment awaits you in the following pages: ecstatic joys, holy encounters, mesmerizing surprises. So now, apropos to this, I’ll introduce you to one of our pilgrimage mottoes: Abandon yourself to God’s unfolding gifts. In other words, be open to what God has waiting for you—often surprises and much adventure.

But still, maybe you think travel and pilgrimages are (pick one or more): (a) elitist, for rich people or the select few; (b) a waste of money better spent on more practical things; (c) not possible, out of your grasp financially; or (d) that stuff is for sissies—I’d rather bungee jump or go to Fort Lauderdale for spring break.

But here’s the upshot: many gifts, epiphanies, and spiritual surprises await us as we make any pilgrimage, so take that holy risk and go on the journey!

PROLOGUE

Three Pilgrimage Snapshots

While writing this book, these particular stories reminded me of three important lessons of pilgrimage spirituality: grit, simplicity, and zeal. These will serve as vignettes or spiritual appetizers for the rest of the book.

Inspiration Pilgrim: Spiritual Grit

I recently took a hike with Timmy. He’s my new hero. In 2010, we hiked 100 miles together from Baltimore to Philadelphia to see Pope Francis and hiked that same distance in Ireland and around the District of Columbia. Timmy recently walked the much-storied Appalachian Trail, or AT, in 2017, which means around 2,186 miles—from Springer Mountain in North Georgia to Mount Katahdin in central Maine. In six months, only a handful of lucky and determined through-hikers completed this incredible outdoor adventure. On one summer’s day, we hiked about five miles from a location near Camp David on the spine of South Mountain in Maryland and then north to the Mason-Dixon Line into Pennsylvania. He moved fast, and I struggled to keep up—barely. For me, that was okay for the short haul, but certainly not a pace maintainable for six months!

During his 2,000-mile-plus journey, Timmy wore a brilliant neon-colored T-shirt (synthetic for quick drying, of course) with a screen-printed logo on the front with the phrase Abandon All for Jesus in bold, block lettering. On the back was the venerated trail symbol of the AT, fashioned into an iconic arrow pointing upward. He was not only brave to even attempt this trip—and yes, he finished the whole deal—but he was also a brave witness of the faith by wearing his unique T-shirt. That day, Timmy quoted a Bible admonishment I remembered from seminary days: Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope. (1 Pt 3:15).

On past pilgrimages, Timmy was the understated go-to guy. In Ireland, he played spiritual music in an airport while on layover; he also played guitar on our hundred-mile walk to Philadelphia. In all our travels together, he led prayers and discussions about our faith to folks we met. He did this on the famous Appalachian Trail. Here’s the kicker: he’s only twenty years old but a true man of God. Timmy is rugged, nimble, and ever so meek. Now that’s a pilgrim and pilgrimage to admire. After walking with him and trying to keep up, I was beat-tired and wondered how I could ever do two-thousand-plus miles camping alone with scant interpersonal contact, no cushy pillows, or other creature’s comforts to fill my daily routine. On some days, he would cover twenty-odd miles by himself, rain or shine. There is an old axiom on the trail: No rain, no pain, no Maine.

This is a snapshot of one kind of pilgrimage. It’s a physically and mentally challenging journey. Timmy is one of only a handful of hikers who, like all travelers, uses his body to overcome the mental challenges we all encounter—self-doubt, inadequacy, and failures—as he hikes from Georgia to Maine, passing through countless American communities and homes, touching other hikers’ lives; sharing experiences, hopes, and dreams; intersecting with them to grow and spread the faith. Thank you, God!

Travel Light: Simplicity

My compatriot-friend Paul likes to tell the story of my group, obviously overwrought Americans arriving in downtown Calcutta, India, in the summer of 2005.

After the harrowing drive from Calcutta’s Dum Dum Airport to Mother Teresa’s home (when we endured quite visceral smells of open fires, cows walking on the roads, and pleading beggars at our car doors), we Americans got out of the crowded taxis jammed with our luggage. Just outside Mother Teresa’s main home, most of us (all men) carried two pieces of luggage each, along with assorted bags and knapsacks. We were not Mark Twain’s The Innocents Abroad, but more like The Ugly American gone wild. We were just doing what Americans usually do: carry our excessive weight around and swagger in style.

However, we weren’t too mindful of what others saw or thought.

Paul remembered one foreigner there who watched us and remarked that he knew right away that we were Americans. How? Paul asked.

It’s obvious from all the baggage. Americans travel like that was his answer.

Later, Paul described to us how everyone else—mostly Europeans and some Asians—arrive in Calcutta. They carry duffel bags (only one each) and are usually lean and nimble in appearance.

Meanwhile, we Americans came swinging into Calcutta with monster-sized baggage—and lots of it! We surely could have used Timmy’s T-shirt message and practiced it, Abandon All for Jesus, but we were typical American travelers—trying to fit in everything, along with the kitchen sink and living room. We were noticed and remarked upon, so always remember, as we tell our fellow pilgrims, make a good impression, smile, and travel light.

We Wanted to See the Indian Ocean: Zeal

We had been staying in downtown Antananarivo, Madagascar, for days in 2013, having fun, doing social service, and enjoying Asian-African life! The thing was, after receiving all these blessings and reaching this fabled destination after much planning, there was yet one more goal to reach: see and experience the Indian Ocean. We knew it was reachable, and every day our noses picked up the scent of sea air. In the dining hall of our lodging was a large world map. It showed us Southern Africa and Madagascar and that the Indian Ocean was nearby.

It was a seven-plus-hour drive, our hosts informed us in ominous tones. They tried to deter us once they learned we were determined to go for broke. Oh, and we were going to do this all in one day. Crazy? Maybe, but that’s what pilgrims and adventurers do sometimes, just sometimes.

We went through many iterations of our decision and made sure all the pilgrims actually wanted to go. Our hosts thought us mad, just Americans, or both. They knew the rigors of the drive and the long distance and counseled against us going—several times. Finally, we prevailed upon them to drive us, with the inspiration of American greenbacks, and our plan came to fruition.

At morning mass and breakfast (4:00 a.m.), we were virtual zombies but awoke just enough to crawl into our two vans and depart, watching Antananarivo wake up as we proceeded into the countryside. The road went up and down, took what seemed to be a thousand turns and switchbacks, climbed into the island interior, and then, on rather steep roads, made a precipitous drop toward the coastal lowlands.

For the next seven hours, we slogged through a tropical rainstorm, occasionally stopping at roadside fruit stands, gas stations, and breakfast nooks. Then we beheld a miracle: we came upon a facility with flush toilets—that’s great news for pilgrim travelers!

Around noon, we made it to the coast. I could definitely smell the sultry salt air of the Indian Ocean when a second miracle manifested itself: the weather cleared! We went through a quaint coastal town, which was definitely nothing like the Jersey Shore. For me, it was sensory overload—exotic odors from fruit stands, radiant smiles of the Asian-Indian inhabitants as they held samurai-like knives, and many palm trees dancing in the salty air along the road to the coast.

No sooner than we’d parked at the beach, some of us tore away from the vans and jumped into the soaring, chaotic Indian Ocean with its greenish-blue water.

Later, we played soccer with local children and gave out rosaries when along came a bull complete with horns. Thank God he walked slowly up the beach, and we interacted with this gentle beast as it was docile and used to human contact.

Our lunch was shared with locals. There were poor everywhere on this great island, but their spirit and bright-heartedness was overwhelming. Afterward, we lounged on the beach in the glimmering sunlight, stretched out, and soaked in the air-friendly temperature and warm sands. We soon realized time was up; our drivers reminded us to get into the vans. It was a very long drive back to our hotel, and we had to reach it before nightfall.

In conclusion, was the experience worth it? Definitely. We not only saw but also jumped into the Indian Ocean. We achieved our goal and would never