Priestly Peregrinations

 

“You can kiss your family and friends goodbye and put miles between you, but at the same time you carry them with your heart, your mind, your stomach, because you do not just live in a world but a world lives in you”

-Frederick Buechner

    Denise dropped me off at the top of the continental divide in the freezing rain.  She felt guilty and I felt sad about her going away.  I proceeded coasting down the 40 mile incline towards the town of Dubois.  Enroute, I found a rustic lodge which gave free cups of coffee to cyclist for which I was very grateful.  There I met cyclists from Brazil and Oregon and we took comfort in each other’s company.  The Brazilian cyclist shared his anxiety for the stability of his country after their recent election.  The Oregonian expressed anxiety about his country as we prepare for our upcoming election.  They both admitted that those anxieties seem very abstract when wet and cold on bikes.  These concerns seemed less important as we derived sustenance from the hot coffee and the kindness which it represented.

     Along this trip I have been thinking of several books I have read about priestly peregrinations (a delightful word meaning contemplative wanderings).  Although the characters are different than me, they all describe the inward journey experienced as the wander around stripped of their clerical identity.

    The first book is Monsignor Quixote, by Graham Greene.  Fr. Quixote was a parish priest in the little town of El Toboso in Spain’s La Mancha region.  He regards himself as a descendant of Cervantes’ character of the same name, even though people constantly point out to him that Don Quixote was a fictitious character.   His bishop, always suspicious of Quixote’s eccentricities, encourages him to take an extended holiday.  And so, he embarks upon a voyage through Spain in his old car named “Rocinante”.  He is joined by a disgraced communist ex-mayor of El Toboso (who, of course is nicknamed “Sancho”.  In the subsequent course of events, Quixote and his companion have all sorts of funny and moving adventures along the lines his ancestor’s on their way through post-Franco Spain.  They encounter the contemporary equivalents of the windmills, are confronted with holy and not-so-holy places and with sinners of all sorts.  In their dialogues about Catholicism and Communism, the two men are brought closer, start to appreciate each other better but also to question their own beliefs. 

    When Quixote dies, Greene puts into Sancho’s mouth one of the most powerful sentences in English Literature.

“…Why is it that the hate of man-even a man like Franco-dies with his death, and yet love, which he had begun to feel for Father Quixote, seemed now to live and grow in spite of the final separation and the final silence-for how long, he wondered with kind of fear, was it possible for that love to continue? And to what end?”

     The second book I began to ponder as I pedaled was the Novel “Via Negativa” by Daniel Horsby.  He describes a Father Dan, a homeless priest travelling across the country.  Dismissed by his conservative diocese for eccentricity and insubordination, he’s made his exile into a kind of pilgrimage transforming his Toyota Camry into a mobile monk’s cell.  He journeys across the United States, taking a route that is not at all direct.  Father Dan listens to compact discs of the artist Prince, in whom he hears “a real mystical theology.”  He tracks his course on an old –fashioned road atlas.  He’s a baby boomer, a sincere one.  “All priests are supposed to be with out homes,” he reflects, probably to make himself feel better.

   The third novel, which I am reading when I am taking a break from cycling, is Foy: On the Road to Lost by Gordon Atkinson.  Foy is a Baptist pastor who can no longer make sense of the religious world into which he has born.  His wife files for divorce and his congregation suggests he take some time to reflect.  He takes a strange bus journey to the heart of New Orleans which marks an exit from a familiar life and a rebirth into a new reality.  He finds, however, the secular world is a strange and lonely place. His identity as a clergyman is more deeply embedded in his soul than he thought.

     I am not like any of the characters in the novels above.  I am travelling with the blessing of my congregation and bishop.  My wonderful wife supports me on my journey and has been a continual source of support.  I miss her. 

     What does resonate with my soul is this opportunity to step out of my role while meeting the many kind persons along the way.  Listening to folks I would never have met if not for this pilgrimage, have taught much about the wonderfully complex, beautiful, and surprising world through which I am pedaling.  I am also discovering much about myself.