A short bus ride took us back to Venta de Santa Lucía to begin our walk.

Our Mongolian driver Acai being greeted by Jan Sebastian

Today was a short, but lonely and barren stage. We started at 8.30am and arrived in Bujaraloz at 2.30pm.  With a stop for lunch factored in we are walking about 4 km per hour.  My shins are still hurting — every step involves a dull pain — but a slower pace at the back of the group and 600 mg Ibruprofen tablets help.

A desolate section of the Ignatian Camino

As we have moved into the “third week” phase of our Spiritual Exercises (Jesus’s Passion) we have entered, fittingly, into a more desolate section of our pilgrimage. “Los Monegros,” Spain’s desert-like region, is hot, arid, and dusty. As we walked today we could imagine that we were walking with Jesus as he turned his face towards Jerusalem.

Our destination, Bujaraloz, in the distance

Our hotel tonight is more of a truck stop

A beer at the end of six hours on the road

What I thought was a pretty basic truck stop — namely the Hostal El Español in Bujaraloz (population 1000) — turned out to serve the most magnificent cuisine. Today was Michael Bertie’s birthday and it will be one which I doubt that he will forget.  There was so much food at the buffet dinner this evening I remarked that it was like I imagine the heavenly banquet will be. The staff were so welcoming and friendly. We had a wonderful evening.

Chona Walden partaking of the buffet

Michael and his birthday cake

The staff sang Michael “Happy Birthday” in Spanish

Helen and Chona at the chocolate fountain

We followed the railway tracks for part of the morning and saw a high speed train flash by. It made a lot of noise.

Spanish high speed train

For about an hour we followed a railway line.

Following the railway line in the early morning

We met a French pilgrim who was walking the other way on the Camino to Santiago. He was 76 years of age and he told us that he had walked the Camino eight times. He looked very fit and said he wanted to walk the Camino one last time “before he died”.

Helen Lucas greeting the French pilgrim

Before the desert

Just after we stopped for a break Michael Bertie announced that we had just reached the 400 km mark.  Only 250 km to go to Manresa. Here members of the group raise four fingers to represent the achievement of reachng 400 km.

Stopping for a break

Celebrating the 400 km mark

We were beside the Ebro River for the latter part of the morning. Then we entered the barren Monegros landscape, named so for the black-looking hills we could see in the distance. Los Monegros are the closest thing to desert landscape to be found anywhere in Europe.  Today the temperature reached 29 degrees centigrade. There was little shade from trees but we managed to find some pine trees under which we had lunch. We needed plenty of water today.

The beginning of the desert

Tracy protecting herself from the dusty conditions she is about to encounter in the desert

Lunch under some pine trees

Kay Quisenberry walking through the barren landscape

About mid-afternoon my shins started to ache and I slowed down. I was very appreciative that Vin Dillon and Michael Bertie slowed down and walked with me for a couple of hours in the hot sun while the other went ahead. Our walk finished in Venta de Santa Lucia, where we had a beer, and then we were driven back in a bus to our hotel in Fuentes de Ebro.

This morning we farewelled inner-city Zaragoza and walked along a busy highway into the countryside. After 5 km we arrived at La Cartuja, an interesting walled village that at one time was a 17th monastery dedicated to the Immaculate Conception. Today the galleries of the cloister are streets and the cells of the Carthusians have become dwellings. We continued through a rather arid landscape en route to Fuentes de Ebro, another small town.

Today was my first day of walking since Stage 8: Logroño – Alcanadre when I did some serious damage  to my shins and needed to rest for six stages. I was quite anxious that I would not make the distance, but I did and my legs have held up. My feet ache, but my shins are fine.

Usually stork nests are on churches but today I saw one on a power pylon

Fr Joe Taylor volunteered to be the back marker today

The group finds some shade on a hot day

Some foot care at lunch time

Towards the end of the day

Our prayer today:  The “Weeks” of the Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius can be divided into three ways — the purgative, illuminative, and unitive.  Ignatius uses “weeks” as a metaphor to denote seasons of soul:

1. First Week — the Purgative Way
2. Second Week — the Illuminative Way
3. Third and Fourth Weeks — the Unitive Way.

Currently on the pilgrimage we are in the “illuminative” phase.  We are walking with Jesus, in order that our lives may be illuminated by his.  We are asking to see more Him more clearly, love Him more deeply and follow Him more closely. Another way of saying this is that we are asking for the grace to deepen our interior knowledge of Jesus. The illuminative phase means putting on the mind and heart of Christ by:

• contemplating Christ in the different events of the Gospel and learning from him
• being illuminated by his way of thinking, his way of doing things.

He is the Word from the Father and we are asking to be taught and illuminated by the Word made Flesh.

Gospel passage.  Today we are reflecting on the Beatitudes. I imagine myself sitting among the people who had gathered on a hillside listening to Jesus as he laid out his path, his “Way.” Then as now, his way is highly counterintuitive; he is inviting us to be and to live for values that are exactly the opposite of what contemporary culture and advertising tell us to do. In his time, Jesus was in contradiction to His world.

Matthew 5: 3-12

³ Blessed are are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
⁴ Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
⁵ Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
⁶ Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.
⁷ Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.
⁸ Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
⁹ Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.
¹⁰ Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

¹¹ “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. ¹² Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Some thoughts on pilgrimage. Each day I ask myself, Why are we doing this?  Why do we put ourselves through this? In a paper entitled “Spirituality for the 21st Century” — a draft of which can be found in the Reading section of this weblog under the tab Journal Articles — my friend Bill Schmidt, an Associate Professor of the Institute of Pastoral Studies at Loyola University Chicago, writes:

It has long been suggested that pilgrimage is archetypal, namely, that it represents a universal human impulse within human experience. As archetype it has the capacity to rearrange psychic elements thereby producing psychological, spiritual, and social effects. This seeming capacity to rearrange psychic content is why pilgrimage is so universally present in all its many historical and contemporary forms. Pilgrims often seem profoundly compelled to go on their journeys as if an eruption from deep within resonates and intensifies the desire. Most pilgrims know the road will inevitably bring certain hardships and struggles yet this deters few. No true pilgrim considers their journey a vacation, or a disengagement from the challenges of one’s life, but rather a journey toward the transformative possibility that the journey itself contains (pp. 2-3).

Schmidt sees six distinct types of pilgrimage  (1) Devotional, (2) Healing, (3) Ritual/Life Cycle, (4) Obligatory, (5) Wandering, and (6) Transformational.

A pilgrimage such as the Ignatian Camino is a limit experience. Physically we approach our limits (in my case I pushed beyond my limits and as a result I have not been able to walk for the past six days).  Approaching his or her physical limits forces the pilgrim to slow down and face himself or herself.  The Camino may cause a pilgrim’s defences to disintegrate and a new sense of the self and one’s purpose in life may begin to emerge. In this sense pilgrimage is transformational.

Bill has written a book on his experience of walking the Camino Frances. Entitled Walking with Stones: A Spiritual Odessey on the Pilgrimage to Santiago, it is well worth a read. I wrote one of the book teasers for Walking with Stones which appears on the back of Bill’s book. It reads:

Interweaving his own intimate story with spirituality, psychology, and theology, Bill Schmidt provides, in his remarkably frank and vulnerable account of his pilgrimage to Santiago, a means by we might discover our own way through love and life. Be careful when you read this book: it may well tempt you to pull on a pair of boots and hike across Spain in search of God and self.

I guess that is what I am doing — again!

Saint Ignatius understood the transformational nature of a pilgrimage. In fact he called himself “the pilgrim”.  For Jesuit novices he envisaged that they would each have the experience of making the full Spiritual Exercises over thirty days but that this was only one element in a broader process of conversion in the novitiate which included working with the sick and dying in a hospital and:

…making a pilgrimage for a further month without money, but rather at appropriate times, begging at doors for love of God our Lord—so that they can get used to eating badly and sleeping badly, and so that, at the same time, leaving aside all the hope and expectation that they might have of money or other created things, they might place it whole-heartedly, with true faith and intense love, in their Creator and Lord (Examen, n. 67.1-2).

Ignatius understood that the graces given in the Spiritual Exercises needed to be consolidated and he saw caring for the sick in hospital and a pilgrimage as two means of doing that.

Today’s walk. On the stage from Alagón to Zaragoza we left behind the tranquil farmlands and crossed over the A-68 highway several times.

Leaving our hotel in Alagon

View of Monzalbarba square

Beautifully landscaped council building in Sobradiel

Church spire in a small town called Utebo

Lunch in Monzalbarba

View over farmland to the mountains

Rejoining the Ebro River just outside Zaragoza

Arriving in Zaragoza — the spires El Pilar in the background

Peter Walden writes:

        “It was another long walk today of 30.8 kms which we finally completed at 4:20pm. Fortunately the weather was kinder to us today with lower temperatures, cloudy conditions and a cool breeze at our backs. Our first break was the 10 kms mark in a small town called Sobradiel which had beautifully landscaped public buildings and we took the opportunity to get our pilgrim passports stamped there. The group walked well today and covered the first 18.5 kms to our lunch destination in a record time.  Our way was a mixture of sealed and unsealed roads which were very stony and uneven in sections. After lunch we only had 12 kms to go and it was not long before we could see the Zaragoza skyline. For the  first time we got lost while trying to enter the city because the route had been substantially altered due to recent construction activity.  After asking directions we eventually found our way.

Our two youngest pilgrims, Amanda and Tracy, ready for the day’s walking

This morning we took the bus back to Gallur where we had our briefing about the route: Today was a short walking stage, mainly along hard-packed dirt farming tracks.  Peter Walden writes:

        “We took a bus from our hotel in Tudela to Gallur, our starting point for this leg of the pilgrimage.  We must be getting stronger as we now look upon the 21.2 kms today as an easy day compared to what we have been walking, particularly yesterday. At Gallur we started from the Cathedral and saw that the roof was covered in stork nests. To one side was the statue of a man looking up,  waving his walking stick and yelling.  Our opinion was that he was trying to  frighten the storks away.”

Pilgrims assisting the statue to shoo away the storks

We walked mostly on sealed roads all morning and made good progress. It was hotter today but again we were blessed with a gentle cool breeze at our backs. Once again we passed through fertile land irrigated by water from the Ebro. Many of us enjoyed the wild figs that we were able pick along the road.

Fr John Fitzgerald and Fr Joe Taylor deep in conversation on the road

Goats, sheep and donkeys on the road

Passing through a plantation

At the 15 km mark we stopped for a group photo to celebrate passing 320 kms which is the half way point of our Pilgrimage. We rejoined the Ebro River in the morning and stopped in a bar in the small town of Cabanas de Ebro for lunch at about 1:30pm. The protective barriers were still in place along the streets as yesterday they had celebrated the running of the bulls through the town streets. 

Fr Paddy Mugavin ready for the bull run in Cabanas de Ebro, but one day late

After lunch there only remained another 5kms to our destination for which we were grateful as the heat of the sun was intense. We arrived at Hotel Los Angeles, Aragon at 3:30pm in good spirits.”

The Ignatian Camino passes through Luceni, a small town with an ancient Roman presence (excavations of the first settlements have unearthed coins and medals from the time of 2nd century AD emperor Antonius Pius).

According to historians, it was on the outskirts of Luceni where Ignatius debated about whether or not to kill the Muslim with whom he had had an argument. Here is the quote from Ignatius’ Autobiography:

While he journeyed on, a Saracen mounted on a horse came up with him. In the course of the conversation mention was made of the Blessed Virgin. The stranger remarked that though he admitted that the Mother of Christ had conceived without detriment to her virginal purity, yet he could not believe that after the conception of her divine Son she was still a virgin. He was so obstinate in holding this opinion, that no amount of reasoning on the part of Ignatius could force him to abandon it. Shortly afterward the Saracen rode on, leaving the pilgrim to his own reflections. These were not of the most peaceful nature. He was sorely troubled as he thought over the conduct of his recent fellow-traveller, and felt that he had but poorly acquitted himself of his duty of honoring the Mother of God. The longer his mind thought upon the matter, the more his soul was filled with indignation against himself for having allowed the Saracen to speak as he had done of the Blessed Virgin, and for the lack of courage he fancied he had shown in not at once resenting the insult. He consequently felt impelled by a strong impulse to hasten after him and slay the miscreant for the insulting language he had used. After much internal conflict with these thoughts, he still remained in doubt, nor could he decide what course to follow. The Saracen, who had ridden on, had mentioned to him that it was his intention to proceed to a town not far distant from the highroad. At length, Ignatius, wearied by his inward struggle and not arriving at any determination, decided to settle all his doubts in the following novel way: he would give free rein to his horse, and if, on coming to the crossroad, his horse should turn into the path that led to the destination of the Moor, he would pursue him and kill him; but if his horse kept to the highroad he would allow the wretch to escape. Having done as he had decided, it happened through the Providence of God that his horse kept to the highroad, though the place was distant only about thirty or forty yards, and the way leading to it was very wide and easy.

Inigo and the Moor

Inigo’s pilgrimage could have had such a dramatically different conclusion had the horse chosen the other path.  He would have become a murderer rather than a saint.  To say that his capacity for discernment at this stage in his life was still quite undeveloped is an understatement.

The destination today was Alagón.  In the old part of town there is a former college of the Society of Jesus, beside the church of Saint Anthony of Padua.



Chapel of the Jesuit School in Alagon

Saint Francis Xavier features in the chapel

A mural of Goya’s can be found in the old Jesuit College, which is now a cultural centre and a centre for adult education. He painted the fresco in 1765-66. It covers the vault of the interior staircase and represents the Exaltation of the Name of Jesus.  In the centre appears the anagram of Jesus which is also the symbol of the Society of Jesus (IHS), surrounded by cherubim floating in a cloud of Glory. The composition is simple and of great beauty, and demonstrates that Goya, despite his youth (he was 19 years at the time he painted it) showed a technical and artisitic ability that was already considerable.

Goya’s mural seen from the bottom of the stairwell

Close up of Goya’s Mural

Pausing along the Way (click on images to enlarge)

Today as they walk the pilgrims are beginning to reflect on Jesus’s public ministry. The scripture passage is Matthew 3:13-17 in which Jesus goes to be baptised by John the Baptist in the River Jordan. I suggested that they reflect particularly on verses 16 and 17:

      “As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”

The grace we are praying for: I suggested that the pilgrims pray for the grace to hear God say to each of them individually, “(John, Michael, Jan, Sandra, Amanda, Vin, Helen, Paddy, Joe, Tracy, Patrick, Stephen, Peter, Chona…) you are my beloved (son, daughter), whom I love, with you I am well pleased.”

Reflection:  John the Baptist calls sinners to repentance and to conversion. I suggested that conversion is not just religious, but that there are five different sorts of conversion:  (i) religious, (ii) intellectual, (iii) affective, (iv) personal moral, and (v) socio-political. (Of course each of these conversions interrelate with one another.)

In thinking about the different kinds of conversation I am guided by the work of the late Fr Donald Gelpi SJ who outlines the five conversions in his book The Conversion Experience.  To summarise:

A person may be in need of religious conversion if he or she is

• disinterested in the realm of the Spirit
• closed to mystery
• unable to ground his or her existence in the context of God’s love.

A person may be in need of intellectual conversion if he or she is

• biased, muddled in thinking, fundamentalist
• close-minded
• prejudiced
• unreflective
• ignorant.

A person may be in need of affective conversion if he or she is

• neurotic, psychotic, emotionally rigid, compulsive
• negligibly unaware of his/her own emotions
• hypertense
• low in self-esteem
• a substance abuser
• uncontrollably anxious
• constantly angry
• unable to be intimate
• unimaginative
• crass.

A person may be in need of personal moral conversion if he or she is

• selfish and ethically irresponsible
• self-indulgent
• obsessed with personal self-gratification
• insensitive to ethical values
• unjust
• lacking in compassion.

A person may be in need of socio-political conversion if he or she is

• only concerned with privatised living (“I am okay.”)
• tribalistic (concerned only for the welfare of my “tribe”)
• apathetic about social issues
• uninvolved in the political process
• unempathetic for the victims of unjust structures.

Maybe God is calling each of us to a particular conversion during this time of pilgrimage?

The walk today.  Although today was a long day on the Ignatian Camino, the terrain was flat as the pilgrims walked along farmers’ roads and past cultivated fields. El Bocal is the first town in which they stopped.  It is the starting point of the Imperial Canal of Castilla — an ambitious project commissioned in 1528 by Emperor Carlos V to create irrigation channels fed from the Ebro River.  In El Bocal is the Palace of Charles V and in its peaceful gardens the oldest oak tree Navarra can be found. The Camino continues through the towns of Ribaforada, Cortes and Mallén en route to Gallur. You are now in the region of Aragon. At the end of the walk the group was transferred by bus back to the hotel in Tudela.

Peter Walden, who also supplied the photos of today’s walk, writes:

        “We prayed hard last night that we would be able to complete this leg knowing it was our longest walk yet (38kms) through hot conditions with minimal shade. We were relieved to wake up this morning to cool and slightly overcast conditions. We started well with the group covering the first leg of 25 kms to Cortez by 2pm where we stopped for lunch at Charly’s Bar. As usual we proceeded to clean the bar of tapas as the hungry pilgrims restocked on carbs.  For most of the day we were walking next to a large canal called the Royal Canal of Aragon,  that been built high up on the side of a hill so we had panoramic views over the fertile countryside. We also had the benefit of cool wind at our backs of between 10/15 kph which kept the temperatures down. We reached Gallur at 6pm  and we were thrilled to see the bus there even though it had been scheduled for 7pm. The group was on a high on the bus and very thankful having completed this challenging leg and all concluded that God had listened to our fervent prayers last night.”

Some of today’s scenery

Following the canal

The Canal System

A determined Helen Lucas leading the group

Fr Joe Taylor and others doing stretches during a break

Outside Charly’s Bar where the group had lunch today

Chona Walden coming into Gallur at the end of today’s 38 km walk