The chapter talks about the author's experience as a pilgrim. From 1973 until 2018, he was a pilgrim to Our Lady of Fátima, mapped and walked a centuries-old route to Our Lady of Lapa and was a frequent pilgrim to Santiago de Compostela. In the meantime, in the spirit of the pilgrimage to Santiago, he also became a volunteer, supporting pilgrims in hostels since 2016. In 2019, a serious illness led him to fear that his pilgrimages had come to an end. The fight against fears, uncertainties about the future, but also the solidarity of many friends and, perhaps unexpectedly, of those who have walked the same roads with him.
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This article describes aspects and points of view of my “life” as a pilgrim. A continuous search for pilgrimage routes and the pleasure of trying to reach the material and spiritual limits they offer. The multiple feelings along the routes travelled and the experiences as a volunteer in the hostels along the road to Santiago de Compostela. In my experience, I have accompanied others who have made promises, I have been the bearer of promises on behalf of people without hope, believing that they could only find a cure or obtain peace from death through the supernatural. I have supported pilgrims in their various conditions, even when they were desperate, but also many of those who, having no roof over their heads, lived off charity and solidarity up and down the roads to Santiago.
The first eight chapters describe many of these experiences, covering the most memorable moments as a person, pilgrim, and volunteer.
But life always has setbacks. In 2019, after having walked half of the French route, cancer forced me to leave the most travelled pilgrimage route in the Christian world halfway through. The ninth chapter deals with illness, the fight against fears, uncertainties about the future, but also the solidarity of many and, perhaps unexpectedly, of those who have walked the same roads with me. Despite this, some doubts persisted: Would I be able to finish the French way?
The continuous search for information about the Camino de Santiago (Way of Saint James), its origins and development are the basis of the methodology adopted. The “inventio” of the relics of St. James the Greater and the legends surrounding the Apostle, reproduced in the “Codex Calixtinus”, ended up transforming history, after being promoted and protected by royal and church elites. The development of pilgrimage routes to Santiago de Compostela is one of the consequences of this protection, plus the commitment of Popes, both in the Middle Ages and today. Also present are the study and knowledge of the evolution of the concept of pilgrim and the existence or not of contradictions between the motivations of the various people who walk the Camino de Santiago.
The methodology for this text was based on experiences that were gathered randomly, guided, and adapted as each moment demanded, through interviews and observation of the behaviour and attitudes of other pilgrims and, when searching for and rediscovering ancestral paths, of elders who had walked them or knew them through tradition.
The main objective, with this article, is to reach the reader in the subject of pilgrimage routes, and to encourage him to become a pilgrim, as well.