Pilgrimage News

(Note: this was my "pastor's reflection" in the Good shepherd Parish Bulletin for February 28, 2010.)

Many of you have asked about how plans are progressing for the Early Christian World Pilgrimage that I will be leading during April. Last week we closed registration with eleven participants, plus myself. This is a much smaller group than I had hoped for, a little more than half of the twenty that I had originally set as the minimum. Thanks to the generosity of Mr. Ersan Atsur, owner of Orion-Tour, our agency in Istanbul, and AmericanTours International, our agency here, we are able to make this pilgrimage, in spite of our reduced number, with no increase in the cost.

About half of our Pilgrims are professional religious educators, a group that I really want to engage in this Pilgrimage experience, so that they can in turn influence young people. The only reason why I am committed to leading this Pilgrimage, and have done so three times in the past and hope to continue in the future, is that I firmly believe the future of humankind in our world today depends on building bridges of understanding among people of diverse backgrounds and convictions.

This kind of understanding can come only through first knowing and being comfortable with our own faith. And quite frankly, that's not an easy task. Learning and integrating our faith into our lives is a life-long task, and an important part of it is exploring our heritage, including what history has to teach us about why we believe as we do.

The other requirement for building bridges is to understand those who are different from ourselves, especially those whom we find difficult to understand or threatening -- or who see us that way.

Turkey is the perfect place to immerse ourselves in both of these essential dimensions of pilgrimage: touching our own heritage and discovering the identity of the other.

One of the opportunities given us by the small size of the group is that we can have more lively interaction with one another and our guide, Aydin Eroglu. Aydin is not only an expert in everything we need to know about Turkey, he is also a devout Muslim who is deeply committed to interfaith dialogue and understanding.

My goal in planning this pilgrimage is to share as widely as possible the insights and results of our explorations. One of our teachers at Good Shepherd School, Maddie Murphy, is coming, and we are designing ways that she can be in constant touch with her fifth-grade students and the rest of the school community. At the same time, I am working on putting a "virtual pilgrimage" on the web, and you'll be able to follow us at http://ecwpilgrimage.org. If, for whatever reason, you can't make the trip physically, you can still come along in spirit through the modern miracles of the internet.

Also, you might want to look at your calendar and see if you can join us for the Pilgrimage next year. We always begin during Easter week, and so next year our Pilgrimage, God willing, will begin on Wednesday, April 27, 2011. Because several people could not make it this year because of the length, it will undoubtedly be shorter, probably sixteen days rather than twenty-two. You can be back home by Saturday, May 14.

We are all pilgrims in life, and I pray that everyone here at Good Shepherd will be able to learn and benefit in some way from our Pilgrim journey to Turkey's Early Christian World sites. Please pray for us who will be traveling as we prepare for this life-changing experience. May God bless you all.