St. James, the Apostle

Today's the Feast of St. James, the Apostle. One of the interesting things about St. James is that during the middle ages, many people venerated him by going on a pilgrimage to where his remains are said to lie in the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia in north-westernmost Spain. People still make this pilgrimage today, called "the way of St. James", and as Wikipedia says, there are a number of routes ...

There is not a single route - the Way can be one of any number of pilgrimage routes to Santiago de Compostela. However a few of the routes are considered main ones. Santiago is such an important pilgrimage destination as it is considered the burial site of the apostle James the Great. Legend states that St. James' remains were carried by boat from Jerusalem to northern Spain where they were buried on the site of what is now the city of Santiago de Compostela. In the middle ages the route was highly travelled. However reformation and unrest in 16th century Europe resulted in its decline. In the early 1980's only a few pilgrims a year arrived in Santiago. However, since the late 1980s the way has attracted a growing number of modern-day pilgrims from all around the globe. The route was declared the first European Cultural Route by the Council of Europe in October 1987 and inscribed as one of UNESCO's World Heritage Sites in 1993.



There was an article a couple of years ago in the Tablet, in which Michael McMahon described his own pilgrimage to Compostel experience ...

For 1,000 years, pilgrims have walked the camino de Santiago to the tomb of St James the Apostle in northwestern Spain. One who completed his 500 mile journey last week discovered on the way that Providence, in the guise of people he met, eased his passage When we caught sight of the twin towers of the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, I asked Luigi how he felt. “Arriving doesn’t make me any happier”, he told me. “How could it? My heart is absolutely full.” We had walked the last 30 kilometres of the camino together, and he had spent much of that time telling me how grateful he was for every single moment of his pilgrimage ....

(snip)

... Luigi certainly knew what it felt like to be “held” in the hand of God, and it was a blessing to walk into Santiago in his company. His cup was running over with happiness, but it wasn’t the happiness of having made it: happiness like that would soon be only a memory. He was happy because he knew that the God who had walked with him on the camino wasn’t going to leave him to walk the rest of his life by himself, and from now on he was determined to share that happiness with everyone he met. It was just before 6 p.m. when we wound our way through the medieval streets to the cathedral, and its battery of bells began to clatter and clank and clang as if to express our joy. Outside the Puerta Santa, Luigi turned to me, smiled, gave me a bear hug and kissed me hard on both cheeks. “Well, Michael”, he said. “Here we are in Santiago de Compostela. Now, the camino really begins.”

- Always rely on the kindness of strangers - The Tablet


- Santiago de Compostela


- interior

Read more about St. James

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