Some terminology: Santiago [Sant Iago] means St. James. Santiago de Compostela is the shorthand way to refer to the Cathedral Shrine of St. James at Compostela where the Apostle St. James the Great is buried. And the Camino de Santiago (camino=road) is the shorthand way to refer to a vast network of roads that pilgrims and trekkers of many other sorts take to St. James’s Shrine.
The Most Famous Pilgrimage: Canterbury Tales
Probably the most famous of all pilgrimages is the fictional one written about by Geoffrey Chaucer in his Canterbury Tales. The story recounts a series of sometimes raunchy stories exchanged by a group of men and women to amuse themselves as they traveled on a pilgrimage in April of 1387 to the Shrine of St. Thomas Becket at Canterbury, England. Even if you haven’t heard of Canterbury Tales, you probably have heard of the movie Becket, which starred Peter O’Toole and Richard Burton, and dramatized the murder of St. Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury, in his cathedral.
St. Thomas Becket was killed because he stood up against his friend and king, Henry II of England, to support the independence of the Church. Becket was canonized as a martyr only two years after his death, in 1173, and his tomb continued to be a pilgrimage destination, until its destruction by King Henry VIII, over 300 years later. Henry VIII particularly resented the devotion to St. Thomas Becket, who was killed because he defied a wrongful order by his King.
Canterbury Tales was written about two hundred years after St. Thomas of Canterbury’s death and is full of references to Catholic practices and saints, to Christ, and to His Mother. Among the thirty-odd pilgrims are both male clerics (a prior, a monk, three priests, a parson, a pardoner, and a summoner), and women religious (a prioress, and a nun).
By the way, when Chaucer was nearing death, he added a retraction, repenting for any harm he might have done out of ignorance by writing down lewd tales and asking for forgiveness for any parts of his work that “sownen unto sinne” [lead readers by bad example towards sin].
From the characteristics of the characters portrayed by Chaucer and by their stories, it’s obvious that even back in the 14th century many people made pilgrimages more for amusement than for penance. The pious destination for many seems to have been a pretext for a lark. In an era before cruise ships, travel agents, and package tours, people in Chaucer’s time traveled for many of the same reasons people travel these days, to see new places, to escape their ordinary lives, to get out in the open air in the springtime, to meet new people and to have adventures to boast about when they returned home. You didn’t have many choices back then if you wanted to see the world, you either went to war (if you were a man), or you went on a pilgrimage.
Aside from the knight in Chaucer’s story, who is traveling to give thanks for his survival during the Crusades, and who is a “a verray, parfit gentil knight,” the only other truly inspiring member of the company is the parson, a poor priest who Chaucer describes as rich “of hooly thoght and werk.”
But then, you might consider the five–times-married conniving Wife of Bath to be inspiring (as I once did during my feminist days when I admired her independent ways). Chaucer wrote that the Wife of Bath knew much about wandering by the way and had “passed many a strange strem.” Chaucer was making ironic digs about the much-mated woman’s indiscretions, but this bawdy 14th century character had wandered much and had passed many strange streams also because she had made an astounding number of pilgrimages: three times to Jerusalem, another time to Rome, and other times to other major pilgrimage sites, Boulogne in France, Cologne in Germany, and most apropos to this review, she had also gone to Santiago, in Spain.
From the first page of Canterbury Tales: The Wife of Bath's Tale
The Way, a Movie that Lost Its Way?
I originally read Discovering the Camino de Santiago when it was first published after an autographed copy was sent to me by Mary Rose Garych, one of the parishioners of the author, Fr. Markey in 2011, when he was pastor of St. Mary’s in Norwalk, CT. I met Mary Rose at a colloquium in 2008 put on by Church Music Assocation of America (CMAA). Mary Rose thought I might be interested in Fr. Markey’s book after she read a lukewarm review I had posted about The Way, a movie by Emilio Estevez about the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route.
In my review, I had found the movie lacking because it tried so hard not to be religious that it fell short of being the powerful movie it might have been.
Father Markey and His Book about Camino de Santiago
When I received the book, I already had a great deal of admiration for Fr. Markey, who I'd met along with some of his parishioners at the previous CMAA colloquium in 2007. He was a zealous, young priest pastor who wore a cassock and a Roman collar and who also offered Traditional Latin Masses in the Extraordinary Form and supported a high-quality sacred music program at his parish in Norwalk, Connecticut.
Father Markey, along with his then-parish’s choirmaster and organist, David Hughes, and a number of the parishioners, at the 2007 Sacred Music Colloquium in Washington D.C.
Fr. Markey at Midnight Mass at St. Mary’s Norwalk (December 25th, 2011). While he was there, the parish offered a Traditional Latin High Mass daily and offers the Novus Ordo Mass in Latin on Sunday mornings.
Fr. Markey is now senior chaplain at the Northfield Massachusetts campus of Thomas Aquinas College in New England.
I especially admired Fr. Markey when I first met him because he seems to do all that he can to foster reverent worship at his parish, explaining, as he wrote on the parish website, that his purpose was “to simply bring St. Mary Church into conformity with the norms of the Church.”
After reading his pilgrim story, I admired him even more.
William Blake’s 1 ft. x 3 ft. engraving of the Canterbury Pilgrims
Original cover, first publication 2011
Discovering the Camino de Santiago was originally published in 2011, and now is republished in 2024 with more stories from his pilgrimage. Fr. Markey started writing this brief (originally 75 page now 160 page) book as he travelled prayerfully and contemplatively on his pilgrimage during a sabbatical, from late June to late July in 2009.
It is a much humbles work than Canterbury Tales. No bawdy tales are recorded in this good priest’s book and nobody’s foibles are parodied.
Devotion to St. James was the original motive for the pilgrimages to Compostela that began to be made about thousand years ago, and a record of widespread devotion to the great Apostle remains in Europe, the Caribbean, and in Central and South America in the scores of cities and towns and hundreds, perhaps thousands, of churches, that bear Saint James’s name. Another major difference is that Fr. Markey’s book was written in our era, which is for the most part no longer even nominally Catholic and which knows little or nothing about pilgrimages.
Hundreds perhaps thousands of books have been written about the Camino. Unlike most of the others, this book is not a guide for someone who plans to check off “Walk the Camino” on his or her bucket list. Fr. Markey wrote in his introduction that he wanted to write about the Camino “from the perspective of a believer” both because the Camino is rich in Catholic history and because the great contribution of the Apostle St. James to the evangelization of Hispanic peoples deserves to be better known.
Fr. Markey’s account of his pilgrimage is a perfect book for a Catholic to read, whether or not you are planning to try to walk the Camino yourself.
Fr. Markey’s book presents the evidence for the traditional beliefs that St. James evangelized Spain, that he returned to Jerusalem and later died as the first martyr among the Apostles, and that his body was brought back to Spain for burial.
He quotes from significant Church documents about the shrine and provides some of the rich history of the Camino.
Fr. Markey’s own journey to the shrine of St. James is humbly told, reverent, and inspiring. He describes how he walked along the road with both a Vatican flag and an American flag hanging on his backpack and a rosary in his hand, handing out blessed Miraculous Medals as the opportunity presented itself, among a shifting stream of people who came from all around the world for many and varied reasons. The new edition has more stories about people he met.
Spiritual Fellow Travelers
Fr. Markey greatest camaraderie occurred during the times when he fell in with a pious and joyful group of Catholic young people who are members of FOCUS (Fellowship of Catholic University Students) and who seemed to be on the Camino for all the right reasons. After they kept running into each other, they decided to join forces, and from that point on they read the Liturgy of the Hours, said the Rosary, and participated at Mass with Fr. Markey, until the end of the pilgrimage.
Fr. Markey’s goal was to arrive at the shrine by the Feast of St. James on July 25, 2009, and in spite of setbacks from “Brother Ass” that put his plan at risk, he made it--the day before the feast. He concelebrated with the archbishop and many other priests on the feast day, and a day later he was able to say a private Mass with the FOCUS group at the tomb of St. James.
Distances Covered
The distance from where Canterbury Tales began in Southwark in London to where it ended in Canterbury is about 58 miles, and the journey took four days for most people mounted on either a horse or mule. In contrast, Fr. Markey walked 496 often-pain-filled miles of the popular portion of the Camino called the Camino Frances, which extends from Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port near France’s border to Compostela, and his pilgrimage took him a month. He walked the Camino to offer thanks to God for his ten years as a priest, with the resolution to offer up any sufferings he might experience along the way.
In this and other ways, he reminds me quite a bit of the Chaucer’s parson, the priest who Chaucer described as rich “of hooly thoght and werk.”
The oval on the right indicates Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port in France, where Fr. Markey began his pilgrimage, and the oval on the left indicates his destination at Santiago de Compostela
As he walked and gave thanks to God for the 10th anniversary of his ordination as a priest, he was only one of the one hundred forty five thousand eight hundred and seventy seven (145877) travelers along the the Camino that year.How many of us who’ve never walked the Camino could imagine that hundreds of thousands still travel on the Camino and converge on Compostela every year? But, as was true in Chaucer’s tale, only a scant few of Fr. Markey’s fellow travelers could be said to be on the Camino for pure motives of performing penance and showing sorrow for sins.
On the Camino Father Markey always wore the collar, which I believe makes a much-needed statement about the special calling of a priest.
He also quoted the homily Pope Benedict XVI gave at the Compostela Cathedral during a visit the year after Fr. Markey went there, in the Jubilee year of 2010
At the end of the book, Fr. Markey wrote: “The experience of the Camino has been exhausting—perhaps the most physically demanding thing I have ever done in my life–yet filled with many graces. The Camino beats you down, wears you out and purifies you.”
Other Reviews
Magdalena Rodriguez, in a customer review said this about the book at Amazon: “My husband an I are planning on going on the Camino De Santiago later this year and have been looking for Catholic books to read in preparation. Sadly, there are so few Catholic books for this Catholic Pilgrimage, and all the reading material is trying so hard to appeal to secular travelers that it almost seems like Catholic pilgrims are not welcome on the Camino. This was a breath of fresh air, and a wonderful read. Definitely recommend to others.”
One reader who commented on the National Catholic Register review of the original version of the book remarked that pictures would have added a lot. Here is a photo from the Internet of the Virgin of Orisson, a beautiful statue that Fr. Markey encountered soon after he had entered Spain on the Camino Frances and started climbing in the Pyrenees
Jordan Saxony, in another Amazon customer review wrote, “There are many books on the practical aspects of the Camino (logistics, what to bring, how to get around). This is not one of them. Instead it may very well be the best book in English suitable for any reader. Most of the Camino books treat the pilgrimage as something entirely naturalistic, like the Appalachian Trail; if they get “spiritual” at all, it is only in the sense of a New Age kind of easy spirituality, or perhaps a kind of psychological journey. Father Markey’s book is entirely different. The Camino is an ancient CATHOLIC pilgrimage route and the book is written by a truly faithful Catholic “peregrino”(pilgrim). It includes the history of Santiago – starting back in the Bible – as well as something most people are not aware of – references to the historical accuracy of this place as the tomb of St. James. The book also includes Pope Benedict’s beautiful homily at the Cathedral Compostela during the Jubilee Year of 2010….[T]here is nothing else like it in English.”
A Bit of Personal Backstory
For about twenty years I ws intrigued by the Camino de Santiago de Compostela. I envied a fellow St. Ann choir member, Kerry McCarthy, who was then a young professor of music at Duke, now a independent singer and a renowned biographer of great Tudor musicians, Tallis and Byrd. After I learned that she has walked portions of the Camino more than once, before one choir dinner towards the end of one summer, Kerry gave me one of the tiny silver scallop shell charms she’d brought back to give away as souvenirs. Scallop shells are a symbol of St. James, and they are traditionally worn by pilgrims along the Camino.
About a year later, I was visiting Kerry’s good friends, Susan and John Altstatt, while Kerry was on one of her summer treks along the Camino, and the Altstatts showed me a video of Kerry at a fountain along the way that has two faucets, one for water and one for red wine. They had prearranged with Kerry a time when she would be there, and John had figured out a way to capture the video from a web cam. So I got to see a grainy black and white clip that they captured of Kerry walking up to that fountain halfway around the world and filling her cup with wine. That is as close I’ll ever get to being there, I thought to myself, and I was glad to share vicariously in that bit of the pilgrim experience.
Father Markey’s book is yet another way I got to share in the experience of a faith-filled Catholic on the Camino de Compostela.
The Wine Fountain was built in 1991 by a vendor and has the following messages: “We are pleased to invite you to drink in moderation. If you wish to take the wine with you, you will have to buy it.” “Pilgrim, if you wish to arrive at Santiago full of strength and vitality, have a drink of this great wine and make a toast to happiness.”
I am so very glad you put this out TODAY!