Walking back to happiness

Walking the Camino along the north shore of Spain to Santiago de Compostela has become perhaps the most active pilgrim route in the world. All kinds of people undertake the excursion, not all of them Christians by any means.

This very personal book is an account of one such by a Catholic woman from Wexford, now resident in Cork. She set out in the summer of 2012 from the little French town of Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port to walk the Way. It was not at all what she expected; she found it a severe trial on her both physically and emotionally. Yet though it meant she learnt things about herself she had scarcely realised, as revealed in these pages based on the journal she kept along the route, she feels she would do it again. Gruelling though it was it brought her a unique kind of happiness.

But a medieval Irish poet noted that “To go to Rome, much labour, little profit: / the King whom you seek here,/ unless thou bring him with you, / you’ll not find him.” 

Indeed one does not need to walk the Camino, hallowed though it is by the feet of pilgrims over many centuries. Here at home there can be found other and perhaps more relevant pilgrim paths. Indeed there seems to be underway a movement to develop these routes, all over the country, for walking them provides a sort of holistic benefit for both body and soul.

This is the specific intention of Dr Rosemary Power in her book, also self-published. She provides full descriptions of the ancient sites at all these places, which can be read with great interest by any one intrigued by the remains of medieval Irish religion, especially as her bibliography will enable readers to investigate further for themselves. But she joins these up with an account of the walks that connect all three.

She mentions many sites, such as holy wells, to be seen along the way.

Scattery Island in the Shannon is perhaps the most famous of these sites, but Dr Power’s book allows the reader to see all three places and their significance in a slightly wider context, which is valuable.

However, this is a guide book only. Unlike Mary Murphy’s book, there is no account of the actual pilgrim experiences. This is often the case I have noticed in similar books that come my way. It would certainly be very interesting, and perhaps revealing, if some writer were able to combine the two, the scholarly notes matched by the revelations of personal spiritual experience. Then the walks would result in both physical and spiritual happiness.