“The world is charged with the grandeur of God
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil.”
~Gerard Manley Hopkins

We titled this pilgrimage we are on ‘In Search of Sacred Places.’ In fact, the guiding line is taken from a book by Daniel Taylor who traveled several of the islands surrounding Celtic lands on his own pilgrimage of skepticism and searching. The inscription that begins the book says simply:’For all spiritual questers who suspect there might be more to things than what we see.’ Yesterday as our 34 pilgrims made their way through landscape varied and diverse, what our eyes could take in couldn’t do justice to the depth and meaning that was being offered. The landscape is so big, so beautiful, so harsh and strong. Frankly, being present to a world ‘charged with the grandeur of God’ becomes a full bodied experience. Today we are spending time processing, allowing the experience to find words and understanding and to sink in and find a home. In short we are taking the time to make sense of the ways in which the Holy is present at all times, if we are awake and aware.

We titled this pilgrimage we are on ‘In Search of Sacred Places.’ In fact, the guiding line is taken from a book by Daniel Taylor who traveled several of the islands surrounding Celtic lands on his own pilgrimage of skepticism and searching. The inscription that begins the book says simply:’For all spiritual questers who suspect there might be more to things than what we see.’ Yesterday as our 34 pilgrims made their way through landscape varied and diverse, what our eyes could take in couldn’t do justice to the depth and meaning that was being offered. The landscape is so big, so beautiful, so harsh and strong. Frankly, being present to a world ‘charged with the grandeur of God’ becomes a full bodied experience. Today we are spending time processing, allowing the experience to find words and understanding and to sink in and find a home. In short we are taking the time to make sense of the ways in which the Holy is present at all times, if we are awake and aware.

Yesterday in the river town of Inverness we experienced a glorious day of sunshine and warmth, not something one associates with Scotland. The river was glistening with sunlight, flowers shot forth brilliant color from window boxes and hanging baskets. The castle that anchors the town stood sentinel as it has always done. And church steeples shot into the sky signaling places of worship, many of which have stood in that place for centuries. Still other church buildings, like one we visited had been de-consecrated and had been turned into a used book store packed to the gills with old books and the musty smell that accompanies them. I have visited other de-consecrated church buildings before and I always wonder about the people who had known these places that held the important moments of their lives…baptisms, weddings, funerals. What is it like to come into the space now filled with books or a cafe? What emotions must run through them? I have to admit a sense of sadness.

Later in the day we made our way along some of the most exquisite scenery I have ever experienced. Rolling, green farmland dotted with balls of white sheep and red, sturdy Highland cattle gave way to the golds and browns and russet reds of the Cuillin Hills. Sheep still graced the ground but in more precarious footing. Photos were snapped and eyes were filled with more and more grandeur, too much really to take in at one time.

Over dinner we took the time to name aloud those places where the grandeur of God had awakened us: the azure sky at not-quite-dark of the night before…the triple rainbow brought on by the morning sun and the misty sky…the sheep standing in their calm and contented way…the conversations with caretakers of churches visited…the birdsongs that seemed to have a different ‘accent’. On and on people shared the ways in which they were awake to the movement of God in their day.

Of course, we don’t need to travel thousands of miles to do this noticing. But most of the time we do need a band of fellow travelers who will help us to remember to stop, look, listen and pay attention. It is what faith communities have always done. As we closed our evening together with the words of the prophet Jeremiah, we stood with the long line of those who continue to follow the path of seeing more deeply and staying awake in times that pull us in countless directions. “Stand at the crossroads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way lies; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls.”

May it be so.

“I arise facing East,
I am asking toward the light;
I am asking that my day
Shall be beautiful with light.
I am asking that the place
Where my feet are shall be light,
That as far as I can see
I shall follow it aright.
I am asking for the courage
to go forward through the shadow,
I am asking toward the light.”
~Mary Austin

After two planes, a couple of delays, and a long bus ride, our group of pilgrims to sacred places in Scotland awoke this morning refreshed and ready to begin a journey we had anticipated for some time. Mist shrouded the streets and voices carried an unfamiliar, yet pleasant, lilt. As we gathered for morning worship, we shared the words of poet Mary Austin. “I am asking toward the light.”

We took our worship-filled selves toward the village of Lindisfarne, situated in the Midlands of England, just shy of the Scottish countryside, and known as Holy Island. Pilgrims have traveled there for centuries, waiting for the tide to recede so they can make their way to the Lindisfarne Priory to offer their deepest prayers. This village that becomes an island daily was home to two named saints…Aidan and Cuthbert… and undoubtedly more unnamed ones. These holy men held space for rich and poor and welcomed those who searched with their very lives to be closer to God. Depending on the weather, this landscape can be breathtakingly beautiful or horribly harsh. I imagine that has always been so and yet people still stream there every day filled with curiosity or hope and a deep longing. I would venture to say our group of pilgrims fit this description. I have yet to hear their stories of their experience today so I don’t yet know.

All I do know is my own experience. I marveled at the devotion and commitment of those early men and women of faith who made this place their home. The work of welcoming those with a hunger for faith can be difficult and frustrating and confusing. It is easy to believe the work is about something you must do. But all that can really be done is to hold the space, to create a container in which those seekers can do their own work, breathe their own prayers, open their own hearts to the Spirit which is always present but often elusive or seemingly invisible. I like to imagine this is what Cuthbert and Aidan did amongst the lush green grasses and intricately carved stone walls of the priory. They put out the welcome mat and let God do the rest. There is probably an important lesson there.

Those they gathered around them, artists and lovers of the scriptures, did their part. They took the words of the gospels and used syllable and image to tell the stories of Jesus so all could ‘hear’. Using paints gleaned from the minerals of earth, they formed pictures and designs…swirls and circles and spirals…to illuminate the words they held dear. Known as the Lindisfarne Gospels these manuscripts are beautiful and inspiring works of art. They represent a welcome mat for those who could not read but were doing their own ‘asking toward the light.’

Each of our pilgrims today took their own brand of asking to this place, a place that has known the feet of seekers for over 1500 years. The very stones under our shoes had stories to tell and today we added our own. We walked through whatever shadows may be holding us and left a footprint that mingles now with the on-going story of faith begun so many years ago. The tide goes out and comes in again. The village is accessible and then it isn’t. But the asking toward the light…and the Light…continues endlessly.
And so it goes.

“We saw a stranger yesterday.
We put food in the eating place,
Drink the drinking place,
Music in the listening place
And, with the Sacred name of the Triune God,
He blessed us and our house,
Our cattle and our dear ones.
As the lark says in her song:
Often, often, often goes Christ in the stranger’s guise.”

These words found in the Iona Abbey Worship Book are an ancient reminder of welcome. I have been thinking of them in these last days as I prepare to go to the small island of Iona off the coast of Scotland where Christianity found its foothold among raging winds and green and rocky fields. That foothold continues more than 1500 years later housed in an ecumenical community whose primary work is to welcome strangers. In a few short days, I will join a group of pilgrims who will travel to this remote island to be welcomed by those who will look for Christ in us. We will arrive after a journey on planes, buses and three different ferries. We may be tired and weary and worse for wear. And yet still, these people whose job it is to welcome, will open their doors, prepare meals, offer us drink and will invite us to make music and share in their worship with them. Outside our bedroom windows where we have stashed our bags and washed our faces after the long journey, the sound of sheep and cows will add to the music.

This is a journey two years in the making. Because there are only two hotels on this three mile wide island we had to put a deposit on space for our 35 pilgrims two years ago. Then the planning began. And the excitement and commitment began to simmer under the surface. Plans were made and remade. Books were read. Prayers were said. Commitments were sealed. Muscles were strengthened through hiking trails all around our cities. And now the time is nearly here.

There are many reasons people make such a pilgrimage, as many reasons as people. For some it is the desire to walk where others have sought answers and connection to the Holy for years. For some it is the beginning of a life transition or the searching for new ways of encountering their faith. For others it is curiosity and the chance to be with like-minded faithful, those who hold one another’s questions with gentleness and compassion. For some, I would venture to say they are still discerning their own brand of ‘why?’ Theologian Richard Niebuhr put it this way: “ Pilgrims are persons in motion – passing through territories not their own – seeking something we might call completion, or perhaps the word clarity will do as well, a goal to which only the spirit’s compass points the way.”

The journey will begin soon. My bags are nearly packed with things that will protect me from sun and wind and rain. I also know that what I leave unpacked is as important as what I have tucked into my backpack. Most of those items are less visible…worry, tasks left undone, my usual lists of “musts” and “shoulds”, any ideas I hold of ‘perfect’ travel. In the shedding, these must be left behind beside the bed where I have been organizing clothes and snacks and sturdy shoes. These invisible companions will not serve me well on this journey of soul.

No matter what I have packed or shed, no matter what I am gripping in terror or loosening in surrender, I am comforted to know that, miles away people are preparing for our arrival. What they will look for in us is not bedraggled or starry-eyed travelers but the Face of Christ. And that brings hope and comfort beyond all words.