Camino de Santiago Portuguese - Day 17

• Daily Overview

• Summary of the Day: We’re here in a little restaurant in A Armetiera. Maybe the only place in this small town that has internet! A Armentiera is another stop along the Camino Espiritual. This is an alternative route that ends with a boat ride that follows the route legend says James’s disciples used to smuggle his body back into the country for burial. The Camino is called the Way of St James. James was Jesus' disciple (one of the sons of thunder), and he was responsible for establishing Christendom in Spain. We’re staying here today after a four-hour walk over the mountain from Combarro. The little house we’re staying in is right around the corner from a bar, a small restaurant (where we are now), and a 500-year-old working monastery complete with monks and nuns. We just returned from the monastery, where they had a vigil called the blessing of the pilgrim service. The service is held in a small cloister. There were probably fifty people crammed in there in addition to the nine nuns who led the service. It was a combination of hymns and prayers with music from a small organ. At the end, they said a prayer in each language for the people present. I was so happy we got to be here for that.

• It was a challenging walk today, three miles up the mountain in the rain and three miles down. When we set out around quarter to nine, the streets were empty of other pilgrims, but as we got up into the mountains, there were at least a dozen or more pilgrims who caught up with us (and passed us 😊) Along the way on this very long ascent one of the locals had an old half size refrigerator with drinks in it for pilgrims beside their house. We regularly see anonymous displays of kindness like this extended to the people who are walking. It is both humbling and encouraging. We got into A Armentiera at noon today, which is the end of the morning coffee break here in Spain, not lunch time. Lunch is between one and three pm. That is the heaviest meal of the day. Dinner time is around eight to ten pm. It’s eight o’clock now, and the restaurant is packed, so we must be here at the right time for a change.

• What we planned to do: 

Today we planned a shorter six-mile walk from Combarro over the mountain to A Armentiera.

The Day's Focus

• Topic: Weakness equals strength - God's continual invitation to me is to walk into places that require his presence and partnership, and participation. I long for that, but sometimes I can’t; I just have to do things myself. Even then, the invitation remains

• Word for the Day: Weakness

• Scripture: 2 Cor 22:10 -Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

• Spiritual Practice:  Identify three areas in your life right now where you feel weak. Write them down. Now ask God for the strength that he has given you in those places.

Moments and Images

• Images from the Way Today: 

What we had for dinner this evening - pilgrim food - God bless the man running this little restaurant with a small crew cranking out great food for thirty people at once.

• Beautiful Spot of the Day: 

The ferns along the road through the forest were beginning to change colour from green to red and yellow.

• Spiritual Meditative Moment: 

  The blessing of the pilgrim service. I could feel the heaviness of the Holy Spirit

• What Church We Visited:

  

  

  
  

  

  

  The church here beside the Monastery looks very old and has a very medieval feel to it.

  
  

• People we experienced: The hostess of the little house we’re staying in was incredibly kind and gracious. She was at the cafe where we went to get drinks for lunch, and she said she was paying for our drinks because the house was not quite ready when we got there.

• Unexpected Surprises: The hostess at the little house had hooked up space heaters in the rooms before we got there (knowing that we were walking and we would be cold and wet). We sat around them for a long time today. The blessing service- we only made it there because the nun in the gift shop mentioned it in Spanish, and Jonathan understood.

• Animal/Nature or local life: We only saw two vehicles during our whole time up on the mountain today.  One of them was pulling a trailer with dogs in it. Yep, they were up there to go wild boar hunting.

Reflections and Learnings

• Reflections from Today: More often than not, the things that God is calling me(and you)to are not well within my capabilities and experience and comfort level. They are far out on the fringe where all my fears and doubts and frailties lie. In that place, He can be who He truly wants to be for us, and we can be who we long to be for Him.

  
  

• "Well, that was hard": Walking out into the early morning to put on our rain gear and start walking was a little hard, but the walk itself was not as hard as it should have been because God was with u,s sustaining us.

• "What helped me today":

  We went to the little gift shop at the monastery to see about getting a stamp for our credentials. When we got here and the nun behind the counter who did our stamp said a few things about a service sometime during the day that I didn’t understand, and then she said something else in Spanish, and I realised she was blessing us. It caught me off guard because I wasn’t prepared for that. It was clear to me, even with the language barrier, that she was serious, and she had the authority to do it. I was glad it was still raining when we stepped outside because it made my tears less obvious.

• "Something I learned": Half the people in this area speak Galician as their everyday language (it’s more like Portuguese).

  
  

• "Insight for the day": If you are wearing a poncho in the pouring rain whilst hiking up a mountain,  you will be just as wet from your own sweat as you would be from the rain. It’s not a question of wet or dry; it’s just a question of what kind of wet you want to be.

• "Mystical occurrences": We encountered a quail just walking around on the trail in front of us as we came up the mountain. It occurred to me that quail was the food that God sent to his people when they needed something more. Today, we needed something more.

Daily Conclusion

• A View of Our Compostela from today

The monastery stamp is beautiful

• Gratitudes (1–3 things I'm thankful for):

A safe walk over the mountain in the rain today

A half day to rest before a very long fifteen-mile walk tomorrow

The beautiful weather that has been with us for weeks