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Pause for Reflection at Montes de Oca
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Pilgrims All - From Wilderness to Promised Land
Traditionally, a pilgrimage is an intentional journey to a destination considered sacred or significnt in some way, associated with a person, place or event. Many are the worldwide sites to which pilgrims have travelled over the ages: Mecca, Lourdes, Varanasi on the Ganges, The Wailing Wall, Deer Park, Rome, Jerusalem, Canterbury and Santiago de Compostela, as well as others not so well known.
Setting out on a pilgrimage involves both physical and psychological experiences. There is uncertainty, with the realization there may be risks or unexpected encounters along the way, but also great anticipation of the adventure. And so, pilgrims set out with a commitment and will to reach their destination. Such an experience has often been said by pilgrims to have been transformational toward a heightened consciousness and greater self-knowledge.
Expanding on the idea of "pilgrimage," we may imagine, or have experienced, that some of life's journeys are unplanned "pilgrimages," sometimes thrust upon us by necessity or chance, taking us to distant landscapes, sometimes inner ones! Any story worth telling involves a pilgrimage of sorts, and we have examples of such pilgrimages in film, plays, myth and literature.
The film, The Miracle Club comes to mind. Another is Shakespeare’s play, King Lear. In it, the king finds himself on an unintentional pilgrimage, both inner and outer when, through his pride, he seeks affirmation from his three daughters of their love for him, saying "Which of you shall we say doth love me the most?" and that he will give up his rule and his entire kingdom to whomever expresses adoration for him.
His youngest daughter. Cordelia refuses to honor Lear’s selfish and foolish demand and, therefore, is disinherited by him. While his other daughters, Goneril and Regan, speak words of love crafted for their own self-gain. However, once they receive what he promised, they exile him, forcing him out of the kingdom to wander on an unexpected pilgrimage into the wilderness, with all lost to him: position, power and wealth.
Most devastating to him is his daughters' betrayal, as he endures the outer elements of a raging storm, and the inner ones of anguish, despair, and madness—not knowing where he is or who he is, until Cordelia comes to his rescue--true proof of her love. He is transformed then from inner wilderness to the "promised land" of forgiveness, acceptance and unconditional love, that which he had been seeking all along.
Ultimately, are we not all pilgrims—for our faith, for an adventure, or, as Lear, for unconditional love and acceptance? Whichever it be, we must submit to the challenges and be grateful for the blessings of our journeys, intentional or not, having taken us to the ends of the earth, or to the "limits of our longing."
One thing is certain, we will not end up where we started. If we are fortunate, like King Lear, we can emerge from Wilderness to Promised Land.
