This is kind of a cool shot. Talking pilgrimage out in front of the icon.
Dear Caminoheads,
I thought of Phil quite a bit today, for different reasons. One of them, obviously, had to do with the Camino, but another one, had to do with our talks, for example. So, I went to the blog thinking: what did Phil write about on a day like today, on the year I met him?… Marvelous answer… almost as if he would had been talking about Towers of Babel (or the Camino!)
Love from all over,
Cris
Hi, just have a few moments to be with you. Has been busy here at Camino de Felipe. I got Steve Watkins to his airport hotel Saturday evening after a great visit. Then Sunday afternoon Michele from Seattle brought five folks out to walk and tapa. That went well as the weather cooperated mostly and we had a nice walk. Then this morning I was Skyping with Catalina’s class at the Jesuit Seminary at Santa Clara.
I am about talked out but it all was fun. What do I do with half my time but talk about pilgrim stuff. Yea, the next best thing to actually doing it is talking about it, right?
It just must be a rich topic since we spend so much time with it. This must serve to clarify our own thinking. We hear our own thoughts and we listen to that and we refine our talk to be more on message and more streamlined. We listen to other’s ideas and interpretations and gain from that. Maybe we never heard things expressed in that manner before. It’s all good for working things out.
Then we need alone time or down time to process. I had the walk this morning for an hour alone to do just that. So, off to work now. Never a dull moment here in these parts. Miss you, love you, Felipe.
Written by Phil/Felipe/The General/The boss; reposted by Cris
I think that photo was taken in Olympia Washington, at St. Michael’s church where we went to screen Phil’s Camino. There was an amazing priest there, Fr. Jim, who had recently been diagnosed with ALS. His parish really adored him, and were taken with how similar he and Phil were. Fr. Jim, before his diagnosis, used to always say he was “blessed” when anyone asked how he was. He made a slight change after his diagnosis: he now says he is “Blessed with ALS.” They were two birds of a feather. <3
Here is a video of Fr. Jim telling his parish of his news. https://vimeo.com/user48569499/review/643323402/e5a608d3bc
Of course, I may be all wrong and that may actually be up in Monterey when we were visiting Fr. Tom, haha! All good. Phil spread a lot of love around. Buen Camino everybody. I think of you all at almost every step these days.
That’s really perfect, Cris. Serendipity happens, and to those who look it becomes, like all miraculous things, more common, more visible, right?
Maybe I should write more ‘comments’ about my last two nights with Phil. Yup, in the Elk Hotel where we’d spent a good amount of time in MON * over the years. We talked two ways on two nights. And there was a coherence to the two conversations –though to all appearances and sounds and words and pace and syntax and content they appeared nothing alike. But…
They Were.
I am cautious about making Phil an icon or figurehad or one whom around which could develop a cultish honoring, a cultish adoration, and therefore a dehumanization the man. He was not a saint. He was a guy, a guy open about his transformational experience and it’s subsequent outworking.
Figuring It Out Together.
We. He said WE, and it was new to me. A new idea, a new meshing of words I’d not heard together, a new concept, a new understanding, and a transformational experience for me.
Collaboration in all things, with all people, about all we seek to understand, or that the Other seeks to understand even more than we might, but
WE figure it out.
THAT.
That. Matters.
That is at the core.
That is a Thing, and a rare thing in its open hearted, earnest, unadorned, unquestioned, even innocent authenticity.
That imperfect, aware of his flawed humanness, willing to open up with another, explore together guy –that guy that was my friend; that was Phil.
Just like all of us, I think. But Phil was generally payin way more attention– in the big picture and in the moment.