On Monday the 13th of May 2013, Harold and I attended Mass at the Cathedral in Santiago and I then got a taxi to the airport and flew from Santiago to Dublin, where I was once again reunited with Margaret. My Camino pilgrimage had come to an end.
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The Cathedral in Santiago de Compostela. I took this photo in August 2009 when I first walked part of the Camino. The steps were huge and they were packed with people.
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The enormous city square on which the Cathedral and the Hotel Paradore are located. I took this photo in 2009. The buskers played beautiful music and the sun was shining brightly. Appropriately, the buskers played Ave maria as I arrived in the square in 2009.
In August 2009, the square in Santiago was packed with peregrinos. This photo gives an idea of just how many peregrinos in Santiago in the middle of the European summer.
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This photo shows the front of the Hotel Paradore on the Santiago city square. Harold and I stayed one night in the Paradore after Harold negotiated for a better deal on price.
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Harold and I attended Mass in the Cathedral on the morning of Tuesday, 14th of May 2013. We were very fortunate. Someone had paid the Cathedral authorities the necessary fee to ensure the giant incense burner was used. This photo shows the censer at floor level with the incense steaming out of it.
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This photo shows the censer hoisted high above floor level in the Cathedral. It was then swung by ropes in huge arcs above the people in the Cathedral with incense pouring out of it. It was a magnificent spectacle and I was glad I was able to see it.
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I took this photo as the censer swung lower to the floor.
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Diary Entry Made on Tuesday 14 May 2013 at 1:57 pm
I am writing this at Santiago airport and I attended the Pilgrim Mass in the cathedral at 12:00 noon today. I got there just after 11:00 am to get an aisle seat in the transept. The transept is where the giant incense burner (the censer) swings in huge arcs. Today I was in luck. Some group had made a "donation" so the incense burning did take place at the end of the Mass.
The cathedral was like a giant market place. Tour groups wandered through behind signs reading "1" or "2" etcetera. Other groups of people - tourists, pilgrims, and perhaps worshippers - constantly wandered into and around the cathedral.
The cathedral itself is vast, cold and full of echoes - a giant statement of raw, unabashed power. The Mass was in Spanish and I understood nothing. There was also a sermon in Spanish. Six priests dressed in wonderful red robes conducted the Mass. In addition, there was a nun who sang beautifully and many other functionaries, including those performed the incense ceremony at the end of the Mass.
The incense burner is very large and it swung in huge elongated arcs across the transept. The swings took it very high up, nearly but not quite horizontal to the cathedral floor. The censer was swung on a very thick rope rolled over a pulley high in the cathedral roof.
The whole incense ceremony was a wonderful spectacle.
Even during the course of the Mass there was constant movement as people kept entering, leaving and moving around the cathedral. Even if I had had knowledge of Spanish, it would have been difficult to understand what was happening - both because of the constant movement and because of the unceasing echoes.
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Soul Song Number 36 - Sanctified
(14 May 2013)
This was the Pilgrim Mass,
I was sitting on a hard church pew inside a huge cathedral.
One that was cold and populated not just by people but also by noisy echoes.
The cathedral was a marketplace.
Tour groups dribbled behind numbers written on placards held aloft by tour guides.
Number 9 one placard proclaimed.
The paying customers of Placard Number 9 jostled for space with other paying customers,
The ones who were dribbling behind Placard Number 10.
Sprinkled among the tourists were cathedral staff,
Trying to create a pretence of order in the melee.
They spoke their instruction by rote.
"No camera flashes are permitted inside the cathedral."
"You can't sit here, these seats are reserved."
"You can't leave your backpack in the aisle."
Pilgrims streamed steadily into the cathedral.
This was their day and this was their Mass.
They were here for the daily Pilgrim Mass,
The one that happens every day at 12:00 noon.
For some of the residents of Santiago, this cathedral was their local church.
Some of them were present trying to worship God.
They needed deep faith to ignore the din that echoed around them.
Tour groups, pilgrims, worshippers, cathedral staff and clergy,
They all jostled for space.
This might have been a place for worship,
But it was also a place to conduct business.
Even when the Pilgrim Mass started,
The jostling continued at the sides.
People came in.
People left.
People simply wandered around.
While all this happened, the six red robed priests recited the Mass.
The Mass was in Spanish.
That was fine if you spoke Spanish.
Of course, the Mass should have been in Spanish.
This was a Spanish cathedral.
The sermon was also in Spanish.
So I understood none of the words of wisdom.
With the Mass finished, the incense censer was swung.
Using huge, leaping arcs, it swung across the cathedral,
Trailing sacred smoke as it went,
Inducing euphoria and expelling evil.
Because this cathedral houses the bones of The Saint,
The crowd was entitled to a spectacle
And the crowd was given its spectacle.
Yet amid the echoing confusion,
Something struggled to express itself.
What was it?
Was it an attempt to listen to and to be aware of the divine?
Yes it was surely there,
Even if at times it seemed to be drowned by the background noise.
Mass completed, I said some hasty farewells.
Then I bundled myself into a taxi.
My destination?
The airport.
Are I a better human being because I have walked The Camino?
Like The Saint, have I been sanctified?
I have no idea.
I will need to think about that later.
Right now, I have a plane to catch.
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My Pilgrim Passport showing the final page of stamps.
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