Pentecost at Chartres.

"Pilgrimage: journey to some sacred place as an act of religious devotion; a long journey, especially one to see or visit a special place; life thought of as a journey."

I had frequently seen ads in Catholic papers advertising pilgrimages to the Holy Land or to Fatima or Lourdes, and they sounded an awful lot like tours, only they were supervised by priests and they included Mass. But in May of 1995 when I agreed to make the 13th annual pilgrimage from Paris to Chartres to celebrate Pentecost, I went on a walking pilgrimage - and to my surprise, it turned out to be a combination of religious retreat and Outward Bound, a whitewater rapids introduction to an ancient spiritual exercise.

It all began when my brother Joe was asked by his parish priest in Montreal if he and his two teenagers would be interested in making a pilgrimage in France as part of a growing movement that was reviving the European tradition. Father was particularly anxious to see the young people attend as he felt that it would be a faith-affirming experience for them.

By the time the news got to me, there were young people and middle-aged people on board, including a sister and sister-in-law and assorted nieces and nephews. There was almost a senior, until Mom conceded that a big hike was likely not very good for People With Heart Trouble. And then there was me - fortyish with five kids ranging from 10 months to 14 years, and no candidate for a marathon. Still, the idea appealed to me, and better yet, I was able to get a last-minute ticket on a flight to Paris.

Paris

The plan was to spend several days in Paris and then we would go on pilgrimage, on which we would walk 80 miles (or so I thought) in just under 3 days, camping along the way. Sometimes it's better not to know all the facts. In this case I might never have gone had I know how rashly I was committing myself.

The first part of the trip was a breeze. We arrived in Paris on one of those perfect spring days to a joyous family reunion. As part of a large but scattered family, we don't see enough of each other - and here we were in exquisite, magical, historic Paris in the springtime. We had a wonderful week. We stayed in the Latin Quarter, which is both reasonable and picturesque and within walking distance of almost every site we wanted to visit. Our 3-storey walk-up "pension" was on the charming Rue St. Jacques, between the Boulevard St. Michel and the Boulevard St. Germain, and offered simple, clean bedrooms, each with a tiny bathroom and tall narrow windows that we opened in the warm evenings.

Our days quickly took on a regular rhythm: early breakfast; lunch of fruit, wine, some pate and cheese bought at neighborhood "epiceries," and a full day of sightseeing. And what glorious sights we saw: the Luxembourg Gardens, the Sorbonne, the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, the Musee d'Orsay, the Musee de Cluny, Montmartre and the Eglise du Sacre Coeur. We criss-crossed the centre of Paris on foot, walking along the Left Bank of the Seine, across the Pont Neuf and through the leafy boulevards and wide avenues of the Right Bank and the Champs Elysees.

At lunch we sat in the cool shade and rested our weary feet. My favourite lunch spot was in the convent garden adjacent to the Eglise du Sacre Coeur. Stone benches and arches were covered in cool green vines, and the noises of the city were extinguished by the soft murmurings of the garden fountain. Over a nearby wall we could faintly hear the voices of the children at a nearby daycare centre.

We would return to our rooms late in the afternoon for a period of rest and preparation for the evening meal, which we usually took at one of the many restaurants nearby. Remarkably, although we were a group of ten, of disparate ages and tastes, we managed every day to find a comfortable, reasonable restaurant and to have a splendid meal with all of us seated together. On one special evening we found a tiny restaurant with an upstairs room where we had the privacy to dine "en famille." During those meals we talked of the coming Pilgrimage, and whether we could do the arduous walk. We were soon to find out.

Day one

Saturday morning, the first day of the big adventure, we set off in the pre-dawn carrying our backpacks, dressed no longer for city sightseeing but for hiking. We were to be at Notre Dame Cathedral by 5:45. It was so early that we walked through groups of partygoers who hadn't yet made it home. When we arrived at the church square, people were everywhere, singly, in small groups, in huge chapters. All were dressed like us in boots and jeans or shorts, carrying packs, tents and banners. Walkers were organized into Chapters representing single parishes, regions, and even countries, and each chapter had made one or more banners of fine materials like velvet and satin declaring its name and patron saint.

After the business of registering, we loitered uncertainly about the Square. Eventually we were approached by a tall, slight young man who introduced himself as Stanislaus, the leader of the Chartres chapter, with whom we would be walking. To be honest, we thought he looked a little young and not terribly forceful. It didn't seem to be a propossessing start, and the only other member of the chapter we met was a man about our own age, Jean Loup, who had attached himself to the outer edges of our group.

The opening Mass was celebrated in the Cathedral at 7:00 a.m. The closest we got was to the outer doors, where we could hear, but not see, the celebration offered by dozens of priests. Still, new chapters were arriving all the time, and the aura of excitement grew despite the cool grey drizzly morning.

As the Mass drew to a close the signal was given for chapters to fall into place, and it was then that we began to see the magnitude of the crowd. Chapter after chapter was announced by loudspeaker and took its place in the vast Cathedral square behind rows of flags and banners proudly carried by strong young men and women. We were told that 8,000 began the pilgrimage in Paris. We saw chapters from all over France, from Germany, Italy, England, Ireland and the United States.

And then at last we began to walk. We walked straight across Paris, past businesses and people waking up for the day, past the tourist sights, even past our hotel where, providentially, my nephews were able to dash in and drop off a forgotten room key. We walked out of the Paris of tourists and into the suburbs, and we began to see the city in a new light. It became more ordinary, like any other city where people lived and worked and struggled to pay the bills and keep a job.

It was a strange feeling, walking in a city and with a crowd so far from home, but the language of prayer bound us together. Each chapter had prepared beforehand a series of prayers, readings and meditations, so that we were walking and praying almost all the time.

Into the fields

Our chapter, a group of nearly 60, consisted of mostly young adults, aged 18-30. It included men and women, a father-son duo, possibly brothers and sisters and cousins, certainly groups of friends. Joe, Joanne, Debbie and I were the oldest in the group, and we ranged from 39-50 years old. Still, we saw other middle-aged and older pilgrims in other chapters, and we were not deterred by our middle age. Not then.

We marched at a military pace, stopping every two hours for a 15-minute break. The first was in a field outside of the city. We had passed even the remotest suburbs and made our way through a lovely French town that mingled old stone walls covered with cascades of flowers and new bungalows, before we came upon a field that was large enough to accommodate the thousands of pilgrims who would be descending upon it. Temporary loos had been set up by the advance trucks that also carried our tents and sleeping bags, and huge boxes of baguettes and apples were passed around for the hungry. The break seemed very short. We were weary already and we still had hours of walking ahead of us.

We were beginning to realize what a serious business this was. You had to work hard to keep up and not fall out of place, and you soon came to regret any extra encumbrances you had been foolish enough to bring along. They only got in the way. Like my shoulder bag and umbrella, and Joe's enormous backpack. Still, the prayers and the spirit of the group were more than a counterbalance to the rigours of the march. Soon after we left the Cathedral Square the singing began, and I don't think I will ever forget it. Beautiful, rich young voices were raised in hymns and prayers: they sang in harmony sometimes; at other times they alternated verses: women, then men, then both.

A tradition in France is the sung Hail Mary. It took me the better part of the first day to get the words all clear so that I could join them in this beautiful prayer, and I found that when I sang I forgot a little bit about my aching feet.

That first day alone we marched 40 miles - and that was only half of the way. We stopped in a forest for Mass and lunch and a chance to sit for an hour. The Mass was an inspiring display of brilliant French logistical organization. It also gave us a sense of what it must have felt like to be one of the multitudes fed with loaves and fishes. Communion was distributed by fully robed priests, escorted by gloved boy scouts and adult standard bearers to assigned sections So careful were the arrangements that thousands of people received Communion in a very short time. We washed our lunch down with wine - even on pilgrimage a necessary and daily beverage in France - and then we resumed walking, until nearly 8:00 o'clock that night.

That day was the worst. I managed to keep up with my group - just barely - but by the time we reached the last long hill before camp I regretted my heavy bag, I regretted being severely out of shape, but most of all I regretted my rotten shoes. Buses were available, but somehow along the way it had become a matter of stretching personal endurance to the limits and a point of honour to walk as far as one could. And so I shuffled on, praying in earnest that the camp would not be far off.

The teenagers, on the other hand, held up remarkably well, although at times we suspected that their appetites outstripped their devotions and fleetingly wondered if they preferred the bistros of Paris to plodding through rural France. They didn't seem to be complaining quite as much about their feet, and in spite of finding the Pilgrimage fare pretty meagre seemed to be enjoying themselves, meeting and talking with other people, including a guitar-playing young German named Matthias who looked like he belonged in a rock band but in fact was quite pious.

The camps, when we finally staggered into them, were another example of brilliant organization. As soon as we arrived we reported to locations colour-coded for our chapter and region to collect our gear. Then we made camp, pitching our tents as quickly as possible so as to be able to crawl into them and sleep. We only took time to go to one of the many food lineups to get our hot soup and baguette and to the washing-up area before turning in for the night.

Second day

In the morning we were awakened by classical music at 5:45. It all became a blur of nursing sore and blistered feet, getting washed, attending Mass, having breakfast and starting to walk once more. On the second day it rained, and we slipped and slithered our way through picturesque forests and up and down quaint hills. One poor little priest fell flat on his back in the mud, but he took it with inspiring grace and humour, and remarkable humility.

The journey to Chartres took us two and a half days. Our admiration for our fellow prilgrims grew daily. In spite of gruelling conditions and tremendous physical stress, there were no cross words, no bad spirits. There was abundant kindness and concern, exemplified most for us by Stan and Jean Loup. Stan, seeing my sister and me flagging at different times, slung our unwieldy bags over his own shoulder. Jean Loup, a veteran of many pilgrimages and the soul of generosity, carried our gear and lightened our way with stories of other Pilgrimages in other lands. We especially liked the stories about Pilgrimages completed.

When we finally entered Chartres we were not with "our" chapter any longer. As etrangers (foreigners), we had been asked to lead the pilgrimage into this ancient French city. As we walked through the last fields we could see behind us the long, winding stream of humanity, punctuated periodically by banners whipping and turning in the bright sunshine. By then all of the pilgrims, young and old, were exhausted, walking on willpower alone, longing to see the spire of the Cathedral. As we entered the outskirts of the city, people lined the roadways to greet and cheer us on for the final leg of the journey.

The Cathedral itself is set at the end of a long, steep, winding hill, and as we approached it we could hear children's voices exultantly proclaiming Hosannas. Officials, organizers and greeters ushered us into the cool confines of the Cathedral and there at last it was, with its soaring vault, magnificent stained glass and the moving Pieta at the centre of the nave. It was a proud moment indeed, and we felt viscerally connected to a long line of the faithful who over the centuries have braved the weather and worse to make these journeys of Faith. We sat in exhausted groups to witness the magnificent celebration of Pentecost - our work was done. We had walked together in community and we had arrived.

Why?

Why did we do it? Perhaps, on the verge of middle-age, we wanted to test ourselves. But we also wanted to give ourselves and our children an experience of lasting impact, one that we could tangibly refer to as a barometer of faith and endurance. In France, which the Pope has called "the eldest daughter of the Church," with a responsibility for leadership among the nations, we took part in a growing devotional movement that testifies to the presence of the Holy Spirit. And we joined at least 20,000 people who found the time, energy and commitment to take part in this pilgrimage.

As a real and tangible expression of faith, a pilgrimage is also an opportunity to congront the gifts of the Holy Spirit and see whether or not we are willing to accept them. The fatigue and sore feet are only physical substitutes for the trials that we confront throughout our lives. The pilgrimage is both act of devotion and trial of strength. In the end it is not our strength alone that helps us to finish, but the strength of grace, of community, and of faith - and good shoes.

Maura Brown lives in Kitchener, ON.