The pilgrimage begins now.

I have made a crazy decision. I am going on pilgrimage in Fall of 2013 (I previously posted 2014). Not just anywhere, mind you. No, I live big. I am going to walk the Camino de Santiago in Spain. The invitation just sort of popped up.

I thought about it. I dismissed it. The invitation persisted. I thought some more and then I decided to pray about it. (Why is prayer always the last thing I think of?)

So, I said a St. Therese novena and asked for a rose if I should go. Beginning on the ninth day I started to see roses in rather unexpected places. All of them were a bright pink. One of them was actually blooming in full shade.

I ignored signs and thought, "No, that's just a coincidence. Novenas are not magic tricks, after all." I finally told my husband that I had been praying about this and that I had been seeing pink roses everywhere. "You don't think that's an answer, do you?" I asked him. Yes, those roses are for me. (Thanks, St. Therese.) So, why is this crazy?

1. I am in terrible physical shape.
2. I have no money.
3. My Spanish is um....well, I can find the bathroom, order food, go to Mass and describe my family.

Yep. I am nuts. But you know who else was nuts? The apostles. Can you imagine? I can just hear it: "You've left your home, your family, your friends, you quit your job, and for what? To follow some guy? What are you thinking?" Their co-workers and families must've thought they'd lost it. And they had. They gave up their lives so that they could inherit the Kingdom of Heaven.

Now, I am not saying that I am on a par with the apostles and that their evangelization of the world is equivalent to my going on pilgrimage. I am saying that God asks us to do things for Him that we think are crazy, but if we keep walking on and trust in His divine providence, it all works out.

I don't know why I am being called to go on this journey, but there must be a reason. Maybe it has nothing to do with me. I do know that all long journeys begin with the first step. There will be a lot of steps to this journey before my feet ever touch Spanish soil. The first step is beginning to walk (so I don't die somewhere in northern Spain) and really pray, as if my life depended on it, because it does. Apart from God, I can do nothing.