SGA Camino Pilgrims crossing the Alps 2010

It has been a long standing tradition of St. Gregory’s Academy to send the boys on pilgrimage.  On some years the boys made a pilgrimage in Auriesville to the Shrine of our Lady of Martyrs.  While Fr. Stemler was chaplain he helped to start the tradition of making the Chartres Pilgrimage (which I almost did a year ago, but wedding season is a pilgrimage of its own).  I hope one day to do the Chartres pilgrimage, and at this point I’m thinking 2013.  We can start planning that in the fall.  But the most incredible and fantastic pilgrimage that St. Greg’s boys go on is the Camino de Santiago.  When the boys do this pilgrimage they usually do it after the school year in the summer time and they go with no money.  They bike all across Spain and juggle and sing for their daily needs.  This is not only an amazing act of faith, but also an incredible adventure.  Read John Sercer’s reflections on the pilgrimage told with wit and wisdom: https://adraughtofvintage.com/2010/07/15/viva-espana/.

The lads singing (notice their Pilgrims garb) on the Camino

The boys encounter on their journeys generous folk who are amazed by their juggling and singing and joy.  It is not uncommon for the boys to wake up a small village and bring them out to the town square to dance and sing and enjoy their juggling.  Mr. Bill McCarthy wrote up his reflections and experiences travelling with the boys for a few days on the Camino, and what his account reveals about the boys and their pilgrimage has made me seriously reflect on my own life and how I can try to live up to the great feats of faith, strength and joy that the boys are doing on a daily basis in Spain right now.

Read Bill McCarthy’s “News from the Camino 2012” here at the Gregory the Great website.

Bill with his son John on the Camino

Blessings,

Peter Bloch

SGA 2005

John Owen juggling on the Camino 2010

The trick called ‘Tower’ mesmerizes Spaniards

Bagpipes! Camino 2011

Alex Garbarino does fire poi on the Camino 2011