By Josh Low
Travelling by foot on the Camino de Santiago (The Way of Saint James) is not your average walk in the park. As one of the most famous pilgrimages in the world, the Camino de Santiago is a large network of ancient pilgrim routes across Europe that all end in Santiago de Compostela, north-west Spain.
Thousands of people walk the Camino each year, with its most popular route being the Camino Francés (The French Way). Among the hordes of people on the Camino Francés this year was Catholic Youth Ministry Perth youth worker Matt Lim, who walked more than 800 kilometres in 30 days and recounted his life changing experience to The Record.
Having flown to France to begin the Camino from its starting point in the town of Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port, Matt commenced walking without any expectations.
“I’d heard a lot about the Camino from people around me who had either done it, or wanted to, and finally decided one day to give it a shot, doing as little research as possible about it,” he explained.
“People walk the Camino for their own different reasons and have different outcomes, but I wanted to keep an open mind and make it my own.”
What stood out for Matt were the relationships he developed with people along the Camino walk.
“I didn’t expect to grow such strong friendships with people, most of all, this one Slovenian guy I walked with from the second day onwards. We didn’t know each other and hadn’t planned at any point to walk together and were both free to leave, but just enjoyed each other’s company.
“After meeting in Roncesvalles, we quickly found out we were both Catholic when he mentioned he’d started from Lourdes.
“He inspired me to take my faith to the next level,” Matt added.
“I had with me a bunch of prayer intentions people had asked me to pray for while on the Camino, so he would join me in praying the Rosary every day, dedicating a decade of the Rosary for each intention.
“I used to think my prayer life was just a private thing, but developed a sense of love for praying with other people and it was him who inspired that in me.”
Matt added that the highlights of the experience far outweighed the challenges he faced along the way.
“I was averaging about 25km each day and the challenge that I found was actually walking, which sounds silly because I signed up for a long walk… which I absolutely hated to do.
“The other challenge was mental, especially during a flat, barren section of the Camino known as the Meseta,” he said.
The Meseta is commonly known for being the part of the Camino where one is left alone in their thoughts among the empty flat Spanish plains.
“It’s not just the emptiness of the Meseta that gets to you, but the timing of it along the way,” Matt explained.
“People all around the world put up barriers to try protect themselves from things that could hurt them, but the Camino kind of strips away all those walls and defenses.
“By the time you get to the Meseta, you’re pretty much bare and go really deep into your thoughts, and all these things that were built up inside you suddenly come out and to your mind, which makes it really confronting.”
A search for something more in life was a common theme among most people Matt encountered while on the Camino.
“The majority of the people on the Camino I spoke to, were either atheist or agnostic; they were desiring God, but not knowing that that was the key to what they were in fact desiring.
“What I found among many of those I spoke to, was that they had everything the world told them they needed to be happy, except they weren’t.
“Amidst all the career success, money and relationships, what I kept hearing was that they were still searching for their purpose in a life which they found to be unfulfilling.”
Hearing the experiences of those Matt came across, along with the time to reflect on them gave him the opportunity to look at his own life and purpose.
“The world promises us happiness, but when you try to reach for the happiness that the world offers, it fails to satisfy.
“Just as Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI said: the world offers us comfort, but we were not made for comfort, we were made for greatness.
“Listening to those I came across also reminded me of the famous quote by St Augustine which really struck a chord with me, that ‘Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee, O Lord’.
“All these people were trying to search for happiness and purpose in their lives but couldn’t obtain that joy they were looking for, because they were detached from the source of all joy,” he said.
“I was quite happy with my life before the Camino, but was then able to reflect on why that was the case; and it cemented what I already believed.
“I understood that the reason for my feelings of comfort with life came from the desire to love God more and more, grounded in my Catholic faith.
“There are definitely things to improve on – I don’t have a perfect life, but I can say I’m quite content, and truly believe the reason why I feel this way is because I trust in God and His will for me.”
Matt believes that anyone considering doing the Camino should take the opportunity and go.
“The topic of who should do the Camino came up a lot in discussion with others along the way, and we all came to the conclusion that everyone should do the Camino, but at the right time.
“So if you are already considering it, I would say you should book it and go,” he concluded
From pages 11 to 13 of Issue 22: ‘The Church in Perth’ of The Record Magazine