Exitus Reditus

*Written upon returning from vacation to Bethany Beach, Delaware, August 2019

"There and back again" suggests the Pilgrim. What is the essence of a Pilgrimage and more importantly the essence of a Pilgrim? "There and back again" was the story of a stubborn Hobbit. Is it now my story? How far can the Pilgrim go and is not the Pilgrim just another sojourner?

There at the World's End, Finis Terrae, we encounter the unsullied waters. An image of Man's Last End. As evening draws near Fire and Ice sparkle as a million gems upon the waters. There at the World's End Jesus to Peter spoke of His Calling. "Follow Me" the Master said, alluding to Peter's End. 

So what is the Pilgrimage for the Pilgrim? Is it the Journey, the Goal, or the Change wrought out by the myriads of thistles and thorns along the way? Or can the mind wander and pilgrimage also? Does it matter where the Pilgrim goes?

Holy is the destination of the Pilgrim's Way. But is not the Pilgrim's Life from Point to Point a mixed bag of Saintliness and Sin? Is not Jesus, the Ultimate Pilgrim, the "Way, the Truth and the Life"? Is not a Pilgrimage a Road and the Encounters along the way? 

Is not a Pilgrimage the Good and the Evil, the Truth and the Lies? One sojourn but a mere image of a thousand, Mixed and made beautiful by duration and time, Redeemed by God's Grace, made holy and new. Somehow we Follow the Eternal Sojourner, Christ, as Pilgrims in this finite World. We in Time find Travel, a wayward chaos from point to point made an upward Spiral with Gift from on high. 

A Pilgrimage is Gift from He who is Way, Truth and Life. Life is a Pilgrimage to Encounter God's Word, Jesus, who stretches out our finitude. He, the Lamb King, makes all Grace and blesses the Thistles into Roses. He, the Eternal Pilgrim, stretched out upon His Throne stretches our finite pilgrimage into The Infinite Pilgrimage. 

We, through Him encounter His Father. 

Alpha meets Omega. 

The Road meets its End. 

Amen. 

"...et erit unus Christus amans se ipsum...and He shall be one Christ loving himself" (St. Augustine of Hippo, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, 10.3)