Synod Diary: Lessons from the Jesuit pilgrimage for the synod slog

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It is often said of members of the Society of Jesus that “if you’ve met one Jesuit, you’ve met one Jesuit.” Rarely is this meant as a compliment. The remark often reveals a frustration with the range of opinions and diversity that others perceive among us. Yet we share many common experiences throughout our formation. For one, at the very start and heart of every Jesuit’s journey is the period we call the novitiate—the first two years of life in the Society, which St. Ignatius referred to as the “school of the heart.” This period is marked by several experiences known as “experiments” and is meant to be a time of testing our vocation. These experiments include making the Spiritual Exercises, embarking on a pilgrimage, working in a hospital, performing humble tasks and teaching Christian doctrine or catechesis. While it is necessary to adapt these experiences to modern times and contexts, the essence of the novices’ experiments remains the same.

Ask any Jesuit about his time in the novitiate, and he will almost inevitably regale you with stories of woe and wonder from the pilgrimage. The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus state that novices are to make “a pilgrimage without money, but begging from door to door at times, for the love of God our Lord, in order to grow accustomed to discomfort. Thus too, the candidate, through abandoning all reliance he could have in money or other created things, may with genuine faith and intense love place his reliance entirely in his Creator and Lord.” For Ignatius, pilgrimage transcended the physical journey; it served as a profound spiritual exercise. It challenges novices to leave their comfort zones, confront their limitations and experience firsthand the vulnerability and grace that come with relying entirely on God’s guidance and the surprising generosity of others.

“So we are on this pilgrimage together. And I think that’s an important thing,” Geert De Cubber, a member of the Synod on Synodality and a permanent deacon from Belgium, said at a briefing in the Vatican press hall this Wednesday. “Two things,” he added. “One, we are in a [pilgrim] church; and two, we need to bring everybody with us. So the only way we can do it is by addressing it in a synodal way.”

I have been here at the Vatican covering the synod for just over a week. It’s a place I have longed to be—the epicenter and culmination of the church’s three-year worldwide listening process. I have followed this closely from afar, and now I can see the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica from the rooftop of my Jesuit community. Yesterday, I was even allowed into the press box above the synod hall to listen to soon-to-be Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe, the former master of the Dominican order, exhort the assembly not to “run away from the difficult questions” raised during the synod.

Yet as time has gone on, I have grown more despondent about the seeming lack of common direction or clarity about the essential themes that need to be discussed among synod members. I have become less hopeful and increasingly frustrated with a process that seems to grow ever more complicated in its methodology, leaving delegates exhausted after long days with little time to reflect.

As Deacon De Cubber recalled the image of pilgrimage as fundamental to the synodal path, I remembered what I learned on my own pilgrimage in 2009.

Over six weeks, a fellow novice and I traveled by boat from Portsmouth, England, through the Bay of Biscay to the northern seaport of Santurzi, just outside Bilbao. From there, I journeyed through lands significant to Ignatius; Loyola, Manresa and Montserrat, ultimately reaching Barcelona before returning to Birmingham via bus to Paris, then London. We did all of this on three-euro a day split between the two of us—and a lot of begging.

The Jesuit’s pilgrimage, I have come to understand, involves confronting one’s limits—the endpoint of one’s emotional availability, generosity and kindness to others—only to discover that God never abandons us even in our sheer exhaustion, despondency and despair. It seems, from my conversations with other Jesuits over the years, we are paired with a novice whom the director of novices foresees as a challenge for us—someone with a different viewpoint, who is fitter and healthier (or not), prays more and is more devotional (or not), prefers to keep silence or chatters the whole day. Maybe they know the language fluently while you struggle, or they have practical skills like building a tent that you lack. Some may love the great outdoors, while for others, glamping is the extent of their comfort.

Yet, as my novice master instructed us and as Deacon De Cubber reminded me, the crucial aspect of the pilgrimage is finding your way together—never abandoning one another and returning home together. We do this not by giving in to each other but by learning from one another—testing our limits while also asking for forgiveness when we go too far. We must be willing to receive hospitality and understanding in surprising ways from our walking mates as well as absolute strangers.

This, too, is the essence of the church’s pilgrimage—an image familiar not only to every Jesuit but also central to this synod and to the church’s understanding of itself, especially since the Second Vatican Council that in its documents repeatedly calls us to see ourselves as a “pilgrim church” in search of God (“Lumen Gentium”). On the 62nd anniversary of the opening of this pivotal council, may we be reminded that we are on a pilgrimage together, as Deacon De Cubber said, and that we must continue journeying together. Or to put it as the good Dominican friar did in his impassioned plea to the delegates in the synod hall on Wednesday: “Please stay, whatever your frustrations with the church. Go on questioning! Together we shall discover the Lord’s will.”

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Synod Diary: Lessons from the Jesuit pilgrimage for the synod slog

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