Pilgrimage Through the Lens of Theology of the Body: An Intern’s Reflection
This past summer, I was blessed to be one of Modern Catholic Pilgrim’s summer interns, a role that provided me invaluable experience and insight. While in the office, I had the chance to sit in on meetings with people from the Catholic business world, learn about outreach and email promotion, research the vast world of marketing, and, simply put, learn about the ins and outs of running a successful Catholic non-profit. However, unlike a lot of summer internships people my age may have, this internship was far more meaningful to me than just a chance to “network” and build up my resume. Will Peterson was invested in my growth not just as a future business woman, but also as a young Catholic individual. Every day at noon sharp, Will would pop over to my desk and we would journey up to the University of St. Thomas chapel upstairs for Daily Mass, and he kindly showed me and my roommate the Biblical gift of hospitality by inviting us into his home for a desperately-needed home-cooked meal.
Most importantly, Will invited me on the 110-mile cross-diocesan Eucharistic pilgrimage from Fort Wayne to South Bend in the beginning of June to kickstart my time with MCP, where I had the opportunity to be one of five perpetual pilgrims on the “tune-up” pilgrimage in preparation for the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage next summer. Getting to be on this Eucharistic pilgrimage was quite a blessing for me - I made great new friends with my fellow perpetual pilgrims; listened to the stories of dozens of strangers-turned-friends along the pilgrim road; was joyously welcomed into the homes of hosts ready to shower us with warm beds, hearty conversations, and delicious food (including cheesecake for breakfast at 6:45 in the morning!); and was introduced to the beauty of the deeply passionate Catholic communities in rural Indiana. Above all, I grew in my love for the Eucharist. There were countless times on the road where I was moved to tears after reminding myself that I was walking with the physical Lord. I felt vastly blessed to be able to worship and adore Him with my body, by literally following Him for such a large amount of time and distance.
Photo: Today's Catholic // Joshua Schipper
It was during my time on this special pilgrimage that I began to marvel at this concept of using my body to worship God. I have often been one to forget that my body is a vital part of worship, opting instead to see prayer as a solely spiritual thing. This thinking is mistaken, however. God created us both body and soul. Had He created us as pure soul, we would have been angels; as pure body, we would have been animals. There must have been a reason, then, that He intentionally decided to create us with both body and soul, a perfect marriage of the two, neither angel nor animal. This is what it means to be a human being. To focus solely on the spiritual, an error I find myself making too often, would be, as St. Pope John Paul II puts it, to attempt to find a “ loophole to avoid the requirements of the Gospel,” to skirt what God has asked us to do. We are urged to do the laborious task of integrating both body and soul, to “offer [our] bodies as a living sacrifice” (Rom 12:1). To truly enter into the Paschal Mystery, we must approach with our bodies, since, as Catholic speaker Christopher West points out, “It is His Body and Blood that saves us, and it saves our body and blood.”
Because of this, we are able to, and we must, use our bodies as an essential element in our sacrifice of praise to the Lord. There is a reason why we kneel and stand at different times in the Mass, why we go to Confession in person, why we move our fingers along Rosary beads as we pray. Similarly, there is a reason why murder and sexual immorality are mortal sins, and why we take the issues of euthanasia, abortion, and the death penalty so seriously. What we do with our bodies matters; it is anything but insignificant. As Psalm 139 tells us, what we do does not go unseen by the Lord; rather, He is “familiar with all [our] ways.”
The question to be asked is how can I worship the Lord with both my body and my soul? The most obvious answer is clear: in the Sacraments. It is in the Sacraments, and particularly in the Eucharist, where we most literally worship God with all of our being. As the Most Reverend John Joseph Myers states, “By allowing us to receive his very Body and Blood, Jesus forges a one-flesh unity between himself and someone who receives him. This unity—akin to the one-flesh unity of husband and wife made tangible in the physical act of love-making—is both spiritual and physical.” It is in the Eucharist that we experience, with body and with soul, the most intimate connection imaginable with the Lord. God loves us to the point that He made His love for us tangible, something that our bodies can touch, can consume, can adore. We will never get closer to the Lord with our bodies than in the Eucharist. How blessed we are that God makes this happen for us.
Photo: Today's Catholic // Joshua Schipper
Besides the Sacraments, how can we praise the Lord with our bodies? As I learned on the road from Fort Wayne to South Bend, pilgrimage, especially Eucharistic pilgrimage, is one of the best ways to do so. Pilgrimage, with its physical joys and struggles, provides a clear demonstration of how we can productively use our bodies in worship. Mile after mile, we can use our bodies to glorify the Lord, for it is the commitment to keep going step after step, despite pain and sweat, to bring about a physical sacrifice of praise, whether in atonement for personal sins, for the sins of the world, or for another intention held close to the heart. To anchor one’s body to the Lord is to anchor ourselves to Him in His Passion, Crucifixion, and the bodily suffering He endured for us. Amidst suffering, we continue to trust in the Lord, and we prove this to ourselves and to others by following Him on pilgrimage step after step.
“In moments like those, I only needed to glance up and anchor myself to the Eucharist.”
Isn’t it wonderful that we have such a simple, tangible way to praise the Lord? A way to engage both body and soul in worship? My experience from Fort Wayne to South Bend taught me this. That’s not to say my experience was without its difficulties; rather, the journey was full of painful blisters, aching muscles, and sun-induced headaches. There were moments where every step I took caused me to grit my teeth from the pain. However, in moments like those, I only needed to glance up and anchor myself to the Eucharist. The tangible presence of Christ right in front of me gave me the strength to not just continue on, but to transform that pain into a beautiful prayer of sacrifice.
