¡Hasta la próxima, Santiago!

Chris and I are spending the next few days sightseeing and readjusting to post-Camino life in Barcelona, and then we fly home on Thursday. We’ve been in Barcelona for almost 24 hours now, and we’re enjoying this vibrant, busy, beautiful city. Even so, Santiago and the Camino are rarely far from my mind.

I had heard from my fellow pilgrims that Santiago was an underwhelming city with an underwhelming cathedral. Many people I talked to or heard from in books and podcasts described feeling disappointed when they arrived at Kilometer Zero after days and weeks of walking, but that wasn’t my experience at all.

Walking through the tunnel and out onto the Santiago’s main square and getting my first full view of the cathedral’s western facade completely overwhelmed me: I felt so grateful and so accomplished, and like I had arrived at the right place, in the right way, and in the right time. I was in tears or on the verge of tears for most of our time in Santiago, thinking not only about the journey and all it meant, but also a very deep gratitude for all who supported us along the way: everyone who prayed for us or wished us well, or who helped with logistical details at home and on the road.

Many of the people we’d walked with continued the Camino on to Fisterre, the westernmost point on the Iberian peninsula and the “end of the known world” during Roman and medieval times. Chris and I had not budgeted enough time to extend our Camino and walk for another 3-4 days, but we had discussed taking a bus tour to Fisterre and other points along the coast. However, within an hour of arriving in Santiago, we turned to each other and agreed that Fisterre would have to wait for another time; we were done moving and wanted to soak in what it meant to be in Santiago. Who knows? It might be our next Camino.

Our guidebook alerted us to the fact that the alpha and omega are inverted in the Chi-Ro (the early, round rosette-style symbol of Christ formed by overlaying the Greek first two letters of his name) over the cathedral’s south door, the one that’s now used as an entrance.

We’d seen a few of these Chi-Rho with inverted Alphas and Omegas at other cathedrals along the Way. Most people think they happened because Jewish and Muslim stone masons helped build many churches and cathedrals in medieval Spain, and both Hebrew and Arabic are read from right to left and so would write the letters that way.

Our guide book invited us to think about the reversal in Santiago in this way:

“Recalling that alpha and omega mean the beginning and the end, to represent Christ, here the church fathers add that being in reverse on this spot at Kilometer 0 means that as a pilgrim you have reached the omega (end) of your Camino, but that the reverse Chi-Rho is a reminder that at the end, you begin again.

It is a nice symbol of this lived truth: now you step forward into new territory, courtesy of all that has altered and shaped you, plus all the grace you have gathered, on this pilgrimage.”

There is a real sense that we’re stepping into new territory now, that we have more to learn and process from this experience. Thanks, dear friends and readers, for sharing the journey with us.Read more