One morning, we began walking at around 7:30. My body felt good, and I was walking at a fairly quick clip. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, a couple of pilgrims took the inside of a sharp curve and blew right past me. I hadn’t even seen them coming. I actually got frustrated that I had been passed. I decided that I needed to walk faster and take the lead once again. There was no way that I was going to get passed. It was not long before I was forced to accept defeat. Those other people had won.
Why did it bother me? I was on a pilgrimage, not in a race. This was not a competition. Had I made it one? Perhaps deep inside of me, a part of me that I was embarrassed about, I had made it into a competition. I felt God telling me that it did not matter if I finished first: it wasn’t about winning. All that mattered was that I was walking and that I would finish.
Another day on the Camino. Another day closer to God.
—from St. Anthony Messenger’s “Finding God on the Camino“
by Fr. Dave Pivonka, TOR
