Well, I know that our listeners are in for quite the... Let me try that again. Here we go. Well, I know that our listeners are in for quite the treat today. Randy Gonzalez, welcome to the show. How you doing today, man? Great, great, I'm glad to be here. Yeah, well, I'm glad to have this conversation. We, of course, have a close mutual colleague in Greg Birch.
And when he was sharing with me what you guys are doing in Spain, along with him and his wife and you and your wife, I was like, wow, this is the type of thing that I want to cover on Think Global, Do Justice. So, Randy, maybe we could start by you introducing yourself. to our audience and just kind of sharing how God led you into missions and international engagement. Yeah, you bet. Sure. So as Brandon said, I'm Randy Gonzalez.
I'm married to Doralecia, who was supposed to be here with us, but she's suffering through a bout of bronchitis. So she had to opt out. I'm originally from Texas, but my story is one of different locales. My dad was born in Mexico. My mom is from Arkansas. So imagine that mix. They met in Bible school in Houston, Texas. And soon after they graduated, they became pastors. And eventually, led through the denomination that we're part of to go to missions as missionary pastors.
And so the first field for them was Mexico and then San Jose, Costa Rica. So probably about a year after I was born, we moved to Monre. And they pastored church there. I have memories of that time, even though I was only there until probably about the age of five. Then we came back to the States for just a short stint, and then we were assigned to San Jose, Costa Rica, where they did the same thing. My dad was really more of an evangelist, and so we had an interesting time there.
I have more memories there, but he was going out and preaching to the drug addicts, and I remember good. good times there where we would, they would actually receive Jesus and then they would take us up in the mountains and we would help them get rid of their, you know, destroy their crops up in the mountains. It was a fun time for a young boy like myself. Anyway, Costa Rica will intersect my life 20 years later and I'll explain more about that in a minute.
So we, We moved back and this time we ended up in Ohio. so we're up in the North, you know, near Canada. We, we, got to see snow for the first time and playing all that. And then after five years, I was just entering high school. We moved back to Texas, kind of where it all started. But this time, instead of Houston, we were moved to Dallas. And, you know, I had always been interested in missions. I was always going to give to missions.
But I told myself I would never be a missionary because I had already done that. I'd been there and I'd done that. And I wasn't about to go back and do it. So I concentrated on school and work and my friendships and had a really great time in Dallas. So by 1986, was, I had a good job, had a great company, but I found myself like there's something else, there's something beyond the daily grind. And really I began wondering how could I serve?
I was involved in church, but I think I just wanted, there was something there, I think it was a seed from my beginnings, know, is something kind of pushing me forth. Around 1988, I began going on short-term missions trips. And I would just find different places that were going and I'd say, hey, can I join up? so most of these were to Europe. And I began sensing through those that something was unfolding in my heart. And I felt like God was beginning to call me.
And so I said, well, you I have to do something with this. So I began applying. I remember getting a magazine, I would be like, okay, let's try this one and let's try this one. But eventually how things usually happens through relationships. And I got connected with a team that was going, that was part of the organization where I actually eventually ended up. And so I contacted them, I applied, I was accepted. That would have been around 1992.
And it would actually take me another five years to actually get to the field. But around 1995, I decided to, I was pointing, I felt like I was pointing towards Hungary. There was a team there and I felt like that's I was going to end up. And so I decided, Hey, I'm going to go take a trip. I need to relax. I was studying hard. I was working hard and let me go check out some things about my future home.
I was flying standby because my brother worked for American Airlines and he could not get me a trip. was standby as if there's space then you fly. If there's not, you don't. And he tried and tried and tried. said, I can't. I can't get you on anywhere to get to Hungary. And then he suggested, why don't you go to Costa Rica? So I said, yeah, that'd be good. So that's kind of where Costa Rica intersection kind of comes back into play into my life. Like I said, were missionaries there.
My parents were missionaries there from late 60s to early 70s. And they had many good friends still there. And one of their good friends was a couple named Julio and Alicia. And those are my wife's parents who eventually became my in-laws. And so I was able to stay with them through serendipity. I got to meet Doralicia and we kicked. We kicked it off. Well, we began talking. We felt we both had a call to missions. There was just a lot of things that were kind of lining up for us.
She came to visit that December. We kind of made it official there. And we got married in January of 1997. So almost about a year later. And we went to the field in August 1997. And so we were just recently married and we were full of energy and strength and like bravado and adventure. And so we wanted to sail together and go save the nations, right? But it wasn't hungry. It ended up being Caracas, Venezuela.
And that's that there is where we meet and come into contact with Greg and Christina Birch, who you know well. So that's that's the story. And now awesome. So we were nine years in Venezuela, four years in Costa Rica, and now we've been in Spain. It'll be 15 years in October. Wow, yeah, you guys are quite the world travelers. What's interesting is you being like an MK and then being like, I don't want to go into missions.
And then, of course, you ended up in missions, which is lovely, but why do you think that is? What do you think it was that was kind of like, yeah, I've lived in Latin America. I don't need to be back there. like, what was that? I think I was trying to fit in, find a place to belong. When you are moving constantly, it's hard to put roots down. And so I think part of me was at that stage of life thinking I was in my early 20s and I was like, you know, I should get a job.
should, you know, get an education. I should look at maybe settling down in some way. There's probably some of that kind of tape kind of playing in my. in the back. Interestingly, years later I found an article that, I don't know if remember this, but our denomination had interviewed me as a child. I was probably eight years old and they have a picture of me, one of those old goofy missionary pictures.
One of the things I said, they said, what do you want to do, you think you want to do when you grow up? And I said, when I grow up, I want to be a missionary and go and serve God. And I was like, that actually made me cry because I was like, wow, the echoes of that. You know, I said it innocently, but all these things go shaping you, you know, your early, your early experiences. Yeah. Yeah, God held you to it, man.
All right, so Randy, we have this question that we ask everybody towards the top of the show. why do you think it's important for Christians to not only think about their own family and their own community, but also consider the needs of other people globally? Yeah, that's a great question. I love that. I think as I was thinking about this question, the gospel for me is full of encouragement, full of we have parables and commands that tells us to love one another.
And so that's pretty clear message in the gospel. And God does urge us in different moments in his word to love our family and those closest to us. And I hope, I think, for many, that's not a difficult thing to do, right? I have my wife, I have two daughters, Abigail and Sophia, and it's really easy for me to love them, no? But Jesus really doesn't stop there. He goes a little bit beyond and he urges us to love our neighbor as part of the great commandment to love.
I mean, he takes it even a step further, says, you know, love your enemies as well. So he's urging me to think of others more than myself at different moments. And he even says, hey, look, if you see somebody in need and you meet that need, it's as if we're feeding and clothing and accompanying and caring for Jesus himself. That's his words. And it's amazing to realize just that reality is like I can actually touch the heart of Jesus here.
So I think that you know, for me, things like the parable of the Good Samaritan is one showing love and care specifically for another who is quite different, right? Culturally, religiously, economically, they were quite different. And that's really hard work. But it's what we're called to do. And so I was thinking about it today, you know, with all the forced migration.
and the large swaths of people that are crossing borders, many of us have the other person within reach, much closer than in times before. And we can actually do good and care for someone who is vastly different from us. It's not that difficult to go and look and find somebody who's doing it. It's like you don't have to get on a boat or plane or train and go to different places.
And I think for me, the capstone or the bookend of this is, I see the picture of Revelation where the multitude is before the lamb and represented there is every tribe, tongue and nation. And we might be able to just reproduce in some small way these personal vignettes here and now how we can care for the other one who crosses our path. So I love that.
that's a good word, So along with that, I mean, you mentioned living in multiple countries originally from Texas, but have moved around and what you guys are doing at Camino Quest is interesting to me. And one of the themes around what you guys are doing is pilgrimage. Now, pilgrimage is not necessarily something that us Christians talk a whole lot about, at least not in the evangelical circles that I've been running in. It's not a particularly common aspect to many people's faith.
And yet there's precedent, you know, for this action, right, for this experience. Maybe could we start by you providing just a definition of what pilgrimage is and then maybe kind of share how that spiritual practice has been employed within Christian faith, historically even. Yeah, sure. I'm still learning about pilgrimage and no way I'm an expert on pilgrimage. But the other thing is there seemed to be like no end to the definitions of pilgrimage. So it encompasses a lot.
But I think that what I've learned and gathered from my own experience and things that I've read is pilgrimage has some interesting elements to it. I like these elements because they speak to what I contemplate and what pilgrimage is. One is it's a journey to a sacred place. There's danger and challenge along the journey. There is the aspect of leaving home and leaving the familiar behind and also returning home but transformed. And so, if I can, I'll just speak a little bit about those.
So historically pilgrimage, mean, it doesn't have to be Christian pilgrimage. You know, have Hindu, Muslim pilgrimage, pilgrimage. Pilgrimage to Mecca is like one of the five pillars of Islam, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you can have different types. point in your life, have to, as a Muslim, you have to make the pilgrimage to Mecca. And so, but pilgrimage is probably something that draws our humanity as well, you know, to that.
But historically, pilgrimage was a journey to fulfill a promise or a vow or sometimes even to pay penitence for some sin committed. But In this, it was always a walk towards a sacred location. Now, in the Christian world, there's three kind of great pilgrimages that we see throughout history. There's the Via Francigena, which begins in Canterbury, England and goes to Rome, Italy, where there you can embark on a trip to the Holy Land. Then you had the pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
for obvious reasons, it's the birthplace of three faiths. As Christians, it holds a of a dear space in our hearts. And then finally, the Camino de Santiago, which is one of the three great Christian pilgrimages. And that one is actually the Camino Frances, the French route that starts in St. Jean-Pierre de Porte and goes over the Pyrenees Mountains and across northern Spain from east to west and culminates in this beautiful city of Santiago de Compostela. That's the one I'm partial to.
So journey to a sacred place. Then you have danger and challenge along the journey. Pilgrimage was typically always put us to the test and does put us to the test in different ways. In the past, pilgrimage was an actual dangerous journey. along the journey. In fact, here in Spain, you have albergues and you have the people who run them, they're called hospitaleros. Hospital is the word for hospital.
And it was a place where pilgrims could be cured of ills of whether they were sick, they were sore, or they had been injured by, you know, marauding bands of bandits. So along the journey, one could be seriously hurt or killed. In fact, I like the idea there's a, word travel, the root word for that is travail. Now we don't feel that now because we get first class, you know, we get our little drinks, you know, we travel in comfort. But the pilgrimage was an ordeal.
It was a tribulation, you know, and a hardship. Today, even though we don't face that, we do face things like, you know, the sore back. the heavy pack, you know, the twisted ankle and most people suffer some sort of blisters on their feet and just general tiredness. At any rate, it's really a sacrifice, I think, that we're making. And just a little quick aside here, I love the word sacrifice because it teaches us something about pilgrimage. It's made up of two words, sacri, which is sacred.
and in fissures, which means to make. So it's basically when you sacrifice your having a moment, an opportunity, opportunity to make something sacred, make the moment sacred. And I, I inject this along the Camino because it is pertinent and it's, helps me to remember, you know, whatever's going on and whatever pain there's something sacred that's happening here. So the other one, go ahead.
Well, the sacrifices is something that is incredibly countercultural because and I don't know if this is just because I'm a Westerner. You're a Westerner as well. We live in a very consumeristic society and consumerism basically says I serve myself. Sacrifice, though, even even along the lines of what you're describing is actually giving up something for someone else or. certainly giving up something for God.
How do you kind of, mean, when you're leading people on this pilgrimage and you're talking with them about sacrifice, mean, how is that resounding with people? Is that resounding with people because most within our culture are not, like sacrifice is like not viewed in a positive way or it's not people's default or? Like, yeah, tell me when you're applying that, when you're talking with people about that, how is that received?
Yeah, I wish I had a meter to see like I start the beginning of the day talking about the theme and and Ironically, I didn't we didn't plan it like this but on the particular route that we do The five-day route the third day is actually the theme of sacrifice and it happens to be the longest day it's 30 kilometers so it's about 19 20 miles and You've already walked two days, so you're already tired.
And so when we made the connection, was like, look, look, because things were happening on this third day that people were either breaking or breaking through. Both are good processes. And so we've seen things happen on that third day that actually really resound with this idea of sacrifice of making something sacred.
It's been incredible because it's, you know, when you get pushed to the limit, the real stuff kind of comes out and the real you kind of comes out and you have a chance to say, okay, how am going to then thinking about the theme? What do I need to do to make this a true sacrifice and make out of this hardship something sacred? I don't think people really understand that.
But they get really close, much closer to understanding that when they're actually involved in the actual sacrifice of what they're doing on that third day and on a daily basis. So it's a great message. It's a great teaching moment for people to learn whatever they need to learn. I don't put it out there. The Lord just really makes it happen. Everyone is wrestling with something different. Yeah, that makes sense.
it's interesting when you were kind of talking historically and there being three different pilgrimages that I can't remember exactly how you framed that a moment ago, but I know there have been certain trips, none of the three that you mentioned, although each of those sound good.
And obviously we're focused on the Camino de Santiago today, but I specifically remember, for example, a trip to Rwanda and being in those places where genocide took place and having spiritual direction in the midst of that very tragic thing where somehow you end up getting closer to God. But I mean, that felt more travail than luxurious travel, you know, being in that space. And it's one of those it's one of those things where pilgrimage seems apropos. in a way.
I would be interested to kind of hear. So you guys are doing the Camino de Santiago. You know, many people are not, you know, they don't know much about the Iberian Peninsula or that, you know, maybe you could just kind of share with us a little bit about the value of doing a pilgrimage there and then even just what's the history of the Camino de Santiago and the connection to the Apostle James as well. Yeah, sure, sure.
I think the benefit of doing, let's say, a pilgrimage anywhere outside your context is that you, I don't know if you've ever heard of the social media algorithms. They tend to place people in a bubble that think alike and, you know, with that, it's terrible. Yes. It's good for social media, but it's not good for human connection. But so I think in some ways pilgrimage is a little bit of an antidote to something like that. You know, we it's good to leave the bubble.
I know it feels good and it feels safe and you don't have to do much. you have to exert much effort because everybody kind of thinks alike. And that's good sometimes, but it can't be like that all the time, you know? So pilgrimage for me, helps us to kind of leave the bubble, you know? And I think...
When we're on pilgrimage, you start encountering other people from different walks of life, from different belief systems, because even though it's a Christian pilgrimage, it doesn't mean that everybody walking the Camino is a Christian. And you come across people like, you know, I came across an older Japanese American couple a couple of pilgrimages ago. They were sweet, sweet couple telling me their story.
They ended up living in Seattle, but they had been in internment camps in the United States during World War II. And everybody has a story. Two friends that I met, one gal from Argentina, I met her friend from Australia on the train coming to the Camino. And then they began walking together and they bumped into our group and they joined our group and then a couple others joined. know, Germans, Italians, English, Americans, Latin Americans, Asians.
And then of course, my beloved Andalusians, who I live in Andalusia, are among many, many more nationalities that walk the Camino. So you can really open up meaningful conversations with people from other cultures and nations. You learn a lot as you walk and you get a glimpse of kind of their story, their pain, their joy, kind of the trajectory of life. And I think it just helps us enlarge and expand our perspective. It gives us more empathy and compassion.
And I think to a sense that kind of we're all connected because of our humanity, because our shared humanity. I like that part. But before, do you want to say anything? Because I love to share that. short version of the history of the community. about to jump there. Yeah. Yeah. We, would love to hear more about that because I mean, the apostle James, obviously, I mean, this is the apostle James that wrote the book of James, right.
And he, I, I know because, because our listeners, one, there's a very strong orphan care contingent. So James wrote the seminal, James one 27, which has probably been mentioned on this podcast more than most scriptures. but also just that. faith without works is dead. Like we have a bunch of listeners here that really resound with that. With that sentiment and that understanding that yes, we are saved by faith and by grace, you know, but that, that always works itself out in actual deeds.
So we have a lot of doers here. We have a lot of people that will resound with the words of James. So what's his tie in here with the Camino de Santiago? Yeah, okay. So yeah, we are talking about Santiago, which is James the Greater. The word Santiago is two words, right? Son is Saint and then Tiago is James. It's just a derivative of Jacob, which is the Jewish form of that.
And so we're talking about James the Greater, who is the brother of John and the son of Zebedee and you know, famous sons of thunder. So legend holds it that after the crucifixion of Jesus, he divided up the world among his apostles, encouraging them to go and get the word out as widely as possible. that James was assigned the Iberian Peninsula, which is another name for mainland Spain. And so he traveled as far as Galicia preaching as he went westward.
We don't have any of that in our biblical knowledge. That's just what scholars think might have happened. And then along the way, he was making disciples. It was not an easy task. Eventually he traveled back to the Holy Land. We do have a record that he was martyred there by Herod Agrippa in 44 AD. And, but that's all it says that he was martyred and he was the first one to be martyred among the apostles.
some people think maybe his body had been thrown out on the dump for the dogs to eat that his disciples and gathered the body and sneaked it out of Jerusalem and put it. This is where we get into like beginning of the legend, put it in a boat without oars and sails and without sailors. And then it traveled. seemingly by itself across the Mediterranean through the Straits of Gibraltar and along the north, along the Iberian coast, and then stopped in Galicia. And here he already had disciples.
And so when the disciples heard, they were said to have taken his body and found a burial place for him on top of a hill in Galicia. And then we don't hear any more of that until for another 750 years. That's what I love about Europe. You're talking about long histories, 750 years, a long time. And then around 13 AD, the Christian hermit Pelayo, again, according to legend, heard music and saw lights shining over a small cave in the woods.
And so he dug on the site and found some bones and parchment. So he called the bishop and then... The bishop came and authenticated the bones as those of the apostle James. And there was also two of his disciples, Athanasio and Pildoro. And so once that became established, then you have relics, then you have a place where people can begin to go. so before long, the tomb began drawing pilgrims. One of the ones that was also informed was King Alfonso.
from Asturias, which is in the north of Spain as well, north kind of center. And he supposedly is the first one to have done pilgrimage from his court in Oviedo, Spain to go see the remains. It's actually, there's like 49 different caminos, I mean, trails, but the main one is the French route. He apparently went through what's called the primitive route. And there is still a, Camino Primitivo. But he was the first one to kind of make that journey there. And he built a church there.
And then there was another church that was built there that then was ransacked by the Muslim military leader in the conquest of Spain. And he tore it down. And then eventually, another one was built there. And when this Muslim leader apparently ransacked the church, he left the remains there. And then they built up another church, which now has become Santiago de Compostela and the cathedral. Now that cathedral is a beautiful cathedral, but it was started in 1075 AD.
And then it was consecrated finally in 1211. But what you see is kind of a baroque facade and that's the one you see standing from the Plaza Obradorio. Beautiful, beautiful baroque facade on that and that's from the mid 18th century. And so now every year you have basically 500,000 people walking the Camino de Santiago that check in at the official pilgrim's office every year and it's growing. It's in number. awesome. This history is really fascinating with James and the centuries afterwards.
So I kind of want to think through. So pilgrimage is not just going for a long walk for the sake of going for a long walk. There's stuff that happens on a pilgrimage. Mm-hmm. would love to kind of hear more of that. Like when people go into a pilgrimage, what's happening there and how is that powerful?
And how would you as, you know, how would you as somebody who is invested in discipleship, spiritual formation, how does pilgrimage kind of situate within that broader context of discipleship and spiritual formation? Yeah, yeah. Excellent. I love these questions. I've alluded to some of that already on what happens on the Camino, but we'll expand a little bit. We all come to the Camino with our unique story. It's our life's experience.
And not everybody comes to the Camino, but there's something that draws people to the Camino. Part of it is adventure, part of it is travel, these days, but mostly the people that I've even talked to on the Camino, there's a specific reason that they're coming. And a lot of times it is, they'll say, I'm not religious, but there's a spiritual thing that's drawing me. And it's easy to have conversations there.
But in whatever story there is, there exists joys and hurts, there's health and there's trauma. It's not difficult to assimilate the good stuff, you know, we just absorb it without any, any problems like, hey, I got a raise, that's great, they don't take it. The challenge is how do we simulate and process and make peace with and overcome kind of pain and trauma and loss. And I think that for me, When we start getting, I feel like discipleship gives us kind of the basis of our faith.
But I feel like spiritual formation or spiritual direction or, know, deeper. When you go deeper into the inner being, that's when you really start looking at some significant transformation. So the Camino really has been helpful, especially when you're walking slowly. you're among nature, you're in the quiet or the storm of your thoughts. It lends itself to solitude and looking inward. And we have to then face the things that we have kind of successfully kept at bay.
I've read a lot of the Camino memoirs. Well, I haven't read a lot, but I've heard a lot of the stories. I've read some of the memoirs. And if you do the whole Camino, It's about 45 days. It's about 30, 35 days. But there's a place about midway. It's called the Maseta, the plateau, and it just long and hot and there's nothing there and boring. But that's where most of the people hit some sort of breakthrough because there's nothing else to distract you.
have to you have to be there wrestling with with what's going on. And I heard the other day an author, I was reading the book and he talked about a lot of hate that was directed in his direction through threats and through comments. And he said something that just stopped me in my tracks. he said, he said that hate, and I would add violence or abuse or rejection or trauma is soul vandalism. Hmm. And I just love that idea because it really nails it so well.
I feel like just like vandalism can be cleaned up, rebuilt, reshaped. I feel like soul vandalism can also have that same experience. And I think pilgrimage is part of what goes a long way to kind of restoring our soul and letting us breathe again. And so those are the things I would say. That's so good.
Yeah. These, these concepts, again, I alluded to this towards the top of the show, but these, we don't, we don't talk pilgrimage on a regular basis, but what we do need is healing, restoration, reconciliation. Like a lot of the things that you're describing, that people within their soul, are able to to move forward in our things that we need. So this is such a fantastic practice to, to, to help us get there and, to, and to ultimately get us closer to God.
Cause that's, that's where we're meant to be is to be, is to be one with God. you know, I would love to also kind of get practical here, Randy. so at one point you said, you know, it's X amount of miles, X amount of kilometers. It's a multi-day pilgrimage. let's get super practical. Alright, do you have to be super fit to walk for five days or whatever it is? Yeah, no. no, no. I think you don't have to be super fit, but I think you have to be prepared for it.
You have to be have conditioned a little bit for it. And so we usually send out a three months before kind of a prep guide. It's a conditioning regimen, a training regimen. And if you follow it, it starts out, you know, quite easy. And then it kind of slowly you increase the kilometer for the miles and how much you can carry because you're carrying roughly about 10 % of your body weight. I mean, we say, you know, no more than like 20 pounds.
Hopefully you can keep it down a little bit, but that adds a pretty good amount to your body. you know, if you can do that, well, we're walking 75 miles a day, which is about 15 miles per day. I mean, 75 miles the whole trip, 15 miles per day. But like, who does that? Who walks 15 miles per day on a regular basis? Most people don't, yeah. So you mentioned these packs, are people like, are you carrying tents? where are people sleeping? What's going in that pack that's on your back?
it's the basics. It's not a, it's a good size pack. I mean, you could probably get by, here we're talking in liters. I don't know how they do it. I don't remember how they do it in the United States, but I have a 50 liter pack. could get by with a 45 liter pack. you change of clothes for three days and then we wash, you know, along the journey. A rain poncho, you know, a microfiber towel. a hat, some sunscreen if it's in the summer.
If it's in the winter, you're carrying a little bit more because you're rain gear because it does rain a good bit up there. So you're pretty self-contained. And I tell people when they come, if you want to come and then stay after, you may want to bring a carry-on with some extra stuff and then just leave it in a locker. But if you're just coming, just bring your backpack. don't need a whole lot of extra in there. And then we stay in, there's different places to stay.
There's albergues, which are hostels, which are communal type, 20 to 50 people in a room. Then there's Airbnb types or smaller hotels. I like to stay in those because of the fact that I think if we were taking students, we would do the albergue route. You know, it's just a fun party and you get to mix it up with different people. But I think our target audience sometimes is, you know, between 50, 55 and above. it takes, you know, walking six, seven hours a day takes it out of you.
And I'm 59 and I've done the albergue and I've done the other. I'm leaning towards the other because I've got to lead these. this pack and I want to be rested up. the food is great. Excellent food along the way and just the journey itself. What's the terrain like? I mean, you mentioned like, seems like it's a little diverse. Like it's not the same thing the whole time, but maybe describe that.
Cause it's like, all right, if I'm just walking, like there's different, there's certain, even being here in Tacoma, Washington, a walk along Preston is different than a walk in point defiance, you know? So tell me a little bit about the, about the terrain. Yeah, if you're looking at the whole trip, the long Camino, that's varied. what we do is northwestern Spain, Calicia area. And it's beautiful. It's really green because it rains a good bit there. It's rolling hills.
So you're doing some climbs and some little downhills. So, but they're not long at all. So sometimes it can be a nice little steep hill, but it's not long at all. You are getting in a good exercise, the, the, the pastures are dotted with cows and sheep. And sometimes you'll meet a herd of cows on the road and with, you know, with the, what would it be the cow herder, the farmer, and you're walking through, beautiful little hamlets, know, 10 homes that you kind of navigate through.
You also walk through larger towns and at least one bigger city on this particular route. And so you have access to that too along the journey. And really it's, you also go through forests that just kind of take you back in time. Like it looks like a medieval forest, like Robin Hood or something like that. Thanks a canopy, there's moss everywhere, there's ferns, it's really beautiful, beautiful. And then finally you arrive at probably my favorite city in Spain is Santiago de Compostela.
Just lovely. were wanting to go on a pilgrimage, what would that even look like? How would they go about that? We'll link your guys' website and everything in the show notes, of course, if people want to follow up. But what would that look like? Yeah, yeah, we have, so on our website, know, CaminoQuest.com, we have all the information there. We have this year four pre-scheduled trips, and two, one in May, June, and then September and October.
We try to stay away from the summer months because it just really grows in number of pilgrims, but we can still do that. in there. So if one of the four don't work, there's also a place that you can go to at the bottom. There's a form that you can access that's create your own custom made, know, Camino. And you depending on the dates, we may be available to take a group of you through there. And it's all done online. You can reach out to me, you know, the email is there.
And we'll answer all the questions that you have. But yeah, it's Usually it's a five to six day trip. You can extend it out. We probably wouldn't go more than 10 days just because of the time that we have to be away. But it's a guided tour. Every day you'll have a spiritual formation theme and a series of questions that'll guide you through the day. And we start the day with solitude from after breakfast up until lunch and lunch here is late.
So it's about 1.30. to, and sometimes people say, my gosh, I can't be quiet that long. Well, and then they say, my gosh, it ended so fast. So we really want to give that space to let you just kind of be quiet and listen and observe and enjoy. Yeah, that's a good word. All right, before we get to our last, last question, Randy, we're talking spiritual formation. We're talking pilgrimage. We want God to be doing a deep work in our inner lives. So I'm going to make this super personal for you.
What would you say has been your foremost personal, spiritual, soul strengthening takeaway? from being involved in pilgrimages. Yeah, think for me, I mean for me myself personally, think without a doubt is I have needed time just to be quiet, time just to slow down because what happens is I'm able to actually reconnect with myself. One, I'm actually able to, without distractions, put the important things on the table. carry those with me and have conversations.
Sometimes, you know, for the emotional life, sometimes I argue with God along the journey. but it's, it's kind of that quiet space and time, the extended time to be able to what I would say reconnect with myself, reconnect with God. and then reconnect with others along the journey. And that is what it's about. Randy, we do have a final question that we ask all of our guests that come on Think Global Do Justice.
So for someone that is pursuing God's heart of justice in the nations, what is one thing that you would recommend that they do? Yeah, I was really captured by that question. And what I thought about was... There are lot of different things that people can do. There's a lot of opportunities. But I think, would say muster the courage to just start. Muster up the courage to just start. And we all have great hopes and great intentions, but sometimes that's where they stay.
I remember reading a book that was called The 10 Second Rule. And the premise was about going about your day and you hear from God. or at least you think you hear from God, but within 10 seconds, you're already justifying why it wasn't God. You've moved on, or the moment's moved on. And I think maybe in a silly way, that could be helpful. Just say, don't let the moment pass, just start. And just get out there and just try something.
It may not work, but you may find a passionate place to serve others. Amen. Amen. Yes. And we have a network in a community here of people that do start stuff and it can be scary, but that is a good word and a good word to end on. Randy, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. It was a pleasure to get to know you and this has been really a fantastic conversation. Great, great, thanks.
If I can say one last little plug, just because we're giving away a book, we're three winners, we're gonna draw, it's a book on pilgrimage. it's called Pilgrimage, A Medieval Cure for Modern Ills. And it's a great little book on pilgrimage. if, when you go to our website, there's a pop-up there, if you wanna sign up and be part of the drawing, it'll happen on March 29th. Okay. will so we'll draw winners. You're welcome to sign up for our newsletter and be part of the drawing.
That is that is that that's good and that will and this podcast will be out before that So I definitely as if you guys needed any other reason to go to Camino quest website There's there's one more we all like getting free book. So Randy, thanks again for being on the show Well, thank you, Brandon. It's been a true pleasure to talk all things Camino and all things pilgrimage.
Absolutely and to our listeners may Almighty God who created us in his own image grant us grace to fearlessly contend against evil and to make no peace with oppression and that we may reverently use our freedom and employ it in the maintenance of justice in our communities and among the nations to the glory of God's holy name through Jesus Christ our
Lord who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit one God now and forever Amen, and we will see you guys on the next episode of think global do justice