Online Catholic Missionaries (OCM): Piligrimage

Hej Hej!
Well friends, EACYN have started new programme on "In the footsteps of Saints" on which we will be sharing the stories and insights of the pilgrimages we have done and those we will do in the future. Someone has thrown me a quick question "can any EACYNer participate?" and a mph! let me think "Of course!!!!!!!! aren't we all friends, like family or something? Of course we are. So you may share your pilgrimage story as well.

Well, If I borrow from Catholic Encyclopaedia, pilgrimage means; (Middle English, pilgrime, Old French, pelegrin, derived from Latin peregrinum, supposed origin, per and ager—with idea of wandering over a distance).

Pilgrimages may be defined as journeys made to some place with the purpose of venerating it, or in order to ask there for supernatural aid, or to discharge some religious obligation.

I remember my chaplain back at the University of Dar es Salaam, the humble and holy man, Monsg. Mbiku, told us that "one can get indulgence (I don't remember whether it was plenary or ..., any way it doesn't matter) well, if he go to the pilgrimmage but must be done well. Done well? a person at the back of my back (mh!that sounds cute ; at the back of my back) asked "done well?" Sure, you got do some rituals before you go for pilgrimages if you so need the indulgence

I remember the qualifications quiet well

1. Do confession (must be in the state of grace)
2.Receive the holy Eucharist
3. Pray for Pope's intentions

Any way, we start with a trip of some EACYNers to FINSTA: A birth place of St. Birigitta of Sweden (It's also the place where she started receiving revelations from Our Lord Jesus Christ. She then founded the order of Birigitta sisters after the death of her husband. By the way, her daughter Catherine of Sweden is also a saint.

So who's Saint Birgitta of Sweden? some hints; http://home.infionline.net/~ddisse/birgitta.html

Birgitta Birgersdotter was born to an aristocratic family related to the kings of Sweden and influential at court. By the time she was 10 years old, her mother had died; when she was 13 or 14, Birgitta was married to Ulf Gudmarsson. She had eight children and served at court for several years. In 1341, the couple went on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Spain; on their return to Sweden, her husband retired from public life, and they apparently discussed plans for both to enter monasteries. However, at Ulf's death in about 1345, Birgitta decided to remain a lay person for a time, until she could found a new religious order.

Her first written descriptions of the visionary experiences that had begun after her husband's death concerned her proposed foundation, but they soon included directions for admonitory letters to be sent to the king of Sweden and Swedish nobles, and later to the kings of England and France and the current pope. Some of her visions she wrote down in Swedish, others she reported to a series of clerical advisors who then wrote them in Latin. This procedure continued until her death, although she soon learned to read and write Latin.

Birgitta went to Rome for the 1350 Jubilee year, in part to get the pope's approval for her religious order and for a Rule that she had written, but the pope, then living in Avignon, France, did not attend the Jubilee. Birgitta, however, remained a resident of Rome for the rest of her life, although she travelled considerably. As a Swedish noblewoman, she made influential friends, and so her reports of her visions (frequently described in letters that were widely circulated) could not merely be ignored. In most of these visions, Christ and/or his mother Mary gave Birgitta messages to be given to others; their theme was usually the need for the reform of the Church through the reform of the lives of the pope, cardinals, clergy, and the secular rulers. Birgitta believed that the prerequisite for any reform involved the permanent return of the pope to Rome from Avignon, where all popes had lived since 1305.

So sit back and enjoy!

Despite the fact that this small church in Finsta which was built by St Birgitta's father,is now a protestant one,(Swedish church)they atleast hold a beautiful icon of our lady and an infant Jesus.