Camino Chaplaincy 2019

If you don’t want to read all about the Anglican-Episcopalian Camino Chaplaincy 2019 in detail, but only want to have the quick summary, here it is:

Background story and what we offered in 2018 can be found here https://egeria.house/chaplaincy

In 2019 we want to run the Camino Chaplaincy longer, from April/May all through to October/November and not only in Santiago itself but also by sending “self-supporting” Camino Chaplains out to walk with the pilgrims on the different Caminos.

If you want to support us, you can:

Pray for us

Spread the word about us and

Donate to us   >>>here<<<.

If you now want to know more details, read on …

 

What we did in 2018

The Camino Chaplaincy 2018 was based out of my place here in Santiago, with 11 volunteers from 5 different countries being involved in it. What we did:

• 27 church services (Sunday mornings in a chapel-like room the Parador Hotel has given us for free, Wednesday afternoons at my home, followed by a shared meal).
• Open House each weekday afternoon, for coffee/tea and chat.
• Hospital and albergue visits to ill pilgrims.
• Meeting up with pilgrims when requested.
• Going out and about town and the last kilometres/miles of many Caminos to meet pilgrims, encourage them, welcome them and listen to them.
• Working closely together with ecumenical partners here in Santiago.
• Providing practical help (food, equipment etc) to pilgrims that either came directly to us or were referred to us by our ecumenical partners.
• And for Saint Francis Day, we even had a service of pet blessing for Estela the Camino Kitten in the house 😉

 

What our Plans for 2019 are

All of the above and some more!

Additionally to the things we have already done in 2018, we would like to extend our services from end of April to mid November all through the whole pilgrim season 2019.

We would like to offer at least 2 weekday Eucharists followed by a shared meal additionally to our Sunday Eucharist.

Apart of serving pilgrims here in Santiago, we also plan to send out self-supporting “walking chaplains” to minister to pilgrims on the way. These chaplains, like all other volunteers, will pay their own way, but it would be nice if we would have some funds to offer them hospitality on arrival here in Santiago and a welcome meal!

If you want to support our plans for 2019, there are three things that you can do and the good news is that two of them don’t cost you any money:

Pray for us – Especially for the selection and training of next year’s volunteers, for all of us as we live together in Santiago and a place for us to worship.

Tell others about us – Whilst the work of the Chaplaincy got widely advertised both online and offline, word of mouth is still the best advertisement! So, if you know of somebody that plans to do the Camino in 2019, give them this link https://egeria.house/chaplaincy/ where they can find out more about us, what we do and where to find us. And feel free to post said link on social media and elsewhere, where appropriate. Additionally you can point pilgrims to our Facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/CaminoChaplaincyCoE/

Donate to us – All chaplaincy volunteers pay their own travel cost and this year some of them even paid for their own accommodation, food etc. Next year we would like to offer all volunteers here in Santiago accommodation and at least some food. Other costs include printing of material and basic mass supplies, but accommodation rental is obviously the biggest expense. Additionally there are the costs of providing a shared meal after the weekday Eucharists and also for practical help (food, equipment) for pilgrims that ‘knock at the door’. If you want to help with the costs of next year’s Chaplaincy, you can use the following >>>LINK<<< or you can contact me directly for other options.

As an indication: It costs around 15 Euro/day to run the chaplaincy, that includes accommodation and food for pilgrims and volunteers plus the aforementioned costs like printing and mass supplies. If you could sponsor one or more days of this – that would be a big help!

And if you have anymore questions or suggestions, please leave them in a comment or contact me directly via https://egeria.house/contact/

Buen Camino, SY