2001

 In 2001 I learned one the most important lessos of my life. I had to move on from St Agatha's Pennant Hills to a new appointment at Toukley. St Agatha's had been my only experience of life as a priest, yet I somehow knew that I had to be decisive with saying goodbye so that I could be as completely present to my new parish as I had been in my last. 

One of the last weekends was with the young adults group pictured below on retreat, as many of these young adults took up leadership of their groups. 

But a challenge was that I had been accompanying a single mother with young kids who was dying of cancer. I visited and prayed often, but in my final week I said goodbye to her, and told her that Fr Vince would now be looking after her. 

A couple of weeks after I arrived at Toukley she died, and her family called me and asked me to do the funeral. I apologised and told them that  I was now in another parish and that Fr Vince would do the funeral wonderfully (which was true). Ten minutes later another family member called very upset and irate with me, but I held my ground. 

The funeral took place the following week. And on the day of the funeral the principal of our local Catholic high school near Toukley died of a heart attack, and so all priests and counsellors were called in to assist the staff and the students. And this confirmed for me that I had in fact done the right thing. If I had gone back to do the funeral, where my heart really was, I wouldn't be where my duty needed me to be at that school. 

So I have continued in this way, saying some hard goodbyes to parishes when I leave. But it has also made me very intentional about goodbyes, about noticing the dynamics of farewells and also of hellos. 

My favourite song, Closing Time by Semisonic has a quite profound lyric: 

"Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end."

This has shaped my awareness ever since. 

And it also makes sense of the Camino!

Today I walked from Larrasoana to Cizur Menor, walking through Pamplona on the way. 

People often talk about forming a "Camino Family", a group who

meet on Camino and become friends along the way, then stick together right to the end. 

I've met a few wonderful people and by yesterday had a couple of guys, Mikey from the UK and Arne from Germany who I thought might become that for me. I thought about whether I should plan my itinerary to be with them, but decided not to, trusting that endings of such little temporary Camino families will give way to new beginnings of other families. 

Then this morning I caught up with Adam from Melbourne and Danny from Taiwan, both of whom I met on day 1. We walked together and had lunch together, and took this picture from a lookout above Pamplona. 

But then they stayed in Pamplona and I went on, meeting Rachel and Maryanne in the albergue in Cizor Menor. And I expect that I'll meet someone new (or re-meet someone old) tomorrow. Who knows that the Camino might hold?