Mary Magdalene Pilgrimage, part I.

Mary Magdalene – pilgrimage and revelation

I'm not 100% sure what called me to this journey, this pilgrimage to the lands of Mary Magdalen; however, what I have learned over my life thus far is to trust the call of my heart. The heart doesn't provide the detailed left-brained thoughts and explanations that the modern world often asks for, but I know that my heart does not leave me astray. 

It was with this trust that I embarked upon and said yes to the Mary Magdalene pilgrimage in southern France with my dear friend/colleague /mentor, Shelley. 

Even up to the day of our departure, an understanding of what lay ahead for me and why I knew I needed to be on this path and what would unfold for me was not clear. Yes, I knew the logistics and the details and where we would be and mostly what we would be doing, but what lay within that was very much still unknown. And I was perfectly okay with that. Thankfully.

I had a sense that this journey would be one of an Awakening of the feminine, both within me as where all things must start, and then subsequently rippling out beyond my individual being - to my relationships, to my work, to my community, to all those with whom I encounter. It is always my intention that my own path of awakening ultimately also serves the greater world that we all inhabit together.

And with this anticipated Awakening of the feminine, so too did I imagine a rebirth and a rebalancing of sacred masculine energies, again within me and then beyond. 

I had some ideas of what that could look like in my life, and yet I still wasn't sure what that meant for this trip. 

There were four of us together on this journey, met and received by our guide in France, Pat, who leads these pilgrimages regularly. The four of us - friends already, and now Pilgrims together - spent two nights in Paris to begin. We explored several sacred sites in Paris itself including Sacré-Cœur Basilica & the San Sulpice Church, both places where I experience deep embodied healing. 

I hesitate here about what to share next as some of this journey was deeply personal. It feels both excruciatingly difficult to share these experiences in writing, and yet simultaneously tremendously important to do so. And so dear reader, continue with that understanding.

In Sacré-Cœur Basilica, we spent the night within the former nuns’ rooms of the church, and in reverent prayer/meditation in the basilica during the night where pilgrims before us had done so for hundreds of years. In fact, there have been people in meditation in the church every night for the past 140 years continuously. To be a part of this perpetual embodied chain of prayer, something so much greater than oneself, was quite powerful. 

The details of that evening experience and what unfolded for me there in Sacré-Cœur are for private conversations, but what I can share here is that this was an absolute reclamation. A reclamation of all that is sacred within me that had been forbidden, shamed, & made unholy for millennia by the church. The Embodied reclamation that took place that night brought back parts of my sovereignty, power and emotional energy that I did not realize were still missing in this way.

It was expansive and empowering. I felt centered balanced and powerful in my body in a whole new way. I felt like parts of me had come alive.

Like so many times before, I have found deep and unexpected healing when I am open to being guided and Spirit led. This was the case on this fateful night at Sacré-Cœur.

The next morning, we had an early train to catch so we headed out to get a taxi/Uber to the train station. When it became clear that no cars would come up to this point in the city, we started hoofing it down ancient and steep cobblestone hillsides. Had I known that we would be walking that distance, I would have worn different shoes (something I noted, but chose not to berate myself for later on). In the rush to walk to the station, I ended up making a full body plant on the ground in front of me as I tripped on something on the sidewalk.

Ouch! 

If you've ever read the book, The Big leap, you'll understand what this represented. My body wasn't quite ready to fully hold the expansion and reclamation I had experienced the night before. It took some tending to my wounds, both physical and emotional, until I was able to regain my footing and my center and be ready to integrate and be ready for the week to come. Thankfully I was surrounded by healers and received a craniosacral session that evening from my friend Cindy to help my body get realigned. 

After a smooth train ride to an utterly different part of the country, we settled in for the week ahead, all of us now ready to begin this journey together in a new way…

To be continued.