Prospect couple visits Marian shrines
PROSPECT — A Prospect couple retraced the steps of pilgrims, saints and church legends last fall during a trip to the Marian (Virgin Mary) shrines of Spain, Portugal and France.
Joyce and DuWayne Flinner spent Oct. 1 through Oct. 14 following the route of travelers along the Camino de Santiago, or pilgrim way, in Spain; visiting the sites of miracles in Fatima, Portugal, and Lourdes, France; and taking in the walled towns and cathedrals of a bygone time.
Traveling by bus once they landed in Spain, the Flinners said their tour group racked up 2,156 miles visiting the various sites.
No matter the mileage, they both said they enjoyed the experience even though Joyce Flinner is Catholic and her husband is Lutheran.
“It could be for any religion,” Joyce Flinner said.
The Flinners arranged their trip through a tour company, which arranged airline tickets, hotels and bus travel between countries.
“We have done some other trips with them, and we were just happy with what we got, so we just stuck with them,” said Joyce Flinner.
The Flinners flew out of Pittsburgh to Newark, N.J., and then left from Newark about 7 p.m. and arrived in Madrid around 7 a.m. after an eight-hour flight.
DuWayne Flinner said, “Once we got there, we got settled in and had a little dinner and met the rest of the tour group.”
He said there were 23 in their group, all either Americans or Filipinos living in California.
The group took a bus to Avila, Spain, and walked among the ancient city's famous walls, which date back to 1090.Avila was also where St. Theresa of Avila, a prominent Spanish mystic, Roman Catholic saint, Carmelite nun and author reformed the Carmelite Order.“There's a convent there, and it's still there today,” said Joyce Flinner.The next day the group drove to Portugal and visited the Our Lady of Fatima Shrine with the tombs of the three young shepherds — Lucia dos Santos and Jacinta and Francisco Marto — whose visions of the Blessed Virgin Mary starting in 1917 were declared worthy of belief by the Catholic Church.DuWayne Flinner said a statue of the Virgin stands at the site of her visitations next to the Capelhina, or Chapel of Apparitions, which houses the stump of the oak tree where the vision of Mary's feet rested.The tour group also visited the site on a hillside outside of Fatima where in the spring and summer of 1916, 9-year-old Lucia Santos and her cousins Jacinta and Francisco Marto, while herding sheep, were visited three times by an apparition of an angel who identified himself as “The Angel of Peace,” as a prelude to their vision of Mary on May 13, 1917.Spending the night in Fatima after taking part in a candlelight rosary procession around the town square, the Flinners visited the nearby village of Valinhos were the children lived. They visited the parish church where the children were baptized. That night they took part in another candlelight rosary procession.The Flinners' tour group returned to Spain the next day and arrived at Santiago de Compostela, the capital city of Galicia province.
DuWayne Flinner said it was one of the top pilgrimage destinations in the Middle Ages because of the belief that St. James, one of the Twelve Apostles, is buried under St. James Cathedral's main altar.Joyce Flinner said they made it a point to walk through the cathedral's “Holy Door of Mercy.”“Last year, the Catholic Church observed the Holy Year of Mercy. If you went through one of these doors, you gained grace,” she said.The following day, the Flinners walked a section of Camino de Santiago, a pilgrimage route to St. James Cathedral.They returned to attend a special noon Mass at the cathedral where they said they were fortunate to witness the use of the Botafumiero, a massive incense burner.Joyce Flinner said, “In the early days, the pilgrims would stay and sleep in the cathedral for as long as a week.“They were unbathed, so the incense burner was used to perfume the church,” she said.Her husband added, “It takes eight men to swing it. They used a pulley system to swing it, pulling on a certain line to make it swing.”Joyce Flinner added, “They only use it on special occasions like Christmas and Easter. We were excited to see it in action.”She said, “We visited the statute of St. James at the high altar. You can walk behind it and hug the statue. Everyone was doing it, but I'd never heard of it before.”The tour group left the next day for Burgos to visit the Burgos Cathedral.The group then crossed over into France to visit Lourdes, the site of the Virgin Mary's appearance to St. Bernadette in 1858 and one of the world's most famous place of pilgrimage, the Our Lady of Lourdes shrine.DuWayne Flinner said, “There is the original church, a new church in front of it and a huge underground church.”
“In the grotto where the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared there are candles burning everywhere,” he said.His wife said, “The grotto is in hillside rock. People go in there and touch the walls. There's water trickling down. People say the holy water from Lourdes has healing powers.”DuWayne Flinner said, “They bring patients from nearby hospitals. They are the first in every procession. They are looking for a miracle.”After Lourdes, the Flinners' group visited Barcelona and its massive Sagrada Familia Basilica designed by Catalan architect Anton Gaudi.DuWayne Flinner said work on the immense building began in 1882 and is still ongoing. “It's supposed to be finished by 2026 or 2028,” he said. They both said the huge building is beautiful but nearly indescribable.They also visited Montserrat and its Benedictine monastery and its 12th century Black Madonna carving.On their last day before flying back to the United States, the Flinners took in the Basilica of Our Lady of the Pillar in Saragosa, Spain.The basilica houses a reputedly miraculous image of the Virgin Mary.Local tradition has it on Jan. 2, in the year 40, the Virgin appeared on a pillar to the Apostle St. James the Greater while he was preaching.“The weather was perfect,” said Joyce Flinner. “We never needed an umbrella. We just needed jackets sometimes.”“I highly recommend this tour. I would not be bored going again,” she added.A return to the Marian shrine tour will have to wait. The Flinners are booked for a tour of Sweden, Norway and Denmark later this year.
