The Journey 362
Read:
Luke 2: 41-52
One of the hallmarks today in the life of many individuals is the journey to
religious places. Christians all over the world plan the holy land tours and
there are people including clergy and pastors who has taken upon themselves of
arranging holy land tour as a part of their vocation. People of every religion
wants to undertake a pilgrimage journey where they visit sites that has
significance to their religious beliefs. The news agency Huffington Post
has released a list of places that people love to visit as a part of their
spiritual pilgrimage throughout the world. The places are the following. The
visit to the Ganges in India is the first on the list. It is believed that
about 20 million people vast the Ganges river, as they consider that this river
represents life, purity and goodness. The second pilgrimage site is Mecca,
where approximately about 13 million Muslims visit as a part of the spiritual
pilgrimage. The third pilgrimage site is the Golden Temple in India, where on
an average about fifty thousand people visit every day, and this temple is the
holy place of the people of Sikh faith. Next on the list is Our Lady of
Guadalupe in Mexico city, which is considered as the most popular Marian shrine
in the world and where about 10 million people visit every year. The
Vaishno Devi temple in Jammu and Kashmir in India is next on the list where
over 8 million people visit this religious site every year. The Lourdes in
France is next on the list and this is the place where Catholics celebrate the
Virgin Mary's ascent to heaven. Next on the pilgrimage list is the Bahai
Gardens in Northern Israel where about half a million people visit. The next on
the list is the Vatican, the holy place for the Catholics, with its various
monuments to various saints and place of the Pope, all circled around and a
place where about 4.2 million people visit every year. Jerusalem is next on the
list, as this is an important place for the Jews, Christians and the Muslims.
The birth place of Jesus Christ, the city of Bethlehem is next popular
pilgrimage place on the list where about 1.4 million people visit this city and
its surrounding historical sites. Machu Picchu a mountain top in Italy is
the next site that people visit more frequently. Machu Piccchu is an Incan
pilgrimage site and a large number of people come to spend time in this
picturesque mountain top. Next on the pilgrimage site is Rumi's tomb in Konya,
Turkey. About 2 million people visit this site which is the place of the tomb
of Mevlana Jelaluddin Rumi. The Bodi tree is the another famous pilgrimage site
where about 1 million people visit this site, the place where Buddha meditated
for 49 days before he attained enlightenment. The next and the last important
site is Stonehenge in southern England, a site that consists of mysterious
circle of upright stones. Thus people of all religion or of no religious belief
undertake a journey of pilgrimage, but the question that one needs to ask is
how does this visit whether a pilgrimage which could be just casual or holiday
have an impact on our Christian life. Does these visit bring about change
and transformation or is these visit more of a holiday or is it just blind
following of certain religious traditions of faith.
Any journey that an individual undertakes in relations to getting to know the
roots of one's faith should help us to have new perspective about our faith
living and only then can we consider these types of journey faith-fully
significant. Even Jesus undertook a journey of pilgrimage. This journey
is found in Luke 2: 41-52 and this is the portion that we shall meditate today
in our devotional journey "Transformed Living". One of the hallmarks
of this passage is that Jesus is going to temple along with his parents in his
young age to celebrate the festival of Passover. There are lots of requirements
that each Jewish family has to do when they undertake this annual pilgrimage to
the temple of Jerusalem and I believe both Joseph and Mary might have
communicated to Jesus the various requirement of the Mosaic laws. One of the
most unique aspect of the journey of Jesus to the temple was that He uses this
journey of pilgrimage to engage in dialogue with teachers of the law and we
find in Lk 2: 46, that he was sitting among the teachers of the law, listening
to them and asking them questions. Here is Jesus Christ unmindful of things
happening around and discussing seriously his faith issues with teachers of the
law. We need to remember that at this time, his parents had already left the
temple and had started their return journey. Jesus it seems was so engrossed in
his discussion with the teachers of the law that he seems to have forgotten
that he was supposed to be in the close company of his parents. That is why
when Mary returns in search of the missing Jesus, and finds him discussing with
the teachers of the law, she is upset and she ask Jesus as to why He did this
to them, as to why He treated them like this, because they were so worried
about him. That is when Jesus gives the most astounding reply "Don't you
know that I should be in my Father's house"?. Jesus with this reply tells
his mother that his pilgrimage is all about helping him with his vision and
ministry that He has to do in his Father's vineyard. The annual journey to
Jerusalem bring in the life of Jesus, a vision for his future ministry and thus
He is able to prepare himself to work in the ministry that God the Father had
prepared for Him. Until and unless we are renewed in life and has a new vision
for our ministry, all journey whether to the church or to the religious
places has no significance. Let us pray that God will always equip us with his
vision whenever we undertake a faith journey.
Rev. Dr. Joe Joseph Kuruvilla