Salve Regina

Day 11: Saturday

Today’s prayer was dedicated to the Carmelite Sisters at Carmel Maria Regina in Eugene. The Sisters there have been praying for me and supporting me for many years. In fact, they started praying for my priestly vocation before I even knew I had one. I recall that someone asked them to pray for me and the possibility that God would call me to priestly service. As I’ve told the Sisters, some days in parish life I’m deeply grateful to them for those prayers . . . and some days, in the midst of trials and hardship, I blame them for what they’ve gotten me involved in! It was a great honor to devote myself to praying for the Sisters and I had the added delight to do so wearing one of my favorite t-shirts. It has an image of St. Therese of Lisieux, the Little Flower, and the words “Start Acting Like a Child.” She is well-known for many things, but her “Little Way” of appreciating God’s glory and grace in the little things in life has always been special to me. She is the patron Saint of missionaries and I suppose I qualify in some respects along the path of this Pilgrimage.

Passing through Newport today, I was reminded that the last 100 miles have been a passage from farms and forests to frapuccino and fast traffic. All of it has been joyful and a revelation, in every sense of that word. I don’t resent city life (I’m moving to Portland soon!), but there is obviously a faster pace within city limits and an accompanying risk of less attentiveness to fellow human beings. Seven times today in Newport, a city which has signs as you enter and leave that say “Friendliest”, I was completely ignored after offering what I thought was a rather cheery “good morning” to people. So I just said “good morning” twice, once for me and once for them.

Yaquina Bay (Newport)

Yaquina Bay Bridge

Near the end of today’s 11 mile journey, at South Beach State Park, I met up with my sister Paula and her husband David. Paula and I shared the final 3.6 miles of walking. We used to go jogging together when we were in college and we’ve shared many walks over the years. Thanks to GPS, I knew that I was already 7.4 miles down the road for the day and it was humbling to have fresh legs right beside me and a rather quicker pace than I’m used to at the end of a day. She’s a good sport and, whenever she was many paces out in front, she would stop and admire the wild irises or the rhododendrons or the bluebonnets . . . just long enough for me to catch up. We will be camping for several days at Tillicum State Park, just south of Waldport. When we finished walking, we drove ahead another 14 miles to the campsite. (We’ll drive back to our Saturday stopping point and make it Sunday’s beginning point.) There are no showers here and, when we asked at another Park where we could find showers, we were told that there are some at South Beach -- now 17 miles away!

Entryway to South Beach State Park

Campsite at Tillicum State Park

Rhododendrons

At Paula’s suggestion, we’ll take the beach route Sunday. Please pray for very firm sand.