Michael Begg describes himself as a spiritual midwife to those who come on week-long pilgrimages to the sacred Celtic valley of Glendalough, a half-hour's drive south of Dublin.
The trim, whitewashed retreat house called Avelin that he and his wife, Andrea, operate accommodates just seven people, and a few times a year -- far fewer than the number of requests he gets -- Begg guides his little band of pilgrims to the surrounding "thin places" of Celtic spirituality.
Thin places are doorways between the everyday world and the world of the spirit. They touch what the soul points to. They are places made sacred and holy by the centuries of reiterated prayers of those who have come to them: The Holy Well of St. Bridget, the Celtic high crosses and pre-Celtic ancient stone circles, the sixth-century monastery of St. Kevin, the ruins of the monastery's Women's Church with its poignant graveyard of unbaptized babies.
Begg, 64, a Methodist minister and psychotherapist, carefully structures the week as an outer and inner journey. He uses each successive visit to a thin place to open, a little further, a door into the minds and hearts of those he guides. He blends in ancient Celtic observances, such as leading his pilgrims seven times around St. Kevin's Well, and celebrates Eucharist for them at the Women's Church. He leaves time at the end of each day for silent reflection. He makes himself available to those who want to speak privately to him.
The harried and the troubled and the searchers of the 21st century have made their way to Avelin. Buddhists, Hindus, atheists and nuns have come. People with hurts and losses. People who feel the dry, dusty taste of their lives in their mouths. People who, Begg says, no longer feel that the language of institutional religion expresses their faith or beliefs.
"The week is about their life's journey. Something usually has happened in their lives which has shaken the foundations a bit, and they're trying to find themselves. So they look up words on the Internet like 'retreat,' 'spirituality,' 'Celtic,' 'pilgrimage,' and they read the essay on my website, and then they call -- from Africa, from Australia, from America and Canada."
Pilgrimage is big in the 21st century. In an era when churches and temples are emptying in the West, the World Tourism Organization's statistics indicate an explosive increase over the past three decades in religious travel -- a significant portion of it originating from the West.
