Fr. Giovann Tabone MSSP
There’s something quietly humbling about watching a group of educators walk a road like this together. People who are used to leading, explaining, holding space for others… suddenly find themselves simply walking, breathing, and trying to keep up with the next hill.
Over these days on the Camino Inglés, it didn’t take long for the usual roles to fall away. Titles don’t help much when the incline keeps rising and your legs have already decided they’ve had enough. What surfaced instead was something more honest. Tired faces, yes. Blisters, definitely. But also a kind of perseverance that doesn’t come from strength alone, but from something deeper that refuses to give up.
Three days in, it was already clear that this journey was asking more than expected. Not just physically, but inwardly. The Camino has this irritating habit of stripping things down. No distractions, no hiding. Just the rhythm of steps and the quiet confrontation with yourself. And yet, in that simplicity, something begins to shift. You realise you don’t need to have all the strength for the whole journey. You just need enough for the next step.
Walking together as a staff from St Paul’s Missionary College gave this experience another layer. It wasn’t just a personal journey. It became shared. Encouragement was passed along without much noise. A glance, a slower pace, someone waiting at the top of a hill. The kind of solidarity that isn’t organised but emerges naturally when people choose not to leave each other behind.
And now, as the sun sets on this final day, there’s a different kind of awareness settling in. That strange mix of completion and beginning. The Camino ends, yes. But it doesn’t really finish. Because what it reveals doesn’t stay here. It comes back with you.
There is something deeply true in that image of the lighthouse. Not everything becomes clear all at once. Sometimes the light is just enough to take the next step, to orient yourself when things feel uncertain. And perhaps that’s enough. More than enough.
We came here thinking we were walking to a place. And in a way, we were. But somewhere along the road, it became clear that “home” is not just a destination waiting at the end. It is something that quietly grows within, especially in the moments when we let go, when we stop trying to control everything, and allow ourselves to be guided.
To XiriCamini, thank you. Not just for organising an experience, but for creating the conditions where something meaningful could actually happen. This wasn’t just well planned. It was well held.
And to each person who walked this together, thank you. Not for doing it perfectly, because no one did, but for doing it wholeheartedly. That’s what made it real. That’s what made it matter.
