A pilgrim sees the face of God, a future of hope

Chad Aubert is not one of those shout-it-from-the-rooftops kind of guys, although he would have pretty good reason in the last few weeks to do his best radio talk-show host impersonation.

At 22, he graduated last week from Loyola University New Orleans with a bachelor’s degree in religious studies, magna cum laude, with university honors. Aubert, a native of Baton Rouge who moved to New Orleans at 16 and graduated from Brother Martin High School, also received Loyola’s Ignatian Award from the university’s Office of Mission and Ministry as Outstanding Senior Man.

Since Aubert was in the honors program, he had to write an honors thesis, and it wasn’t something he threw together at the last second, fueled by a six-pack of Red Bull and Doritos at 4:30 a.m. on deadline day. His carefully measured topic was “God’s Neighbor and Environment: The History and Mystery of Christian Pilgrimage.”

When most Catholics think of going on a pilgrimage, their mind immediately leaps to the majestic wonders of the Sistine Chapel, the spiritual oasis of St. Francis’ Assisi or the bleached stone of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, worn smooth over the centuries by legions of faithful reaching for a God who is not dead.

When Aubert was asked if he had been on a pilgrimage, he paused briefly to consider the question.

“You mean, like to a shrine?” Aubert said.

Aubert said, no, he hadn’t visited the Vatican or the Holy Land. But just last summer, he and a dozen other young men and women walked from California to Washington, D.C., as part of a Crossroads tour to promote a pro-life message.

“That’s the closest thing I’ve done to a pilgrimage,” Aubert said.

The cross-country journey deeply affected him and also confirmed a desire he has held since his late teens that God might be calling him to religious life. The bruises and blisters he picked up crossing the Rocky Mountains and the Great Plains gave him plenty of time to contemplate the meaning of life, as well as the meaning of his own life.

“I didn’t think we would get as much support as we did,” Aubert said, recalling the people the group encountered on the roads, in small towns and at churches on their 2,500-mile trek. “I was very overwhelmed by that. There was definitely the feeling that a lot of the country we saw was on our
side of the debate.

“We were wearing pro-life T-shirts in huge, bold letters, so it was obvious what we were doing, and people wanted to give us money and support. We saw a few specific fingers along the way – we did get some negative responses – but the pain in my feet was much more painful than that.”

In a blog post during the walk, Aubert reflected on “walking the divine journey,” which very much sounds like a bonafide pilgrimage. He wrote about his mixed emotions and his physical exhaustion.

“One of the continuous thoughts I have while walking and bearing the pain in my feet is considering the saints like Francis of Assisi and Ignatius Loyola, who also traveled across great distances to live simply and spread the message of Christ,” Aubert wrote. “I also think of the Israelites constantly traveling through the desert. The call in Isaiah 55 to ‘come to the water’ must have sounded like winning the lottery. After walking along these highways, water and bread have never tasted so good.”

Aubert said although he didn’t lose any weight – “people kept making and bringing us food figuring we would walk it off, and we probably ate the most unhealthy things you could imagine” – his calves doubled in size. But the technicolor scenery – God’s playground – was awesome.

“You were out in the middle of nowhere where you’d see a car every couple of minutes, and there was a huge mountain and a lake in the background,” Aubert said. “It’s really beautiful to find these kinds of connections. God’s presence is in all these places. The ultimate purpose of a pilgrimage is that the physical journey is a manifestation of the spiritual journey. Whatever you’re doing in the physical sense, whatever place you’re going to, must mirror your relationship with God and your desire to get closer to God. Making a pilgrimage should help you in your journey to get closer to God.”

In August, Aubert will continue his journey. He will present himself at St. Joseph Abbey in St. Benedict to begin his discernment and formation, which one day may lead to him becoming a Benedictine monk.

“It’s just a matter of trying to discern God’s will in general,” he said. “It’s just a matter of being as close to God as possible.”

In Pittsburgh, close to the end of his walk, Aubert got about as close as he has ever been. After Mass, a little boy and his mother went to see the priest. The mother whispered something into her son’s ear, and the mother told the priest her son wanted to tell him what he wanted to be when he grew up.

“I want to be a priest,” the child said.

The priest told him, “When you grow up, we’re going to need plenty of priests to go visit the high schools.”

Then the priest got down on his knees, put both hands over the child’s head and said a blessing.

Another pilgrim, another journey.

Peter Finney Jr. can be reached at [email protected].