A pilgrim's progress

Pope Benedict visits Spain this coming weekend and will travel first to the pilgrimage city of Santiago de Compostela and then to Barcelona where he will preside over the consecration of the Holy Family cathedral. Tradition holds that the remains of the apostle St. James the Greater are buried in Santiago de Compostela and it has been an important pilgrimage destination since the Middle Ages.
The pope’s pilgrimage to the northern Spanish city coincides with the Santiago de Compostela Holy Year which occurs every time St. James’s feast day, July 25^th, falls on a Sunday. William Bossert is a British architect who has been on the pilgrimage walk to Santiago de Compostela several times. He spoke to Lydia O'Kane about why this pilgrimage is so special for him.

Bossert said the moment he started the pilgrimage he felt "an immense sense of freedom and happiness ... which I'd never experienced elsewhere." When he eventually arrived at his destination at the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, Bossert said it was "a fantastic feeling of exultation, a huge achievement.... a high point in my life which one can't ever forget." Asked how he felt about Pope's Benedict's visit to the Spanish city, Bossert said it was it was "wonderful and important ... for extending that tradition (of pilgrimage)..."