Parishioners of St. Thomas à Becket Church in Reston
know that it’s precisely 5,925 miles from their church to the
holy city of Jerusalem, and they are using this fact to
perform a unique Lenten devotion. “Walk to Jerusalem” is a
program that helps parish members grow healthy, both
spiritually and physically.
The program was developed by the St. John Health system, a
southeast Michigan health care provider, as part of their
parish nursing program. It was designed as a 12-week virtual
trip to the Holy Land that starts in January and ends at
Easter. Participants log miles weekly to bring the parish
closer to Jerusalem, and to achieving its goal of physical
and spiritual well being.
Long time parishioner and registered nurse Susan Infeld heard
about “Walk to Jerusalem” last year when she took a parish
nursing course at Shenandoah University. She saw the
potential for her parish and brought the concept to Father
Tom Ferguson, pastor, hoping he would see a benefit for his
flock. He did and Infeld purchased the rights to copy the
various materials from the St. John Health CD and adopted it
to fit the parish.
She started the parish on its journey in early February with
plans to arrive at Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. More than 100
teams, many sporting whimsical names like “The Praying
Mantises'” and “Heaven Eleven” signed a “Walk to Jerusalem”
scroll as a testament to their commitment to the journey.
Interested parishioners logon to the parish Web site –
stthomasabecketparish.org – to register, and then come back
weekly to enter their mileage. Participants need to perform
20 minutes of exercise to generate a mile of progress. These
20 minutes of exercise can be anything from walking, running
and aerobics to a pickup basketball game or even carrying
golf clubs in a round of golf. It just has to be something
that raises the heartbeat – and the spirit.
For those not able to participate because of a physical
limitation there are ways to earn that all important mile by
performing a good deed or praying the rosary. Each good deed
or rosary puts the parish a mile closer to the Holy City. All
the individual mileage adds up to push the parish toward
Jerusalem and parishioners can chart their progress by
checking out a world map on the church Web site or in the
church lobby.
To keep up interest in the program Infeld set up a table in
the lobby that displays various artifacts of the locale the
parish is traveling through. In the first week of the
journey, the table displayed mostly health and fitness
related items, but as the pilgrimage moved on the display
became more in tune with the surroundings. With the parish
moving into the Middle East, the table now contains books on
the region, Christian religious texts as well as Jewish and
Muslim prayer cloths and other ethnic artifacts.
The weekly parish bulletin has a “Walk to Jerusalem” section
that posts fictional letters to the mysterious “Miriam,”
which is the pseudonym for Susan Infeld, the writer and
recipient of the notes. In the March 2 bulletin, there was a
message from “Rick” who welcomed the parish pilgrims to his
home in Morocco. Rick goes on to describe the various foods
the parishioners enjoy and signs off with Humphrey Bogart’s
line from Casablanca, “Here’s looking at you kid.”
The March 9 letter was more ominous, citing growing tension
and violence in the Middle East and comparing that to
Christ’s suffering as His mission on earth approached
fruition.
Although Infeld spent many hours setting up and managing the
program she said that much of the credit for its success lies
with Father Ferguson.
“The success of any program is tied to the support and
enthusiasm of the pastor,” she said. “Father Tom has been
extraordinarily generous in both.”
As of March 9, the parish had logged 4,910 miles, leaving
them 1,015 miles to go until their journey’s end. Infeld was
confident of success and said she believed that Father
Ferguson, “Rick,” “Miriam” and the entire parish will process
triumphantly into the City of God on Palm Sunday.
