Hospitality at Gite Beilari

In this episode of These Holy Bones, I speak with Joseph, the owner of the albergue Beilari. He talks in his gentle manner about how he came to purchase the albergue and what hospitality means to him. 

Transcript

Vol 1 Episode 2 Beilari - 6:30:24, 4.50 PM

[00:00:00] Hello, and welcome to another episode of These Holy Bones, a podcast about the ancient pilgrimage to the Cathedral of Santiago, where the bones of St. James are interred beneath the high altar. I'm your host, Robert Nerny, and today I'm talking to Joseph, a hospitalero at an albergue

It's called Bilare. Joseph, welcome. Joseph, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you ended up here at Bilare? Hello, good morning. Yes, of course. Some years ago, I walked a little bit because I'm I'm living here, so I was touched by, by this pilgrimage, and I wanted to experience, but I just, just did some, some days, like four or five days walking.

That was the, the year of, uh, that [00:01:00] year that my father passed away, 2009. And just, uh, yeah, it was a really good experience, but very short. After that, there were, in the past, a lot of things, but, well, I can't explain everything, but, uh, it was a, uh, really big synchronicity. And, uh, at the time, uh, Some friends were here, Dutch people, a couple of Dutch people, and we were friends and, uh, in a moment they decided to, to leave from this hostel.

And just in the same time, I received like a vision to, to be a hospitalero. It was like, what? I said yes, so, yes, I don't, my past life was not completely in, in this, I was doing completely another [00:02:00] thing. But, uh, that happened and, and I said yes. At the same time, my, uh, our, uh, Our friends were selling this, this, so we took over and that was our start.

Excellent. That sounds great. So last night we spent, um, a beautiful evening, um, we had dinner and we introduced ourselves and we spoke a little bit about our journey, our, or our journeys and, um, so the, I really felt your hospitality and I, it's very important for me to, uh, encounter that. So how would you explain the importance of hospitality?

And, uh, in your expression of it, that's a very good question for me is what I try to practice in my everyday life. Uh, it's complicated and not same is very simple. It's just, [00:03:00] uh, open to the humanity. And, um, Before I started doing that, the word I was receiving in my, myself was welcome. Welcome. So, welcome.

And, uh, but I didn't, I didn't, uh, realize that that was too pernicious. Because, and at the same time I was living here since before I started here. I was living with my family. And when I had this vision, I, I, I understand, I understood that was welcome pilgrims. The hospitality is, uh, comes from a, uh, um, also from a sensation that we are welcomed by something that is bigger than us.

And just is a transmission of [00:04:00] that, yes. I, I, uh, Give what I receive. I receive this being welcomed by and supported by something that is bigger than us and try to give that to pilgrims that are coming to my home. Awesome. Well, I felt it last night. I felt deeply, um, welcomed and I appreciate that. Um, what about pilgrimage?

I know that I've been on this pilgrimage a number of times. That um, many people are here to walk because of their physicality or because of culture or history But i'm here on pilgrimage. How would you define pilgrimage? How do you? um Yeah, how would you define it? And is it really? Something that's worthwhile to do Yes, um, well i'm not very good at defining things [00:05:00] Sure Yes.

And it's, it's not easy because, uh, pure greenage means, uh, a different thing for each one of persons. That's, that's, uh, the reason. And so each building I try to understand, uh, what that means for each person that comes here. And I realized that. . I can't judge any, uh, any reason. I can't, I can't judge. It's, that is very, very personal.

Sometimes we have this temptation to say, oh, this is a real pure green. That's not a, and it's completely, um, because this is, this thought is . It's, uh, breaking the idea of pillage. The p is, is burning. Burning, uh, birthing, birthing. [00:06:00] in each one. And sometimes, that starts with a very, uh, superficial, uh, reason.

Like, doing sport, or seeing landscapes, or, but it's good. And sometimes, what happens is that, working, working, working, going forward, this reason transforms, and arrives to be something more profound, more deep, and comes to, uh, more close to who we are, who we are deeply. So, uh, for me it's this, this path, this path, but inside that goes changing and goes closer and closer to what is sacred and divine in ourselves.

Alright, that's awesome. Alright, Joseph, thank you so much for your time. [00:07:00] This is a wonderful place, and it's because of people like you. So I appreciate it. Alright, one for you though. I won't tell anything to the USA.