Overleaf you find our itinerary interspersed with the relevant bible references and comments kindly provided by David Cook. I hope these will help you share our trip and provide background to David’s talks over the coming weeks. Further pictures of this and the previous pilgrimages and links can be found on my website: www.newbury.net/robert.willis.

In the years Before Christ (BC) the prophets foretold the coming of the Messiah in a world of wars and idol worship. In the years after Christ (AD) and his teaching, death and resurrection, it was, and still is, a world of wars and disbelief, but with the addition of division in the church. All these centuries later, I pray I may be forgiven for my occasional sense of despair. Just how many today are heeding the Golden Commandants of loving God and neighbour?

Turkey is a no nonsense secular country. Although there are mosques and churches they are akin to clubs, or else they are relegated to the status of museums and tourist attractions. The Holy Land is an unhappy mixture of the secular and different faiths where Christ is either embedded in the Trinity of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, accredited as a prophet or ignored.

I found in Greece a feeling of Christ amongst us where the Golden Commandants govern lives in a very human, even naïve, way. Given the roots in ancient mythology and philosophy, conversion to Christianity by St Paul, old and recent wars, invasions and occupations, I suppose I should not have found this the surprise I did.

This sense of well being started on Day 2, whilst visiting St Sophia in Thessaloniki and comparing its ambience with that of St Sophia in Istanbul – the difference between a living church and a dead museum.

Throughout the trip I found myself making other comparisons. Greece is in the Common Market: Britain is in the Common Market; Greece is in Europe: Britain is in Europe; and both are separated from the “mainland” European Union dream by sea. This is something else I had to get my head around. At a boringly practical level I found myself doing my currency conversions via the Euro price so conveniently printed alongside the Drachma price on menus, etc—so much easier than accounting for all those noughts.

With a bit of lateral thinking, this led me to pondering the parallelism of comparing monetary transactions with Golden Commandments transactions, if I can put it like that. The former helps us feed the body: knowing what a beer and a toasted sandwich costs in familiar money. The latter helps us feed the mind bringing us closer to the Creator of all and to all that has been, for better or worse, created.

I had seen amphitheatres, archaeological excavations, remains of pagan temples and so on during the other pilgrimages, and I must admit that they are not a big turn-on. One pile of old stones looks very similar to another, as they say. And that is where a good guide comes in. So often in life, we look but don’t see. Our guide Johanna was excellent. It was not just that she knew her stuff. It was the way that communicating it was a two-way experience.

Maybe it was the heat, the aching feet or the Ouzo the night before, but Jo’s deliberations gave me a real feel for how Paul may have delivered the good news to the Greeks. Jo was speaking in English, her second language, to an assembly that contained a number of specialists. (David Cook’s knowledge base seems inexhaustible, and, together with Ian Park, Patrick Cogswell and others, stretched Jo’s extensive training at Tour Guide School to the limit!) Those like me, could only stand back and listen in amazement as they deciphered and interpreted the ancient Greek lettering and sculpture for our benefit, for example, the pattern of Greek E’s used to symbolise eternal life, and the stance of the statues with one foot in front of the other to express moving forward.

In his book “St. Paul in Greece”, Otto Meinardus paints many word pictures of Paul addressing and debating with the learned and learning thinkers of the time. The dialogue in the group was, I suspect, not that dissimilar.

On most evenings the group met for worship, bible reading, study, prayer and discussion. Although we were remote from news, the developing situation in Afghanistan and the Anthrax threats were never far from our thoughts. (At some hotels there was BBC World and CNN in English on the TV; otherwise, it was a matter of seeing the pictures with unreadable sub-titles and commentary in a foreign language.) The nearest we came to any sort of danger was the large cruise ship “hidden” in one of the harbours. It had been scheduled to cruise the coast of Turkey with a party of Americans.

So, safely back home, what now? How can we put what we have learnt about St Paul to use? Paul preached the resurrection of Jesus Christ and converted Jews and Gentiles to Christianity. Interestingly he did this only in the places that the Holy Spirit directed him. (Acts informs us that three distinct facts led to Paul’s mission in Europe: the Holy Spirit prevented him from declaring the message of Christ in Asia; that the Spirit of Jesus prevented him from entering Bithynia; and a vision directed Paul to Macedonia, i.e. the Greek mainland and not to be confused with the present day Republic of Macedonia.)

Where is the Holy Spirit now directing us? It seems to me that the Spirit has set us less of a challenge than he did Paul. We don’t need to travel vast distances or suffer much discomfort or the threat of physical imprisonment. There is plenty to be done here in West Berkshire. From the heart can we say that we are unceasingly obeying the Golden Commandments, loving God and neighbour, and preaching the Good News by example, in all we think, speak or say? Having been on the Pilgrimage I feel that I could do better.