Seuil

[Bradypus]

I just came across a story on a local Navarra news website. 16 year old pilgrim who managed to lose contact with his adult companion but they were fairly quickly reunited after some phone calls by local police and officials. Hardly headline news you might well agree.

But some of the details intrigued me and I looked up the organisation behind the journey. On their website they describe their purpose this way: "The project of Seuil is to bring young people in difficulty, in social breakdown, often immersed in despair, to become the actors of their own reintegration by an individual walk,
about 3 months, 1600 km, abroad, without a phone or music in my ears." (Google Translate). A three month journey one-to-one with a mentor? That must be a pretty intense experience. A similar project was run by a Belgian group in the past though I believe it is no longer active in that way. In a week when there is a great deal of publicity for a new book about a Hollywood actor's Camino journey with his son I found this little fragment of news fascinating.

El peregrino menor de edad que perdió al grupo en Villava

No hablaba inglés ni español. Tampoco sabía el teléfono de su monitoria. Y se había perdido. La Policía Municipal de Villava, con la ayuda de una administrativa, auxilió ayer a un menor francés

www.diariodenavarra.es

L'association | Seuil

www.assoseuil.org

 

[SabsP]

I just came across a story on a local Navarra news website. 16 year old pilgrim who managed to lose contact with his adult companion but they were fairly quickly reunited after some phone calls by local police and officials. Hardly headline news you might well agree.

But some of the details intrigued me and I looked up the organisation behind the journey. On their website they describe their purpose this way: "The project of Seuil is to bring young people in difficulty, in social breakdown, often immersed in despair, to become the actors of their own reintegration by an individual walk,
about 3 months, 1600 km, abroad, without a phone or music in my ears." (Google Translate). A three month journey one-to-one with a mentor? That must be a pretty intense experience. A similar project was run by a Belgian group in the past though I believe it is no longer active in that way. In a week when there is a great deal of publicity for a new book about a Hollywood actor's Camino journey with his son I found this little fragment of news fascinating.

El peregrino menor de edad que perdió al grupo en Villava

No hablaba inglés ni español. Tampoco sabía el teléfono de su monitoria. Y se había perdido. La Policía Municipal de Villava, con la ayuda de una administrativa, auxilió ayer a un menor francés

www.diariodenavarra.es

L'association | Seuil

www.assoseuil.org

Indeed this French initiative is just wonderful!

Seuil

L'association SEUIL s’adresse aux jeunes en difficultés en leur proposant des marches individuelles de longue durée pour favoriser leur réinsertion dans la société.

www.assoseuil.org

In Belgium we had Oikoten who did the same but have merged with other organisations.

 

[J Willhaus]

We had an interesting night with a youth and his mentor from Italy while serving in Zamora. The boy was "sentenced " to walk by the court.

 

[mspath]

For more information re such rehabilitative programs during the past on the camino see these earlier Forum threads.
https://www.caminodesantiago.me/community/threads/juvenile-penitent-pilgrims.1043/

https://www.caminodesantiago.me/community/threads/court-ordered-camino.42950/

February 2009 in Villadangos del Páramo at the frigid albergue the other pilgrims were a French ex-cop with a teenage fellow. The man had volunteered to walk with a delinquent youth to try and redirect him towards a better life style. They had been walking for 2 months from Seville following the Via de Plata north to Santiago and were now returning to St Jean Pied de Port by walking the CF 'in reverse'. All had been silently difficult until a long sleet storm nearing Santiago. They both agreed that their joint shared endurence walking through that sleet had changed their relationship. Now they could successfully talk about new possibilties. ...Ultreia.

 

[JerryStroebele]

In 2013 my wife, daughter and I were in the municipal albergue in Bilbao when in walked in two tall young Frenchmen. I assumed both were in their twenties but one acted immature. We invited them to share our dinner in the albergue. Along with a Romanian woman and an Australian man we more or less all waked together to Santiago and became a Camino family. In 2016 even more so when my daughter married the older Frenchman. After the Camino we learned that Julien was the mentor and Christof the 17 year old "juvenile delinquent", sentenced to walk the Camino for 3 months or go to jail for a year. Christof was the best man at the wedding and he and Julien keep in tough regularly. Christof is now married with two children.

The Seuil non profit project has a strict program for the youths: Walk for 3 months, which meant walk to Santiago and then back, or backwards on a different Camino. (On one Camino Julien and his youth walked from St. Jean to Santiago, then backwards on the Via de la Plata to Sevilla.) In those days, only 30 minutes was allowed each week in an internet cafe for the youth to call or email home or a girl or boyfriend. A very small daily budget for food and lodging. It was the youth who had to decide how to spend it, both suffered from poor choices. No alcohol was allowed either the youth or the mentor. At any time the youth could quit -- and go straight to jail. If that happened, the mentor did not earn his pay for this trip.

Julien participated in the program for 6 Caminos. One youth bailed. How did this affect Julien? Well, I have the nicest son-in-law imaginable. In 2015 Julien and my daughter walked the Camino Portugues from Lisbon to Porto where they joined the rest of our family to walk to Santiago and Finisterre. This past March Julien, my wife and I walked the Camino Mozarabe. It helped a lot that Julien speaks fluent Spanish. The Camino provides. Buen Camino

 

[lovingkindness]

In years past, during the month of August one could find an exhibition about SEUIL set up within the Abbatiale at Conque, a village where pilgrims pause along la Voie du Puy, France. I came across the exhibition prior to the Covid pandemic. I don't know if the exhibition continues today. If anyone happens to be walking to Conque this summer perhaps they could let us know.

Here's a news clipping about the SEUIL exhibition as it was back in 2016:

https://www.ladepeche.fr/article/2016/08/14/2400660-exposition-a-l-abbaye.html 14/08/2016

"During the month of August, Seuil exhibits "Walking to get by" within the abbey. Eight large panels present the Seuil association under the vaults of the abbey church. Photos taken by the young walkers, videos will also be projected in an adjoining room. This educational project allows young people aged 14 to 18 who have been mistreated by life, victims of a tragic story or prisoners of a delinquent spiral, to get out of it. A great opportunity for young walkers from Seuil to talk about their experiences. Bernard Ollivier, founder of Seuil and writer: “Walking, as we conceive it, is an erasure of all this past of failures. We start from scratch.

Past relationships and infantilizing judgments are bracketed. The teenager is presented with an enormous challenge. He who missed everything will he exceed his requirement of the immediate result, start an adult relationship with the accompanying person, accept all the constraints related to walking, overcome the physical suffering of the 1st days, the moral suffering of separation? … Confinement is not the solution. The feeling of freedom offered by hiking, the happiness of surpassing oneself and above all the encounters it provides are the real path to resilience…”. For Brother Pierre-Adrien: “Our world really needs liberation.

Behind this theme, there are, of course, official prisons and the difficult question of the reintegration into our society of detained persons, but there are many other confinements: victims of hostage-taking, mental and internal prisons... Moreover, the stakes are high in the current situation where our country seems tempted by a policy of confinement and withdrawal.

The way in which a country knows how to take care of its young people in difficulty is undoubtedly indicative of its greatness and its future”. -Google translate

 

[davejsy]

In 2013 my wife, daughter and I were in the municipal albergue in Bilbao when in walked in two tall young Frenchmen. I assumed both were in their twenties but one acted immature. We invited them to share our dinner in the albergue. Along with a Romanian woman and an Australian man we more or less all waked together to Santiago and became a Camino family. In 2016 even more so when my daughter married the older Frenchman. After the Camino we learned that Julien was the mentor and Christof the 17 year old "juvenile delinquent", sentenced to walk the Camino for 3 months or go to jail for a year. Christof was the best man at the wedding and he and Julien keep in tough regularly. Christof is now married with two children.

The Seuil non profit project has a strict program for the youths: Walk for 3 months, which meant walk to Santiago and then back, or backwards on a different Camino. (On one Camino Julien and his youth walked from St. Jean to Santiago, then backwards on the Via de la Plata to Sevilla.) In those days, only 30 minutes was allowed each week in an internet cafe for the youth to call or email home or a girl or boyfriend. A very small daily budget for food and lodging. It was the youth who had to decide how to spend it, both suffered from poor choices. No alcohol was allowed either the youth or the mentor. At any time the youth could quit -- and go straight to jail. If that happened, the mentor did not earn his pay for this trip.

Julien participated in the program for 6 Caminos. One youth bailed. How did this affect Julien? Well, I have the nicest son-in-law imaginable. In 2015 Julien and my daughter walked the Camino Portugues from Lisbon to Porto where they joined the rest of our family to walk to Santiago and Finisterre. This past March Julien, my wife and I walked the Camino Mozarabe. It helped a lot that Julien speaks fluent Spanish. The Camino provides. Buen Camino

Wow this is so wonderful!

 

[Bradypus]

An article posted to the SJPDP pilgrim office Facebook page today. A young woman and her Seuil mentor walking a Camino together before the young woman's trial some time in the future. The final paragraph states: "The requests are exploding: 50 young people are walking this year, compared to 25 in 2023, and we have received 400 applications from accompanying persons in ten months," explains Yvon Rontard, the director of the association to Le Parisien."

Une Francilienne de 16 ans, bientôt jugée pour proxénétisme, en pèlerinage à Saint-Jacques de Compostelle

Un pèlerinage pour tourner la page. Une adolescente de 16 ans originaire des Yvelines s'est lancée sur les chemins de Saint-Jacques de Compostelle en attendant son procès pour proxénétisme.

www.bfmtv.com

 

[jsalt]

I walked parallel with a Seuil French social worker and a 16 year old girl about 8 years ago on the Norte. From Santiago they continued south onto the Via de la Plata. They stayed in donativos whenever they could as they had 10 euros each to spend each day. By the time we got to Santiago I had great admiration for the French woman and her perseverance, as her young charge was trouble, but in Santiago we really felt for the teenager too, as she was opening up and communicating; there was hope for her yet. An admirable organisation.