Thoughts? - people getting a compostela without walking the final 100k

Kathar1na said:

And what has all this got to do with people getting a Compostela in 2018? Next to nothing.

People may and may not have cheated in connection with pilgrimages throughout the ages but in 2018, we cheat or bend the rules, imagined or real, or interpret them freely, because we want a souvenir or a recognition of our efforts for ourselves, something to hang on a wall in our home or office, something to remember by or to brag about to friends and visitors to our homes.

We don't need a Compostela as a presumed get-out-of-jail card or to present it to our bishops or the local courts. Whether we bring a Compostela back home or not is not exactly of existential importance. BIG differences between now and then.

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nathanael said:

and what has your reply got to do with this ???

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nathanael said:

and what has your reply got to do with this ???

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Kathar1na said:

As to the not self-imposed penitential pilgrimages, one has to distinguish between those imposed by the church (mainly on clerics and nobles) and those imposed by courts/judges (relatively rare). The focus is often on Compostela in these forum discussions but here is a list that sheds a different light on it. Hamo de Hethe, bishop of Rochester (1319-1352), matched offense and pilgrimage as follows:

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Source: D. Webb, Pilgrims and Pilgrimage in the Medieval West

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