{"id":3535,"date":"2016-04-24T09:57:48","date_gmt":"2016-04-24T16:57:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/?p=3535"},"modified":"2016-04-24T12:44:36","modified_gmt":"2016-04-24T19:44:36","slug":"on-a-human-scale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/on-a-human-scale\/","title":{"rendered":"On a Human Scale"},"content":{"rendered":"

A<\/span>fter Rabanal, we crested the Cordillera Cant\u00e1brica at Cruz de Ferro. Traditionally, one leaves a stone at the foot of the cross there. This is the accompanying prayer: <\/p>\n

Lord, may this stone, a symbol of my efforts on the pilgrimage that I lay at the foot of the cross of the Savior, one day weigh the balance in favor of my good deed when the deeds of my life are judged. Amen. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Beyond the simple prayer and the stone, of course, everyone has something else to lay down there as well. Something we’ve been holding onto.<\/p>\n

Sin. Attachment to sin. Bad habits or attitudes. <\/p>\n

Or something else entirely: grief, emotional or mental baggage, memories of slights or offenses that you must let go.<\/p>\n

After this is a dangerous and harrowing descent down the mountainside. <\/p>\n

 \"\"<\/a> 
\nThis, we did over two days, bringing us finally into the beautiful valley of El Bierzo.<\/p>\n

There’s poetry in that, I think. <\/p>\n

 \"\"<\/a> 
\nAs we passed through many tiny villages over the past few days, I was struck by the very human scale in which they are constructed.<\/p>\n

The streets tend to be narrow, perhaps 20 or 30 feet wide, and tall, with the houses close in.<\/p>\n

The central plaza or main street holds a church, a bar\/caf\u00e9, perhaps a restaurant, a grocery, and a shop or two.<\/p>\n

Everything is within walking distance. Everything is on a human-sized scale.<\/p>\n

 \"\"<\/a> 
\nI can’t help thinking that this is the way humans are meant to live together in community.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After Rabanal, we crested the Cordillera Cant\u00e1brica at Cruz de Ferro. Traditionally, one leaves a stone at the foot of the cross there. This is the accompanying prayer:  Lord, may this stone, a symbol of my efforts on the pilgrimage that I lay at the foot of the cross of the Savior, one day weigh the balance in favor of my […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3534,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[11,8,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3535","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pilgrim-reports","category-ruminations","category-thom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3535","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3535"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3535\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3541,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3535\/revisions\/3541"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3534"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3535"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3535"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thomryng.com\/camino\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3535"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}