A 500-mile journey: Leah Stolte-Doerfler will hike the Camino de Santiago

By Kristine Thomas

Leah Stolte-Doerfler has made many preparations before she steps into another world to do something utterly different than her “normal.”

She has read books, walked countless miles and prayed. She has given a great deal of thought about letting go of her responsibilities. She has gathered what she needs to fit into a small backpack.

“On one hand it is profoundly exciting,” she said. “And on the other, it causes anxiety.”

The pastor of Immanuel Lutheran Church in Silverton, Leah will spend from mid-August to mid-November on sabbatical. For 40 days as she hikes the 500-mile trail of the Camino de Santiago in Spain, she said, she will be pondering who she is apart from her “to-do list.”

“When I make this journey, I will not be Pastor Leah. I will be just Leah,” she said.

She begins her journey in St.-Jean-Pied-de-Port in France and will hike to the shrine of the Apostle St. James the Great in the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia in northwestern Spain, where tradition has it that the remains of the saint are buried. For more than a thousand years, pilgrims have made the journey, each for their own reasons.

As part of the agreement when she became the pastor of Immanuel Lutheran Church, Leah knew she would be taking a sabbatical in her seventh year – “a time to bring new energy and new vitality to this call.”

“As a pastor, it is my job to set as an example,” she said. “A sabbatical reminds us that we are not God. We need to rest and we need to recharge. There really is an arrogance we have that if we stop what we are doing the world can’t survive without us.”

Devoted to her congregation and her profession, Leah said her sabbatical is about being open and it’s about listening. “It’s about 500 miles to hang out with God in a very intentional way.”

A huge part of pastoral ministry is producing and maintaining a tight schedule, she said, adding the idea of walking the trail is to be unscheduled and unproductive.

To complete the journey in 40 days, she said, she would need to average 12.5 miles a day. Part of the challenge for her is not to push herself.

“My goal for this is to walk until I am tired,” she said. “If I see I cool town, I may spend any entire day there. I will have the freedom to just do what I want. I don’t have a place I have to be or a to-do list.”

“The folks who know me know this is going to be a different journey than my normal,” Leah said. “They know I am used to being where I say I will be and getting things done.”

In her day-to-day life, there is a long list of things that occupy her hours and her mind. She has weekly sermons to write – something she compares to a term paper. She plans worship services, funerals, weddings and more.

“I have been producing week after week,” she said. “I keep calendars and schedules.” As a pastor, she said, there is time for scripture, prayer and worship.

“But that is all goal driven, about meeting a deadline and getting something accomplished,” she said. “Walking the Camino is about time with God that isn’t goal driven. It’s about being.”

She doesn’t have reservations for places to stay or towns to be in on a certain day. On her blog called Sabbatical Babble, she shares what little she is taking with her, including her backpack that can only be 10 percent of her weight. Laughing, she said, her blog is what she calls it “babble.”

“Usually when I write, there is a beginning, a middle and an end and a point to make,” she said. “My blog will be babble. It’s not going to be coherent thoughts. I don’t want it to be about producing.”

She is writing it on her phone.

In her blog, she wrote about learning how a professor from George Fox University will start the Camino a few days before her. They have compared packing lists, places to go and what they are looking forward to.

Leah asked the professor if there was anything she was afraid of along the journey. “I loved her response which sounded something like this,” Leah wrote. “The Camino de Santiago has been traveled by pilgrims for over a thousand years ~ folks who were pursuing miracles, healings, awakenings…a millennium of faithful have coated those pathways with prayer…what better place could there be to walk?”

“As I leave this amazing corner of the world, with a community praying for me, I will step into another corner of the world, to add more prayer to those ancient pathways. What a privilege it will be to wander, to meander along those trails,” she wrote.

There are four pieces to her sabbatical, she said, a time to reflect, respond, rejuvenate and reintegrate. She leaves Aug. 18, with her daughters Katie, Sarah and Emily to travel in Ireland. Then she will go to Iona, a small island off the west coast of Scotland and considered to be one of the most holy places in the world. She begins her hike on Sept. 1. She returns to Silverton Nov. 12. At Immanuel Lutheran, there is a bulletin board with a map of the trail and a picture of Leah. As she travels along the trail, her picture will show where she is.

As she begins her journey, she knows she won’t be truly alone. She will have the prayers and thoughts of her friends, family and congregation along the entire path. She’s grateful for Debbie Eder, her training partner and friend. “The woman has been amazing,” she said. “She has made every part of this journey with me until I get on that plane. She is so gracious.”

Like an older sister, Debbie has asked Leah if she remembered this or that and told her about places she should avoid. She has read the same books and walked many miles with Leah, including hiking in the Wallowa Mountains in northeastern Oregon. Debbie knows Leah will complete her journey.

“It doesn’t mean she will do it without pain or suffering,” Debbie said, adding she will worry everyday about Leah.

“I will pray everyday day and I will put my faith in God, faith that she will get what she needs along the way. Whether it is needle and thread, a prayer or a blister specialist. I think this journey for her is definitely a leap of faith. Faith and trust in God that all will be well.”

What Leah looks forward to in her journey is time to spend with being with God. It’s about clearing away all the distractions in her life so she can truly hear and see him.

“I am of the theology that God shows up all the time but we are so busy with our lives that we miss him. We are living in a culture that is so scientific that we often explain him away,” she said. “This journey is about letting go and letting God. It’s a time to just be with God. A time to listen and to learn and let him guide me.”