On any given Friday night, the streets of inner Sydney belong to the revellers, the nightclub queues, the neon and the noise. But in the early hours of Saturday 22 August, the city awoke to a different sound: the deep murmur of the rosary and the steady tread of more than 1,500 men walking through the dark behind a statue of St Joseph. This was the Camino of St Joseph – Sydney’s annual overnight pilgrimage of prayer that continues to grow every year.
By Darren Ally
This year the walk began at St Patrick’s Church Hill and made its way through the streets of the inner west, finishing at St Mary’s Cathedral.
Camino of St Joseph: A Record Night in Sydney
“We are back in the streets of Sydney, front and centre,” said pilgrimage co-ordinator Michael Jaksic of the Life Marriage and Family team within the Sydney Centre for Evangelisation. “Tonight, we have a record registration of 1,000 men, already.”
That night swelled to well over 1,500 — a 25 per cent increase of 300 men from last year.
From all over the country, men began gathering from 7pm where Catholic Sydney itself began, St Patrick’s Church Hill, the site that kept the Eucharist alive in this country in its earliest days, housing the Blessed Sacrament even when the colony had no priest.
Before the Walk: Confession and 9pm Mass
Before a single step was taken, the queues had already formed — not for coffee, but for confession.
“Just before we started walking, I heard confessions for about two and a half hours. Just to see men coming to God in faith and humility — what a gift for me to be a spiritual father,” said Fr Michael Last MGL, one of the priests assisting on the walk.
Then, at around 10.30pm, after 9pm Mass, the statue of St Joseph was lifted onto shoulders and the river of men flowed out into the city — priests and laymen, tradies and teachers, fathers and sons, grandfathers and teenagers — pausing at seven churches through the night for prayer and adoration before the 20-kilometre-plus journey ended at the cathedral after dawn.
The Camino of St Joseph Takes to the Streets
Every man, it seemed, carried his own intention.
“Tonight I’m going to be offering this up for all the sick people I know in my life,” said one pilgrim as the walk began.
“I’m walking as a bit of a sacrifice, trying to be the best version of myself,” said Ryan Elia, of the cathedral’s men’s group. “And I believe the way to achieve that is through Christ.”
For Ivan Szilagyi of St Mary MacKillop Parish, Oran Park, the intention was closer to home. “I’m walking for my family,” he said. “To show them who a real man is.”
Asked what St Joseph meant to him, his answer needed only seven words: “Masculinity. Fatherhood. The earthly protector of the Holy Family.”
Brotherhood, Fatherhood and the Message of St Joseph
That theme — fatherhood, and the state of it — ran through the night like a current.
“We’re at a time in history where there’s been a great wound in fatherhood and in masculinity, and St Joseph is the remedy to that wound,” said Jaksic. “He is the healing. He’s our spiritual father.”
“Men are craving brotherhood. They’re craving purpose,” he added. “More and more men wanting to be better fathers and better husbands and better men. And that’s why they’re here.”
For Lorenzo Saavedra of St Benedict’s Broadway, that longing found its answer somewhere in the small hours, surrounded by strangers who no longer felt like strangers.
“I felt like I was part of something bigger,” he said. “All these people here, they’ve got a purpose. They all want to grow in holiness. I just felt like something bigger, actually, like a church.”
The Camino of St Joseph Arrives at St Mary’s Cathedral
As the sun rose, the procession turned up College Street and the towers of St Mary’s Cathedral came into view — journey’s end, and for many the emotional summit of the night.
“Overwhelmed, actually,” said David Falcone of Holy Family Parish. “It’s a different experience when you get to St Mary’s Cathedral.”
For Kava Mo’unga of St Joachim’s, Lidcombe, who helped shoulder the statue on the final stretch, the arrival was “a grace-filled moment.”
“So many men processing in honour of St Joseph and to bring that grace to Sydney was beautiful,” he said.
Inside, weary pilgrims packed the pews for Mass. Not a spare seat was to be found as outside afterwards, the cathedral forecourt filled with the smell of a well-earned barbecue breakfast and the laughter of men comparing blisters.
“Hoping for Eucharist first and then after, bacon and eggs!” grinned Martin, of St Mary MacKillop Parish.
Sore feet notwithstanding, the verdict was unanimous. “Would most definitely invite a friend to next year,” said Jeremy of St John the Baptist, Bonnyrigg.
As the men dispersed back into an ordinary Saturday, Fr Ben Saliba, who accompanied the men through the whole walk, gave them a message for the road home.
“Be like St Joseph. Be protectors. Be providers. Be men of prayer. Be men that obey God. And if we can tick off all those boxes, the culture will be a better place.”
For one night, Sydney’s streets carried something different. By morning, 1,500 men were carrying it home.
The Camino of St Joseph is an initiative of Maximus Men’s Ministry within the Life Marriage and Family team in the Sydney Centre for Evangelisation.
This article was first published by Catholic Weekly and has been republished to EWTN Australia.
