Camino Photo of the Day: Magdelena Cloister

22 February 2023 Thom Liminal Space, Photo of the Day 2013, Ruminations

There’s just something about a cloister that invites contemplation – and photos. They are, after all, meant to evoke Eden. This is the cloister of the Monasterio de la Magdelena, now an albergue rather than a monastery. Spain’s government seized all Spanish churches and monasteries in the 19th century in their own version of what Henry VIII did in Britain. Many of these buildings were turned to secular uses and basically trashed.

Although they were actually returned and restored within a generation, for many places this break was enough to finish them as active monasteries. You will see many of them now being used as hotels, albergues, offices, and government buildings. This sort of thing always fills me with a certain kind of melancholy, perhaps appropriate to Ash Wednesday.