Making a pilgrimage is a great form of prayer, discernment, and personal growth. For those not sure of what a pilgrimage actually is, Wikipedia puts it this way:
In religion and spirituality, a pilgrimage is a long journey or search of great moral significance. Sometimes, it is a journey to a sacred place or shrine of importance to a person’s beliefs and faith. Members of every major religion participate in pilgrimages. A person who makes such a journey is called a pilgrim.
There are all sorts of ways that we make pilgrimages. It may be traveling to Europe to follow one of the ancient pilgrimage routes. It may be cycling across the midwest. It may be getting on the bus and traveling across town to the cemetary where a loved one is buried. “Smaller” pilgrimages are not necessarily less significant. We all have our own reasons for a pilgrimage, reasons which may seem absurd to others. Often pilgrims journey together, each for their own reasons or for a common one. I know in my life I have made several deliberate pilgrimages. One was my journey to Monroe for the first time to visit the IHM Motherhouse. Another was a trip to the desert and the mountains for retreat, prayer and discernment.
Zenit.org recently published an article on the modern pilgrim: “Planes replace trains for modern pilgrims“. The article ends with a good quote by Cardinal Ruini: “The ways of doing pilgrimage change often, but its deep soul remains substantially the same when one is speaking of pilgrimage and not just of tourism. The search in this kind of travel and prayer leads to a more profound contact with God.”
What kinds of pilgrimages have you made in your life?
Archived Comments
- August 31, 2007 at 7:03 pm
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The McGlone family was known for its “pilgrimages.” Living in the Denver area for at least a 1/3 of my life Mother Cabrini’s Shrine was a twice a year tradition. In the Fall to get the waters to get us safely through the winter illnesses and for the holy water font by the back door. In the Spring we went to walk the Stations of the Cross to the “Top of the Mountain.” Trips were planned around churches. And Holy Week was not complete until we had traveled from church to church in Denver spending time in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament. The more I think about it, the more pilgrimages in my life I remember…And then too, there is this one long Pilgrimage I have been called to make from birth. What a Grand Life…Thanks Be to GOD.
- September 1, 2007 at 3:32 am
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Walsingham, aka England’s Nazareth, the (Anglican) Shrine of Our Lady. It’s a fantastic place, and I’ve now been 4 times in the last 25 months. I’m not going again until May; I love it there but I want it to stay special. I’ve also been to Iona, and that was fantastic too. There are plans at church for a pilgrimage to Rome in about 12 months time, but I know I won’t be able to afford it, so I think I may miss this one
- September 1, 2007 at 7:17 am
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I’ve never been anywhere that I could say “I’m going on a pilgrimage”. I have visited shrines as a part of other sightseeing vacations, and been spiritually moved by those visits. Lindisfarne and Durham Cathedral rank up there for me. Is there a sense in which the Sunday drive to Church classifies as a pilgrimage? “going up to Jerusalem” anew?
- September 2, 2007 at 12:41 am
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I have a book–I think the title is Travel as Pilgrimage. I think I need to pull it out and read it through all the way. When I was a college student, we went on a “pilgrimage” to the Holy Land at Christmastime. For myself and most of my classmates it was interesting, but we were probably not spiritually very pilgrim-like. But some later trips were–somewhat surprisingly. We traveled to Siberia of all places–and not for spiritual reasons per se. But in traveling to Siberia, I found great faith. I traveled to India with a group to do service among poor children. They gave me much more than I gave them. From them I learned about great hope.
- September 3, 2007 at 2:12 pm
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In my view, a pilgrimage is a journey or trip or experience, usually physical but sometimes only spiritual, that contributes to our journey as pilgrims on this earth.
Throughout my life, I’ve made various pilgrimages to recognized holy grounds, usually one day trips. However, your question focused me on a particular family trip we made each from 1982-1990. During this period, each September my parents and we would drive a priest who had spent his summers in our home parish back to his ministry on the faculty of Pontifical College Josephinum in Worthington (Columbus), OH. A seemingly ordinary journey, this was indeed also a pilgrimage of renewal and faithbuilding. While I was somewhat aware of these dimensions as I experienced, I grew to recognize, understand, and appreciate them far more deeply as I grew into adulthood and those trips were no more.
Right now, as I prepare to co-present a workshop at a national conference later this week, I am preparing for what I believe will be a pilgrimage of its own kind as I prepare to travel to New Orleans, LA for the first time since Katrina/Rita showed themselves. While for many, the travel there will be primarily to conduct business, I am already aware that a spiritual awakening probably awaits.
- September 4, 2007 at 12:19 am
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There are two pilmigrages I shall do in life: Taizé (France) and Santiago de Compostela (Spain). They’re both calling…
- September 4, 2007 at 1:22 pm
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Br. Dominic-Michael – Yes, I think the journey to the Eucharistic celebration is a pilgrimage of sorts. What an interesting way to look at it! Sister J
