From Worcester to Peterborough on a pilgrimage neither guided nor self-guided
This August, a group of pilgrims set out from Worcester on a two-week-long trek. The average daily group size was 37, most walking all the way. Over 50 pilgrims took part in total. This was the 2024 walk of the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton Ecumenical Walking Pilgrimage.
Since 1975 we have organised an annual pilgrimage somewhere in England and Wales. Some years our destination is a cathedral celebrating a particular anniversary and some years our route is just wherever inspires us. This year we decided to link three cathedral cities that we had never visited before: Worcester, Coventry and Peterborough.
We sleep on the floors of village halls, church halls or churches. We have a van that carries our luggage, a support car that gives us refreshments along the way, and a catering team who go on ahead and prepare our evening meal, but the really distinctive thing about our pilgrimage is how we walk. Each day has a leader or leaders who have planned and recce'd their route in advance. The leaders put up orange cardboard marker arrows, the pilgrims follow the arrows at their own pace, and back-markers take down the arrows which are then reused. This makes our pilgrimage a compromise between "guided" and "self-guided". Pilgrims can and do spend some of the day walking in a small group and some of the day walking on their own, and this year pilgrims who were walking with us for the first time said how much they appreciated this. We averaged 15 miles a day.
I found that the mood was relaxed and convivial. It was good to see pilgrims old and new mucking in and enjoying the pilgrimage spirit. The route was gentle and perhaps surprisingly rural. We found ways in and out of city and town centres that involved little urban walking. We followed canals, rivers and various long distance walking routes across the countryside, stopping for prayer in the churches that we passed and finding rest and sustenance in pubs. Once a day we held or attended a longer act of worship in various forms, facilitated by having a Catholic chaplain with us all the way and an Anglican chaplain some of the way. A personal highlight was the visits to the new Coventry Cathedral and the adjacent ruins of the old cathedral. Our group was privileged to be allowed to explore both Coventry and Peterborough cathedrals at times when they would normally by closed, in order to fit in with our schedule. As we went along we made a record of our daily adventures in our web diary www.thepilgrims.org.uk/2024 Some of the pictures are included here.
Planning for our 2025 pilgrimage is under way. As well as being the Holy Year with its theme "Pilgrims of Hope", 2025 is the 50th anniversary of our first pilgrimage so our route will be within our home diocese of Arundel and Brighton. Details and booking forms will be available early in the new year.
John Chenery
