Embracing Tradition: The Spiritual Significance of Pilgrimage in Catholic Practice

One of the oldest and noblest Catholic practices we have is to emulate the Holy Family in their annual trip from Nazareth to Jerusalem to worship at the Temple. This walk of 138kms (each way) has inspired people the world over to follow in the footsteps of the Holy family in order to emulate their holiness. Any pilgrimage is a spiritual journey that has a physical element added to it, wherein one goes beyond the realm of daily comfort to achieve a goal; worship, honour, praise, thanksgiving, penance etc.

In Christian Europe from the early ages of the Church, people would try to make pilgrimages to the places made holy by Our Lord, or any of the great saints. In doing so, they would give great example to others by humbling themselves through physical exertions, mortifications and penances. No two pilgrimages are the same and each pilgrimage has a multitude of faces to be discovered.

This first pilgrimage in the North of New Zealand hopes to walk in the footsteps of our first Catholic Bishop, Jean Baptiste Pompallier, as he walked around the area of his first apostolate, the area between the Bay of Islands and the Hokianga harbour. It is a way for us to keep alive his efforts and sacrifices, to make our acts of love to God and to grow our faith.