Peace Pilgrimage is encouraging groups to organise local peace pilgrimages across the country.
If you are looking at this page, you may well be thinking about organising your own local Peace Pilgrimage. Brilliant!
If so, here are a few important questions to reflect on:
Who do you feel drawn to organise and walk a local peace pilgrimage with and why?
This is a key starting point. You might want to walk a pilgrimage on your own, or as a small group of just two or three friends, or you might be thinking of walking as a particular group, like a church or meeting. You might want the pilgrimage to bring people together from different denominations (e.g. through Churches Together) or from different faith groups. You might want to invite people affected by conflict – refugees from Ukraine, Afghanistan or Syria, for example. You might be a group of activists campaigning against the arms trade.
There are no right or wrongs here, what matters is that you organise a pilgrimage that feels managable but also alive and interesting.
How do you envision your local peace pilgrimage?
The pilgrimage might be just an hour or so – or a whole day. It might be rural or urban, circular or from Point A to Point Z. Consider how you envisage it feeling, looking, sounding and smelling. Let your imagination run a bit wild and get a flavour of what it could be.
Follow the ideas that give you most energy – and use the unique experiences, gifts and passions of the planning group as a whole. This is the way to organise a truly inspiring local peace pilgrimage!
What do you want to do along the way?
Would it be important to visit ‘sacred sites’ (places of natural beauty, churches and other places of worship) and/or ‘sites of suffering’ (arms factories, detention centres, places of environmental destruction, etc)? Would you want to include rituals, symbols, songs, reflections on poems or passages, meditations and/or a chance to consider particular questions related to conflict and peace?
Again, there is no right or wrong, what matters is that you organise something that feels organic and alive for you and your group.
Once you’ve pondered these questions, you are well on the way to organising a brilliant local Peace Pilgrimage!
Some Helpful Resources:
- We have produced a document with some more in-depth ideas and resources for developing your local Peace Pilgrimage: Developing Your Local Peace Pilgrimage – Google Docs
- The British Pilgrimage Trust have also produced a helpful document with lots of advice for those planning their own pilgrimage: https://britishpilgrimage.org/how-to-create-your-own-pilgrimage-route/
Feel free to get in contact with us at peacepilgrimage2023@gmail.com if you have any questions, and remember:
There is no way to peace: peace is the way!
Peace Pilgrimage 