Why Go on Pilgrimage?

May 12, 2023

Pilgrimage is not obligatory for any Christian.

That is the simple fact. As St. Gregory of Nyssa wrote in the year 379 AD, “When the Lord invites the blest to their inheritance in the kingdom of heaven, He does not include a pilgrimage to Jerusalem among their good deeds; when He announces the Beatitudes, He does not name among them that sort of devotion.”1 Nevertheless, pilgrimage is something that many humans seem compelled to undertake, regardless of their faith tradition. Some might just call it “vacation,” but a true pilgrimage is an undertaking of both a physical and a spiritual sort.

Part of the draw of Orthodoxy for me is the tradition of pilgrimage.

Until I became Orthodox, I never had a strong desire to go to the Holy Land or any of those hot dusty places where crowds of people shuffled along and bought olive wood ornaments. To my Protestant mind, it would have just been “tourism” Yet, Christian tourism is alive and well and I’ve heard many reports of trips to the Holy Land or Asia Minor or any number of places significant to Christian history, and folks come back in awe of the fact that they stood where Paul preached on Mars Hill or saw the place where Jesus raised Lazarus, or stood at the banks of the Sea of Galilee, and there has always been a part of me that would have liked to see those places, but travel is expenseive, and it wasn’t something I was burning to do. The term pilgrimage however is not something I remember hearing much or at all; because in my understanding of Protestant Christianity, one’s faith should be sufficient for salvation and Christians are not to depend on such things to draw closer to God. Certainly a Protestant would never pray before and venerate the tomb of Mary the Theotokos to ask for her intercessions, or at the tomb of Christ, or before the relics of a saint because of the sacredness of these sites. To them this would be anathema, maybe even idolatry. Of course those places hold historical significance but are those sites actually where those things happened? Even so, preachers will stand along the banks of the Jordan and preach sermons to his accompanying congregants, then baptize them in the Jordan (even if they’ve been baptized before.) It boils down to semantics because all of that is essentially what defines a pilgrimage, and people who come back from such trips always seem to have a notch in their belt that gives them a certain aspect of spiritual or intellectual authority, complete with wonderful stories about their experiences. For Protestant me, since the connection to Church tradition had been cut, the vivid sacredness of holy sites was denied, the confidence in authenticity of various sites was in question . . . why go? Even so, folks seem fascinated by archaeology and science and history and the possibilities of the questions that they raise in proving what Scripture says, however fragmented these areas of study may be.

Now that I am Orthodox, I am longing for pilgrimage.

Because of the emphasis on longstanding Church tradition, my trust is much greater that things are what the Church says they are and if the site of Christ’s burial, for example, has been preserved inside the Church of the Holy Sepulcher since the time of Constantine, I’m inclined to think that might actually be the spot! But it is more than this, and it goes back to posts that I’ve written recently about icons and relics—there is something that human souls who exist as part of human bodies need to experience by the physical movement from place to place, to see what the Saints have seen, to feel what they have felt, and to pray where they have prayed. These places have been made Holy because they have been sanctified by the presence of God on earth, and we ache to be there. Whether we are helped by the presence of the saints in heaven who are interceding for us, or we are able to pray more earnestly because we are actively seeking that connection with God, the pilgrimage serves to make us more desperate for the God to whom we long to be united through His Son.

St. Gregory of Nyssa, who was himself a traveler to the Holy Land, speaks against a zealous pursuit of pilgrimage for the purpose of drawing closer to God in On Pilgrimages. I agree with him, in that my faith would be neither less nor more for having made a pilgrimage. God does not count it as part of the things I must do to increase my holiness or rack up good deeds that will earn me salvation, and I think that may be his point in part. As Christians we should not be pursuing things that may puff up and inflate the ego with knowledge and experience or things that would set us with false authority over our brothers and sisters. On the contrary my faith is mostly increased by the humble dailiness of life, the pursuits and disciplines of prayer, and the sacraments. But I also believe that God does not despise the longings of the human heart to see and to know and have faith affirmed if and when it is possible through the practice of pilgrimage.

So if it does not add to the value of my faith, why pursue pilgrimage?

As of today I am 18 days and a wake up from embarking on my own first pilgrimage, led by Andrew Gould of Orthodox Arts Journal. It is not to the Holy Land, but that is on the wish list for the future. In true “Accidental Pilgrim” form, this opportunity came up quite unexpectedly; the timing didn’t seem quite right, and the time away from home is longer than I would normally spend. Even so, at the end of March my Godmother emailed me and asked if I would like to join her on a trip to the Balkans to visit Churches and monasteries of interest not only for their spiritual value, but also for their architectural and artistic value. The trip will examine the expression of the Ancient Faith at the intersection of East and West. Simultaneously, my husband will be on a pilgrimage of his own with several men from our parish (including an archpriest and a Metropolitan—i.e. Bishop) to visit the country of Georgia, where Orthodoxy is firmly planted and is a significant part of the national history and identity. It all seems like crazy timing, but we decided to pursue these trips for a variety of reasons, not the least of which are the people that will be companions on our journeys. In spite of St. Gregory and others’ advice to the contrary, the tradition of pilgrimage is long and its effectiveness in connecting Christian communities is to a great extent the engine driving my desire to be a pilgrim and participate in that longstanding practice.2

Here are my reasons for pursuing this particular pilgrimage and I expect my husband’s would be very similar concerning his, except the part about the baptism sponsor. His will not be traveling with him, but our spiritual father will be.

I am a brand-new Orthodox Christian. I know virtually nothing in comparison with my cradle Orthodox friends and family, or even those who have been converted for much longer. This is an opportunity to spend significant time away from media and distractions with people who are interested in expression of Orthodoxy from its very roots, and how we as American Orthodox Christians might integrate and live out the beauty of this faith. It is also my hope that I will make some new and lasting connections with other members of the greater Orthodox community outside of my home parish.
Because I am a recent convert to Orthodoxy, I want to learn all I can about this family I’ve “married into.” Eastern Orthodoxy starts at the very beginning—at Pentecost—and has remained through trials and tribulations to this very age. The history, people, and culture are so different in their perspective and practice. The deep roots and cultural steadfastness of the eastern faith are helping me to regain a relationship with Christ and the Church that has largely been lost in the west. It is my hope that this particular trip will help me to find a point of connection between the two cultures.
I want to see grand old churches, monasteries, and Cathedrals. I want to experience the depth of what it means to beautify a space for the purpose of experiencing the worship of God as described in Revelation. Every building we will see is a work of art and craftsmanship, devoted to that very purpose, and none other. I want to abandon the utilitarian mindset of the west and let myself be lost in the beauty of sacred spaces.
I want to spend time with the person that sponsored me for baptism. We live far apart, so visits are rare. She is wise and winsome, and I gain much from being with her.
I want to see Orthodox people in a non-American setting. I want to watch how they do things and experience their culture which has been deeply rooted in Orthodoxy for longer than Americans know how to imagine. I want perspective.

As I read over this post and the reasons I have listed above for this crazy undertaking, the reverberation throughout each point is a desire for connection—connection with beauty, connection with worship, connection with other humans who worship, connection with the boundaries of time and space which contain and enclose the story of the Church. All of these are deeply human desires that help us to understand who we are in the context of this vast world and how it interacts with the Creator of it all. I cannot wait to see how my mind will be stretched, my beliefs challenged, and my understanding deepened. I expect there will be a fair amount of cognitive dissonance that I will experience, and this will be humbling, but I pray that the process of bringing it all back into harmony will make me a better Christian.

Unnecessary? Possibly. Permissible? Definitely. Invaluable? Probably.

I can’t wait to share with you the things I see, hear, and learn from my first pilgrimage. You are coming with me, and I will be careful to take notes and share it with you.

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The Accidental Pilgrim