What is a pilgrimage — and what is it for?

A pilgrimage is a journey undertaken for religious reasons to a place of special significance. The syllabus splits the purpose in two, and you should always answer with both.

• Spiritual goals — to draw closer to God; to seek healing, of body or of mind; to do penance for sin; to give thanks for an answered prayer; to make a decision; to stand in the place where the events of the Gospels actually happened, and so make faith concrete rather than abstract; to worship alongside Christians from all over the world.
• Physical goals — to reach the shrine itself: to bathe in the waters at Lourdes, to walk the Way of the Cross in Jerusalem, to be present at a Papal audience in St Peter’s Square, to touch the stone in the Church of the Nativity.

Nobody has to go. Pilgrimage is not one of the sacraments and is not commanded anywhere in the New Testament. It is a devotional practice — hugely important to some Christians, and of no interest at all to others. Keep that in view; it is exactly what part (c) will probe.

Spiritual or physical?

The journey itself: challenge and effect

The syllabus is unusually specific here: it asks about the journeys themselves and their effect on the pilgrim. The travelling is not merely how you arrive — it is part of the point.

• Physical challenges — expense; long-haul travel; heat and crowds; illness or disability (many Lourdes pilgrims are seriously ill, and travel with volunteer carers); the sheer effort of walking a route such as the Camino to Santiago de Compostela over weeks. Some pilgrims deliberately choose the harder option.
• Spiritual challenges — leaving home, work and routine behind; boredom and discomfort; the honest possibility of disappointment, if the healing does not come or the shrine feels commercialised.
• Effects — a sense of solidarity with fellow pilgrims and with the sick; renewed faith; a habit of prayer that outlasts the trip; for some, a lasting sense of peace even where there is no physical cure.

Exam-ready line: many Christians say that the hardship is the pilgrimage — that stripping away comfort is what makes room for God. Others reply that suffering is not a virtue in itself, and that God can be met just as fully at home.

Lourdes: healing and spiritual comfort

Lourdes is a small town in the foothills of the French Pyrenees. In 1858 a fourteen-year-old girl, Bernadette Soubirous, reported a series of visions of a lady — whom Catholics identify as the Virgin Mary — in a rocky grotto beside the river. A spring emerged there. Millions now visit each year.

• The Grotto — pilgrims file past the rock, touch it, and pray in silence. Candles burn continuously.
• The baths and the water — pilgrims bathe in or are sprinkled with water from the spring, and take some home for those too ill to travel.
• The torchlight Marian procession each evening, and the daily Blessed Sacrament procession, at which the sick receive a blessing.
• The sick are given priority. Volunteers push and carry pilgrims who cannot walk; hospital pilgrimages are organised from all over the world.
• A Medical Bureau examines claimed cures. Only a very small number have ever been recognised by the Church as inexplicable — a fact that both supporters and sceptics use in argument.

Different views: for many Catholics, Lourdes is a place of profound spiritual comfort even when no cure occurs — the healing sought is often of the spirit. Many Protestants are uneasy about the whole thing: they see the focus on Mary and on a holy place as unbiblical, and would say that God heals in answer to prayer anywhere.

Healing without a cure

Rome: St Peter and the Pope

Rome matters to Christians for two linked reasons: it is where the apostle Peter is believed to have been martyred and buried, and it is where his successor, the Pope, lives.

• St Peter’s Basilica — built over the traditional tomb of St Peter. Catholics trace the Pope’s authority back to Jesus’ words to Peter: “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church” (Matthew 16:18).
• St Peter’s Square — the vast colonnaded piazza where crowds gather for Papal appearances, including the Sunday Angelus from the window and the Urbi et Orbi blessing at Christmas and Easter.
• Papal audiences — the general audience at which pilgrims can see and hear the Pope in person; for many Catholics this is the emotional peak of the trip.
• Rome also holds the tombs of other early martyrs and the catacombs where persecuted Christians buried their dead.

Different views: Orthodox Christians honour Peter but reject the claim that the Bishop of Rome has authority over the whole Church. Most Protestants reject Papal authority outright and read Matthew 16:18 as referring to Peter’s confession of faith, not to an office passed down. So Rome is a place of pilgrimage for Catholics in a way it simply is not for other Christians.

Which place of pilgrimage?

Tap a site or feature, then tap the place of pilgrimage it belongs to.

Bethlehem and Nazareth: birth and upbringing

• Bethlehem — the town where the Gospels record that Jesus was born (Luke 2:1–7). Pilgrims visit the Church of the Nativity, one of the oldest churches in continuous use anywhere in the world. Beneath the altar, a fourteen-pointed silver star marks the traditional spot of the birth; pilgrims queue for hours to kneel and touch it. The entrance is the famous Door of Humility — so low that everyone must stoop to go in.
• Nazareth — the town where Jesus grew up. Pilgrims visit the Church of the Annunciation, built over the traditional site of the house where the angel Gabriel told Mary she would bear a son (Luke 1:26–38), and the Church of St Joseph, over the site traditionally identified as Joseph’s workshop.

Why pilgrims come: to see that the Incarnation happened in a real, small, unremarkable place. Standing in Nazareth makes concrete the belief that God entered ordinary human life — and pilgrims often say that is exactly the effect it has.

Be careful and honest: these are the traditional sites, venerated for many centuries. Christians differ over how confident anyone can be about the precise locations, and a good candidate says “traditionally identified as” rather than overclaiming.

Place and church

Jerusalem: the Way of the Cross

Jerusalem is the supreme Christian pilgrimage city, because it is where Christians believe Jesus died and rose.

• Gethsemane — the garden on the Mount of Olives where Jesus prayed in anguish and was betrayed and arrested (Mark 14:32–42). Ancient olive trees still stand there; pilgrims pray beside the rock in the Church of All Nations.
• The Way of the Cross (the Via Dolorosa, “the sorrowful way”) — the route through the streets of the Old City traditionally taken by Jesus carrying his cross to Golgotha (Mark 15:22). Pilgrims walk it in groups, stopping at each of the Stations of the Cross to read, pray and, in some processions, carry a wooden cross themselves. Many describe this as the most powerful hour of their lives.
• The Church of the Holy Sepulchre — built over the traditional sites of both Golgotha (the crucifixion) and the empty tomb. It is shared, under a centuries-old arrangement, by Greek Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic, Roman Catholic, Coptic, Syriac and Ethiopian Christians — so a pilgrim can hear several liturgies in several languages under one roof. That shared custody is a visible sign both of the unity of Christian devotion and of its divisions.

Site and significance

Tap a site on the left, then the event or reason on the right that makes it a place of pilgrimage.

One church, six traditions

Should Christians go on pilgrimage at all?

The syllabus title says “the importance of going on pilgrimage for some Christians”. That phrase is doing real work: it is not for all.

• In favour — pilgrimage is an ancient practice; it makes faith tangible; it builds the worldwide community; it can be an act of penance or thanksgiving; it draws the sick and the poor into the centre of the Church’s attention rather than the margins.
• Against — many Protestant and evangelical Christians argue that no place is holier than another. Jesus told the Samaritan woman that the hour was coming when true worshippers would worship “neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem” but “in the Spirit and in truth” (John 4:21–24). Salvation, they add, is by grace, not by works — so travelling somewhere earns nothing. Some also point to the expense, the environmental cost of flights, and the commercial stalls around the shrines, and argue the money would be better given to the poor.
• A middle position — pilgrimage is valuable but optional: a good spiritual discipline for those who find it helpful, and no obligation on anyone else.

The strongest objection

Answering the 8-mark evaluation

Part (c) carries 8 of the 20 marks and is marked on AO2 Evaluation. Take this:

Do not simply describe Lourdes. Description earns AO1 marks in parts (a) and (b), not here. Part (c) rewards weighing and a reasoned judgement.

The big ideas to know

That is the whole of C3. Press Finish to see your score.