The Extra Mile, A 21st Century Pilgrimage by Peter Stanford

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Peter Stanford begins his introduction with Waterden Church, a “Small Pilgrim Place”, before going on to explores 8 major places of Pilgrimage. Some have a pretty solid Christian identity – Walsingham – some less “solid” with significant pagan interest - Glastonbury – while Stonehenge despite its rich mix of identities has very limited explicitly Christian interpretations.

Stanford goes to these places at the times they get their peak pilgrim numbers, and observes – except that more than once he does get sucked into being a participant, he is interested in the people, the pilgrims, as much as the places.

One surprise was the realisation that I haven’t actually been to most of these places – Iona, Lindisfarne, Glastonbury, and Bardsey sit so firmly in my imagination that I have sort of forgotten that I have never physically travelled to them. This perhaps points to their power, a pilgrimage is only ever partly physical – the physical is a token signifying the “real” journey of the mind or spirit – the place of pilgrimage, even when you at physically present, is a place that you imagine.

In exploring the non-Christian pilgrimage, particularly at Stonehenge and Glastonbury, the absence of the traditional narratives of pilgrimage perhaps offers more direct insights into the question “What do people think they are doing?” as they have had to find a language of their own rather than wrapping responses stock phrases (although it seems they is plenty of borrowing of “Christian” vocab...).

Stanford finds common themes across all the expressions of pilgrimage – desires for connection, desires for a grounding, desires for a sense of something beyond the worries of everyday life. There are twin experiences of something intensely personally and something common or collective.

Stanford is visiting major pilgrimage sites at points of above average visitor numbers and this might explain the emphasis on the collective experience, but even in the absence of others the sense of a place “where prayer has been valid”, as T. S. Elliot put it, feels an essential part of pilgrimage.

These places have great stories associated with their pasts, and particularly with their origins – and our relationship to these stories can be complex. Many have rich layers, full of colour and drama, through which the location of historical “facts” is not always easy. The stories explain why the place is worth visiting, and yet in many cases the stories are probably not true. In some cases the place almost certainly existed before the stories – some have long pre-Christian heritage going back well beyond the Saints and Martyrs we recall today. There is a bit of Chicken and Egg – the Story that tells us why the place is significance only exists because the place was significant and people needed to explain why.

I am probably not someone who needed to be convinced that Pilgrimage is good for you, but nevertheless Stanford provides such engaging insight that he reaffirms its value. There can be great healing found through pilgrimage, not from some magic associated with spring waters or saints bones (although I wouldn’t rule that out), but in the intentional act of going somewhere, a bringing together of mind and body that allows renewal to take place.

Even reading it in the depths of winter I found my feet start to itch to be on the road again.