“On pilgrimage we contribute physically, mentally, spiritually to our prayers, and it often gives us comfort that we’re doing everything we can to leave our petition in God’s hands,” he said.
On the Kapaun Pilgrimage, as on any pilgrimage, people walk for different reasons — some for a specific purpose or prayer intention, some seeking spiritual rejuvenation, others for the purpose of venerating the holy site at the end.
“I feel like everybody has their own story. Everybody has something that strikes them. But I do think there’s a unique way where the physical nature of the pilgrimage, the removal from our ordinary lives; it just invites us into something different and to experience something in a unique way,” he said.
Carter said the joy that awaits pilgrims at the end of their journey is reminiscent of the joy we hope for as Catholics at the end of our life journey.
“When you reach your destination, it was just so overwhelming and so beautiful, people cheering us on and everything. And so it’s a little hint, hopefully, of what heaven is like … the welcome that we’re going to receive when we’re finally walking through the pearly gates,” Carter said.
‘American Catholics are reengaging’
Gabe Jones, a father and a financial adviser with the Knights of Columbus, founded the Joseph Challenge Pilgrimage in 2015 in St. Louis. The roughly 24-mile annual walk aimed at Catholic men has grown from just a handful of friends in its first year to “just under 60 guys” in one of the post-pandemic iterations. Jones said they’ve had 30 or so participants on average in each of the nine years, with minimal promotion of the event apart from word of mouth.
Even if their ranks aren’t quite as large as, say, the Kapaun Pilgrimage, Jones said he has seen the Lord working during the pilgrimage even if the number of walkers is small. One early year, he said, several fellow participants dropped out, leaving the number of pilgrims at just two. Jones walked with that one other man, who was at that point discerning his vocation. That man is today a monk at Silver Stream Priory in Ireland, Jones said.
“You can never judge the fruit of [a pilgrimage] by the numbers,” he commented.
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Jones told CNA that most people he encounters find the idea of pilgrimage very appealing, in part because it is an experience that grounds you in reality in an age dominated by the virtual.
“The world now, because we’re so digital and you can experience so many things that aren’t real on a screen — a pilgrimage reconnects you with reality. It reconnects you literally with the earth, because you’re walking for miles and miles and the pain that comes with that. You know, the discomfort in your feet and your joints from walking and walking and walking,” he said.
“You encounter people. You’re walking through street corners, and people come up and say, ‘What are you doing?’ So I think there’s that desire in the human heart for an experience, for action. And I think American Catholics are reengaging with that.”
Large pilgrimage groups remain a relatively rare sight on U.S. streets, and Jones said often he gets asked by passersby what they’re “protesting” — which he finds ironic.
“Public witness doesn’t have to be in protest of something. You can do something publicly like this as a witness and as a testimony because of the things you love,” he noted.
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