Pilgrimage to Walsingham September 2009
Walsingham in Norfolk is one of those places that time seems to have passed by for hundreds of years, a place of oak-beamed buildings, colourful cottage gardens and peace. Off the beaten track you might think, but the truth is that people have been beating a track to this place for almost 1000 years, since the lady of the manor had a vision of the Blessed Virgin Mary and erected a replica of the Holy House of Nazareth in a field. In the Middle Ages it was said that the Milky Way pointed here and even Henry VIII was a pilgrim. So it is difficult to escape the fact that for centuries Christians have been coming here to lay their needs and the needs of others before the Lord.
Our pilgrimage this year to Walsingham involved people from five churches on the Fylde coast, namely St Nicholas Fleetwood, St Stephen-on-the-Cliffs, St Cuthbert's Lytham and St Paul's Warton as well as ourselves. Our party of 34 left the Fylde on Tuesday 22nd September arriving at Walsingham in time to unpack and commence our pilgrimage to England's Nazareth with our First Visit to the shrine before an excellent and welcome meal, served in the Refectory. After supper there followed the customary Tuesday evening service of Healing and Reconciliation, which follows an altered format this year with laying-on of hands, anointing and confession proceeding simultaneously at different points around the church, all in the peaceful presence of our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. Over the next two days there followed the usual round of devotions supplemented on this occasion by celebration of the Feast of Our Lady of Walsingham, which involved an ecumenical procession from the Slipper Chapel to the Anglican Shrine followed by Solemn Vespers. We were also privileged to share in the Golden Jubilee Mass of a former Guardian of the Shrine and hear two wonderfully engaging sermons from the new Administrator of the Shrine, Bishop Lindsay Irwin.
As well as the devotional aspects of the pilgrimage we were able to browse around the various shops in the village, walk around the grounds of the old Abbey or walk the Holy Mile out to the Slipper Chapel (the point from which mediaeval pilgrims removed their shoes). Certainly Our Lady smiled on us with wonderfully sunny weather and so it was on the final morning, that we paid our final visit to the Holy House, and, as generations have done before us, sealed our intercessions by the final offering of the Eucharist, and boarded our coach for home.
Only for the sanctimonious or holy?? Certainly not! This was fun and a celebration of our faith. If we thirsted after righteousness, we had a physical thirst as well and the fellowship of the gatherings in the pub or the trips out were as much part of the experience as the devotional parts. Give it a try next year, you may just enjoy it! For further information speak to Margaret Garner, or any member of the Cell of Our Lady of Walsingham.
Gerald Wilson