Pilgrimage

1344 Words3 Pages

Pilgrimage

Introduction

This is coursework is about Pilgrimage. The coursework is divided into

three parts. I am going to talk about what happens at pilgrimage, why

people go and reasons why/why not are these places becoming too

commercialised. But what is a pilgrimage? A Christian Pilgrimage is a

journey undertaken, by believers to a place, which is, for some

reason, considered to be holy. No one has the obligation to go but

religious pilgrims have been particularly important in the Catholic

Church for centuries. Many Christians have seen them as an essential

part of their own spiritual journey as it not only takes them to

places where God, or one of his saints, have revealed themselves in

the past, but it also gives them an opportunity to meet people

involved in similar journeys. There are many places of pilgrimage

like: Lourdes in France, Rome in Italy, Taize in France, Holy Land in

Israel, Knock in Ireland, Santiago de Compostella in Spain, and many

more.

AO1

Lourdes is a town in the South of France. It is in the Pyrenees

mountains. In 1858, a teenage girl named Marie (who later changed her

name to Bernadette) believed she had several visions of Mary, the

mother of Jesus. Bernadette's parents were poor farmers, and she was

uneducated. During one of the visions, the Lady told Bernadette to dig

nearby and to drink the water she would discover. Bernadette dug, and

uncovered a spring, whose waters were found to have healing powers. It

was not long before people came to Lourdes, to see for themselves what

was happening. Some were simply curious. Others were hoping for a

miracle. Some visitors had disabilities, such as lameness that doctors

could not cure. They drank from Bernadette's stream and some were

cured. Lourdes quickly became a famous pilgrimage centre for

Christians. Nowadays, millions of pilgrims visit Lourdes every year.

The town is full of hotels and souvenir shops. Pilgrims visit the

grotto where Bernadette had her visions. There is a statue of Mary in

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