[Not the Exact Route!]
Northern is part of the Pilgrim Cross family and is one of 6 legs which walk for 7 days, arriving in Walsingham on Good Friday. Whether you have walked with us more than 20 times or you’ve only just heard of us, we’d love to walk with you next Holy Week.
We walk around 120 miles, mostly on quiet country roads. We build community by walking together and the shared challenge of carrying the cross. We have support vehicles so while it helps to be fit enough to do a decent proportion, you don’t have to be able to walk every step.
We spend a lot of time on the road talking to each other, with conversation topics ranging from the substantial and serious to the sublimely silly. Whether we’re discussing our favourite picnic food items, or our views on a particularly theological point, we hope to be a place where no answers are off-limits.
We welcome people from a range of different church traditions, and those who are open to and exploring questions of faith. While some of us are deeply committed to our Christian life, others are clinging to our faith or our churches by our finger-tips. Together we aim to create a safe space to explore: doubts, questions and an acknowledgment of our struggles are welcome. Different members of the leg share the role of creating and leading liturgy so this also reflects the diversity of our church traditions.
We spend many of our evenings in pubs, and often sing and play music together. We often have very talented musicians in our group and we welcome their contributions, but even if your last musical experience was recorder club in primary school; a set of leg kazoos means there’s always a way to join in!
We mostly sleep on church hall floors so a sleeping bag and floor mat are essential. Even if the accommodation isn’t luxurious, the warmth of the welcome we receive is amazingly generous. While we grow to be a close-knit community of friends as we walk together, we recognise that all those who engage with us and offer us hospitality are also in some way part of the community with whom we walk towards Easter.
As may be obvious, exhaustion is part of the deal, and while that may not sound immediately appealing, it creates an environment where we become real to each other very quickly. With less energy to protect ourselves behind the masks we wear most of the time, we become vulnerable to each other. As we get to know each other, we discover that, warts, blisters and all, we can love and be loved, which is how in a very short space of time we become real community. It is a community which forms and reforms each year, and there IS space for you.
Aisling (was our leader in 2020)
Steph (was our leader in 2019)
Northern Pilgrim 