Happy Feast Day of St James the Great, the Patron Saint of all Pilgrims!
St James, Patron Saint of Pilgrims: pray for us
During this Holy Year of Jubilee we are all exhorted to be ‘Pilgrims of Hope’, however we decide to journey to sacred sites, either in person or in prayer. The age-old tradition of Catholic pilgrimage is particularly strong in our own Diocese of Leeds, with young and old travelling across the country and across Europe in family, school and parish groups on Annual Diocesan Pilgrimages to Lourdes (from which pilgrims have not long since returned) and to Walsingham, this year on Saturday 27 September.
Details of all our pilgrimages are posted on our dedicated Jubilee website as well as on the Pilgrimages Page of this website, along with dates as soon as they are known or confirmed.
Our walking pilgrimages through our local communities are acts of public witness intended to deepen faith and encourage opportunities for evangelisation – and to promote respect for the environment, as these ‘green’ pilgrimages are all to and from places which are well served by public transport. Starting in this Jubilee Year, there is a Laudato Si’ Mini-Pilgrimage or event to mark each of the ‘Four Seasons of Creation’:
Our Summer Laudato Si’ Mini-Pilgrimage is coming up soon on Saturday 9 August in Knaresborough: making a short, guided walk after Mass at St Mary’s Catholic Church, to the Chapel of Our Lady of the Crag, via the Cave of St Robert the Hermit.
As with all our pilgrimages, this is a fully risk-assessed walk for which we need to know the numbers attending, so please email communications@dioceseofleeds.org.uk
if you’re planning to come on 9 August!
In honour of the Holy Year, St Mark’s Way – the Northern Route of the National Jubilee Walking Pilgrimage of Hope – begins at Leeds Cathedral, where ALL are welcome to the 8am Pilgrims’ Mass on Saturday 6 September. ‘Day Pilgrims’ please sign up here with the National Pilgrimage organisers to walk any part of the way from the Cathedral, along the Aire and Calder Navigation towpath to Woodlesford – or all the way to our Jubilee Pilgrimage Church of St Austin in Wakefield! (Day 2 of this National Pilgrimage continues through our Diocese on Sunday 7 September, after 8am Mass at St Austin’s.)
St Mark: pray for us
Our Diocesan Camino, St Wilfrid’s Way, celebrates its 10th Anniversary this year and will be walked on Friday 10 and Saturday 11 October between Leeds Cathedral and St Wilfrid’s Catholic Church in Ripon, via the Chapel of Our Lady of the Crag in Knaresborough on Day 1 and via Markenfield Hall on Day 2. The pilgrimage is over two days and the route is in stages, so you don’t have to walk all the way – just sign up via communications@dioceseofleeds.org.uk with your details and which part of the walk you would like to join … and remember, people offering hospitality, overnight accommodation, or lifts to tired walkers on St Wilfrid’s Way are pilgrims too…!
St Wilfrid, Co-Patron of our Diocese: pray for us
All details of ALL our diocesan pilgrimages are posted on our dedicated Jubilee website as well as on the Pilgrimages Page of this website, along with dates as soon as they are known or confirmed!
(Details will be published soon about forthcoming our Autumn and Winter Laudato Si’ Mini-Pilgrimages. On Saturday 4 October at St Benedict’s Catholic Church in Garforth, we will visit the parish’s allotment and celebrate a ‘LiveSimply’ Harvest Festival and a Blessing of Animals. The Winter event will be an Advent Eco-Fair and Rosary Walk at our Diocesan Pastoral Centre, Hinsley Hall in Headingley on Saturday 13 December.)
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