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- Convenors:
-
Marion Bowman
(The Open University)
Tiina Sepp (University of Tartu)
- Stream:
- Religion
- Location:
- A229
Short Abstract:
This panel concentrates on one significant aspect of contemporary pilgrimage: the theologically intriguing trend towards Protestant Pilgrimage. Whether denominational heritage/roots tourism, or a longing for a pre-Reformation world of sensory experiences, this topic deserves focussed attention.
Long Abstract:
Although scholarly, popular and disciplinary definitions of pilgrimage may vary, it is undeniable that travel to and from significant sites for varied religious and spiritual activities has proliferated in recent decades.
Coleman and Eade, in Reframing Pilgrimage: Cultures in Motion, identify in contemporary pilgrimage 'diverse processes of sacralization of movement, persons and/or places' (2004: 18). In this panel we concentrate specifically on the theologically intriguing trend towards Protestant Pilgrimage that appears to be sweeping Europe (and beyond).
The panel will examine such issues as the act of walking (what people feel is happening, or what they believe is brought about by, the very act of 'walking with intent') and its popularity for Protestants; Protestant re-framings or re-narrations of pilgrimage; the material culture, performativity, relationality and identity-formation of Protestant pilgrimage.
Whether protestant pilgrimage is more about travelling than arriving at hallowed ground, whether it is more denominational heritage/roots tourism than devotional journeying, whether the current Protestant enthusiasm for pilgrimage reflects a longing for a pre-Reformation world of sensory experiences and closeness to nature, bringing together folklorists and ethnologists exploring this phenomenon in a variety of contexts, from different angles, will foster an informed overview of Protestant pilgrims and pilgrimage which can contribute to a more integrated understanding of this phenomenon in the 21st century.
Contributions based on contemporary fieldwork from a variety of contexts and countries especially welcome.
Marion Bowman, Religious Studies, The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK. marion.bowman@open.ac.uk
Accepted papers:
Session 1Attracta Brownlee (National University of Ireland Maynooth)
Paper short abstract:
This paper explores the conceptual underpinnings of Protestant pilgrimage. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in the west of Ireland, the historical, theological, political and sociocultural dimensions of pilgrimage are grounded in analysis of contemporary Irish Protestant identity and spirituality.
Paper long abstract:
While pilgrimage in Ireland is often regarded as a practice strongly connected with the Catholic Church, there is a growing awareness of a trend towards pilgrimage among Protestant denominations. Yet, what are the tensions surrounding the terminology and concept of pilgrimage, and what does the act of walking on pilgrimage mean to Irish Protestants? The multivocal nature of Protestant pilgrimage in the context of travelling to and from places for spiritual purposes requires deeper analysis.
In Ireland, the association of Catholicism with many Irish pilgrimage sites such as wells, mountains and ancient Celtic monastic sites is clearly visible. One cannot ignore, for instance, the abundance of Marian imagery or the votive offerings at many sacred sites. In this paper, the ways in which Protestants negotiate a pilgrimage landscape overlaid with the material culture and symbols of Catholicism, and how ancient sacred sites are re-imagined will be explored. These negotiations and re-framings can range from a desire to reconnect with the Christianity of the ancient Celtic church to an eschewing of pilgrimage in Ireland in favour of a more 'authentic' Protestant pilgrimage to foreign shores.
Jackie Feldman (Ben Gurion University of the Negev)
Paper short abstract:
Travel to the Holy Land has become important in Protestant devotional practice, community building and political mobilization. After three decades of guiding Protestant pilgrims to the Holy Land, I examine the textual and locomotive practices used to imbue the Holy Land with meaning and authority.
Paper long abstract:
In a website of the Christian Broadcasting Network, Eva Marie Everson quotes: "Five gospels record the life of Jesus. Four you will find in books and one you will find in the land they call holy. Read the fifth gospel and the world of the four will open to you".
While Protestants are relative latecomers to Holy Land pilgrimage, in recent decades, Evangelical travel to the Holy Land has become important in devotional practice, community building and political mobilization.
Based on three decades of guiding Protestant pilgrims to the Holy Land, I will examine the textual and locomotive practices used to imbue the Holy Land with meaning and authority. How and where are sacred texts performed and by whom? What role do itineraries, maps and diagrams play in creating spiritually significant links to places? How do sermons and evening meetings cement participants to places and to each other? How do individual pilgrims negotiate the meanings favored by pastors and the tourist industry?
I will draw on studies of pilgrimage, the spatiality of religion (Knott), the materiality of the Bible (Bielo, Malley, McDonnell) and the phenomenology of place memory (Casey) in order to analyze how place, movement and text interact. A comparison with contemporary Catholic pilgrimage practices in the Holy Land will show how such practices are contingent upon Protestant theological understandings.
David Zimmer
Paper short abstract:
Can an individual trip to an artwork in a Protestant church evoking experiences of transcendence be understood as a 'Protestant pilgrimage'? The question is discussed with a historical example of the 18th and a contemporary example of the 21st century, both located north of Berne, Switzerland.
Torunn Selberg (University of Bergen)
Paper short abstract:
Since the turn of the century pilgrimage has grown steadily in Norway after a break of several hundreds of years. Three medieval pilgrimages have been revived, but the focus is very much on the roads and the walking, placed within a heritage discourse. The paper will discuss this connection.
Paper long abstract:
Since the turn of the century, pilgrimage has been growing steadily in Norway, after a break of several hundreds of years following the Reformation when pilgrimage was forbidden. Three Norwegian pilgrimages from Catholic medieval times have now been revitalised, and are to a certain extent in competition with each other. However, in the Norwegian context much attention is given to the roads or the pilgrims' ways, and also to pilgrimage as something that has to be done walking on your own feet towards the site of the pilgrimage. The walks are often referred to as walking in the footsteps of our forefathers and this can be connected to how these roads are very much considered heritage in a Norwegian context.
The stress on continuity and tradition are central in spite (or because?) of the break of several hundreds of years. The paper will discuss why the heritage/tradition references are so important, and why the journey occupies such a big place even at the expense of the pilgrimage sites themselves. References to heritage are also influential in pilgrims' personal narratives and I will employ personal narratives from pilgrims published in various Norwegian pilgrimage fraternities' Internet sites.
Marion Bowman (The Open University)
Paper short abstract:
Post Reformation, the routes, practices, materiality and relationality of Scottish pilgrimage were fractured. Since the late 20th century, however, pilgrimage has increasingly been rediscovered, reframed and revived in nominally Protestant Scotland, in a quest for lost content/ content.
Paper long abstract:
As a result of the Reformation, pilgrimage in Scotland ceased to be part of mainstream religiosity in a predominantly protestant, Presbyterian context. The routes, practices, materiality and relationality of pilgrimage were fractured. In the late 20th century, however, pilgrimage has increasingly been rediscovered, reframed and revived.
Iona has become a pilgrimage destination for a range of protestant Christians; the Presbyterian church in Luss created a pilgrimage centre and path, reframing the landscape of Luss as a site of faith tourism and anti-sectarianism. The Scottish Pilgrim Routes Forum campaigns 'to develop and promote Christian Pilgrimage Walking Routes throughout Scotland', while Scotland's Churches Trust promotes (initially) six ancient Scottish pilgrim routes. Christian Scottish-based business Holy Socks is founded on 'a combination of novelty socks and the ancient idea of life as pilgrimage'
This paper examines how the restoration and reframing of the lost content of Scottish pilgrimage praxis and infrastructure is being envisaged as a way of reclaiming what is now presented as an era of lost content in Scottish religiosity. Elements of Celticism, anti-sectarianism, vernacular religiosity, heritage and roots tourism, contemporary non-aligned spirituality, materiality, topophilia, nationalism, proselytism and pragmatism combine to present and promote pilgrimage in Scotland in the 21st century.
Marion Bowman (The Open University)
Paper short abstract:
This round table discussion invites contributions on three main issues: the contemporary appeal of pilgrimage for Protestants, the ecumenical/ community issues addressed by pilgrimage, and the heritagization implicit and explicit in contemporary Protestant Pilgrimage.
Paper long abstract:
This round table discussion, led by Marion Bowman, invites contributions on three main issues:
The contemporary appeal of pilgrimage for Protestants, and the theological reasoning and reframing necessitated by this new/ renewed engagement with the phenomenon
The ecumenical, reconciliation and community cohesion agendas being addressed through Protestant pilgrimage
The issues of heritagization implicit and explicit in contemporary Protestant pilgrimage, and the extent to which these drive, inform, subvert or enhance Protestant pilgrimage.
Tiina Sepp (University of Tartu)
Paper short abstract:
‘Caminoisation’ refers to the process of introducing aspects of the Camino pilgrimage to other pilgrimage sites. In the light of my previous fieldwork on the Camino, I look into pilgrims’ experiences in English cathedrals and try to answer the question of why pilgrimage still matters today.
Paper long abstract:
'Caminoisation' (a term coined by Marion Bowman) refers to the process of introducing various aspects of the Camino pilgrimage to other pilgrimage sites. The main features of Caminoisation seem to be the ideas that real pilgrimage is done on foot and that journey is more important than arrival. This has led to the revival of ancient pilgrimage routes as well as developing new ones (predominantly) by people who have either walked the Camino or are planning to do it. This paper is based on my fieldwork carried out in the cathedrals of Canterbury, Durham, Westminster and York, that are sites of case study for a 3-year project 'Pilgrimage and England's Cathedrals, Past and Present'. The project's aim is to get greater understanding of the experience of pilgrims in the past and compare this with the experience of contemporary pilgrims at Anglican and Roman Catholic cathedrals. In the light of my previous fieldwork on the Camino de Santiago, I will look into pilgrims' experiences in four English cathedrals and try to answer the question of why pilgrimage still matters today.
Lena Gemzöe (Stockholm University)
Paper short abstract:
This paper discusses how certain themes found among Swedish Camino pilgrims are present in the ongoing reinvention of what might be called Nordic pilgrimage, with examples from the current practices and theology of pilgrimage in the Church of Sweden.
Paper long abstract:
The Camino pilgrimage and the reinvention of Nordic Pilgrimage.
This paper relates the reanimation of the Camino pilgrimage to the pilgrimage movement within the Church of Sweden, focussing on certain aspects. On the one hand, the Camino pilgrimage (i.e. the walking pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela) serves as a model for pilgrimage in Sweden and is integrated in Church practices with parishes undertaking communal walks on the Camino for instance. On the other hand, there is also an attempt to distinguish pilgrimage in Sweden from Catholic pilgrimage practices of today. In this paper, I will discuss how certain themes found among Swedish Camino pilgrims are present in the ongoing reinvention of what might be called Nordic pilgrimage. One example is the elaboration of a theology of pilgrimage in the Church of Sweden focusing not on the goal, but on the journey itself, using "the road" as a key symbol. Another central theme is an emphasis on nature as God's creation.
Marion Bowman (The Open University)
Paper short abstract:
Open discussion on the growing phenomenon of the 'Caminoisation' of pilgrimage in relation to Protestant pilgrimage.
Paper long abstract:
This discussion, led by Marion Bowman and Tiina Sepp, will focus on the contention that we are witnessing the 'McDonalisation' of pilgrimage in the wake of the Camino's appeal, success and publicity.
Why are so many Protestants copying/ being inspired by this model? What aspects of vernacular culture and religion are involved in the renegotiation and localisation of Camino features?
As Caminoisation comes to dominate assumptions of what a pilgrimage has to look like/ involve/ achieve, what are the broader implications for Protestant pilgrimage, pilgrimage per se and pilgrimage studies.