For many Catholic cruise guests, the journey is more than a getaway — it’s a chance to spend time with the faith influencers they’ve followed online or listened to on the radio.

Penelope Williams, a self-described “Catholic Answers convert,” is one such person. The 71-year-old resident of Carlsbad, California, will be embarking on her second Catholic cruise in the company of some of the very people she says helped spark her conversion to the Catholic faith: the apologists from the Catholic Answers media apostolate.

Twelve years ago, the former Anglican said, she happened upon an episode of Catholic Answers Live, the radio call-in show in which apologists field questions from believers and nonbelievers alike (listen on EWTN Radio).

“Never in a million years was I considering becoming Catholic until I, by a stroke of the Holy Spirit, heard an episode of Catholic Answers Live,” she told the Register, explaining that “many of my family prejudices against Catholicism were exploded.”

She soon became a daily listener, and then an active supporter of the ministry, attending galas and conferences put on by Catholic Answers. A couple of years later, she was received into the Catholic Church.

Since then, she says, she has sought to enter more deeply into her faith, through the sacraments, but also, since she retired seven years ago, through travel.

In the company of Catholic Answers apologists and like-minded travelers, she’s gone on pilgrimage to Rome and taken a cruise up the St. Lawrence River, exploring the legacy of the North American Martyrs and early French settlements.

Williams’ travels as a Catholic have also taken her to the Holy Land and on a cruise following St. Paul’s journey across the Mediterranean with biblical scholar and apologist Steve Ray, a frequent guest on EWTN.

This May, she will again travel with Catholic Answers on a 12-day Rhine River journey through the Netherlands, Germany, France and Switzerland, stopping at the great cathedrals of Europe.

“I have the great good fortune to be able to afford to travel and I have the time. As a convert, I’m reading and listening and doing what I can to learn, but I’m able to travel and go to the places of Church history and the places of the saints and the places of the Marian apparitions. I just can’t get enough,” she said.

She told the Register that she has enjoyed getting to know the apologists at Catholic Answers and is grateful for this chance to continue learning from them.

“There’s an opportunity to meet your favorite radio personalities. All of these people — they’re just so knowledgeable and so well-educated, so articulate. It’s just a delight for me to be around them and hear from them,” she said, noting that Christopher Check, president of Catholic Answers, is “quite the historian.”

“The reason that I like to travel with a Catholic group is because they go to places that are significant to Catholicism,” Williams said, noting that in French Canada, she visited the shrines of Catholic saints and the places where they worked with immigrants and Indigenous people.

“You visit all these tombs. I mean, it’s saint after saint after saint. You’re able to venerate these saints and learn more about Church history,” she said.

On the Mediterranean cruise led by Steve Ray, she visited the island of Patmos, a site of deep significance in biblical history, an experience she said was “amazing.”

“You go up to the cave where St. John wrote the Book of Revelation — where he had his visions — you’re in that place,” she said. “I’m so excited about seeing these places.”

Williams also appreciates that on a Catholic cruise there is a priest on board, and there’s daily Mass, as well as opportunities for confession, plus prayer with her fellow passengers.

She says she finds it moving to visit Catholic churches outside the United States. Both the Catholic Answers cruise and Steve Ray’s Footprints of God Pilgrimage tours are arranged so the group goes to Mass at churches along the way.

“You go to Mass in a foreign country, and no matter what the language is, you know what to do. You can follow it, and you’re welcome,” she said.

“Whenever I walk into a Catholic church, it’s like, ‘Oh, here are my people.’ I think it’s a really beautiful thing, the universal Church.”

LEARN MORE Catholic.com/cruise FootprintsofGodPilgrimages.com

Plan Your Cruise

A sampling of the Catholic cruises sailing in 2026 and 2027:

206 Tours Seine Cruise: A pilgrimage up the Seine, with stops in Paris, visiting Catholic churches and shrines, medieval castles, French villages, and other historical sites such as Omaha Beach in Normandy.

Dates: March 17-28, 2026

Catholic Answers Rhine River Cruise Pilgrimage: A cruise up the Rhine in the company of Catholic Answers apologists, visiting historic cathedrals and churches in the Netherlands, Switzerland and Germany.

Dates: May 2-14, 2026

St. Paul Center Greece Pilgrimage Cruise: A cruise of the Greek Isles “in the footsteps of St. Paul” led by John Bergsma of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology.

Dates: May 22-June 1, 2026

206 Tours Fatima and Portugal Cruise: A pilgrimage cruise of Portugal’s Douro River Valley, visiting Fatima and the sites associated with St. Anthony of Padua and St. Teresa of Ávila.

Dates: Sept. 1-13, 2026

206 Tours Danube River Cruise Pilgrimage: Visit Linz, Passau, Vienna and Budapest on a cruise up the Danube, stopping at Melk Abbey, the Maria Plain Shrine in Salzburg and touring the Esztergom Basilica and Shrine, St. Martin’s Cathedral in Bratislava and the Regensburg Cathedral.

Dates: Oct. 8-21, 2026

Steve Ray’s ‘In the Footsteps of St. Paul’ Mediterranean Sea Cruise: Journey in the footsteps of St. Paul through Thessaloniki, Philippi, Athens, ancient Corinth, Ephesus and Rhodes, with Steve Ray, a biblical archeologist.

Dates: Oct. 21-Nov. 3, 2026

Good News Cruise: Take a Caribbean cruise for Catholic couples with special guests Harry Connick Jr. and Father Mike Schmitz, among others.

Dates: Feb. 6-13, 2027

Steve Ray’s Rhine River Pilgrimage: Sail the Rhine from Basel, Switzerland, to Amsterdam, visiting historic and pilgrimage sites with Steve and Janet Ray of Footprints of God tours.

Dates: May 29-June 8, 2027