It's been said that travel, at its best, is intensified living.

If that's true, then pilgrimage travel is intensified faith — in motion.

A pilgrimage has the power to change people, to deepen and strengthen their bond with God. The pilgrim leaves behind his provincial view of the world and immerses himself not only in prayer and contemplation but also in culture and history.

Souls, spirits, hearts and minds are rejuvenated: newly nourished and strengthened for the continuing pilgrimage toward heaven that is every Christian's life.

When you go on vacation, you see things you haven't seen before and do things you haven't done. Well and good, but your destinations and experiences are an end in themselves. You come home and can say, “Been there, done that.”

Meanwhile, on pilgrimage, the things you see and do are signposts to a destination further on up the road. Yes, you see new sights and do new things, but they're a means to something greater — your own spiritual progress toward God. They help you get where you ultimately want to go.

On vacation, you taste the local cuisine. On pilgrimage, you feed your soul and mind with food that can't be had anywhere else.

On vacation, you check off one sight and move on to the next. On pilgrimage, you go to daily Mass, pray in holy shrines and walk in the footsteps of saints from centuries past.

On vacation, you take photos and buy souvenirs to show others where you've been. On pilgrimage, you store memories of your interior experiences in your heart and revisit them in quiet prayer times the rest of your life.

Life-Size Reliquaries

Part of the power of a good pilgrimage lies in its particularity. You encounter this place, which was made holy by this saint. You walk the places he or she walked. You pray in the places he or she prayed.

Pilgrimage shrines are usually built on or near the tombs of the saints, or where they worked and lived out their witness to Christ. This reflects the ancient Christian belief that the saint's presence hallows, or makes holy, the place in which he or she lived or died. A segment of a saint's body, or something he or she owned or touched, becomes a relic. Through the relic we have contact with the holy man or woman.

The shrines or tombs of the saints are, by extension, relics of a sort. For, through these places, we have contact with the holy ones of God. A pilgrimage is contact with God through the particular and so is profoundly incarnational.

Just so, our respect for such unique places is a reflection of our awe over the incarnation of the Lord himself.

Think about it. Jesus became a man at a particular time, in a particular place. He had to do so in order to become truly one of us. Jesus worked his miracles one at a time: He healed this particular man, had mercy on this particular woman. He was born and died at a particular place on a particular day. By entering space and time, Christ sanctified each place and moment.

For this reason indulgences are usually attached to Church-approved pilgrimage sites. An indulgence is the remission of the temporal consequences of sin through the merits of Christ as granted by the Church, which is the repository and custodian of all the graces and mercy Christ has gained for us.

Just as Christ offers his grace to us in particular ways through the sacraments, so the Church offers us the fruits of his saving work, the “treasury of his merits,” in particular ways. Usually the indulgence granted is attached to offering certain prayers or performing certain acts of devotion. Again, the incarnational principle is at work: Christ's life and saving work are given to us through a particular time and place; his grace is offered to us through particular acts at particular times through the sacraments. So it is that the extraordinary privileges the Church offers through indulgences are given to us through particular places and particular saints.

‘Part of the power of a good pilgrimage lies in its particularity.’

Saints Alive

A pilgrimage is also about encountering the communion of saints and making the experience a reality in our lives. In the Apostles' Creed, we say, “I believe in the communion of saints.” But for many of us that thought might be just an abstraction, something we assent to intellectually without really entering into. On pilgrimage, in and through Christ, we have a real meeting with “those who have gone before us marked with the sign of faith” and who are now with God in heaven. And our relationship to them becomes every bit as real as yours is with the parishioners who share a pew with you every Sunday.

The saints are not dead and gone — they are alive. They are alive to God in heaven and, by extension, to us here on earth. Because they are with God in heaven, they are in perfect communion with him. Remember, our communion with God is still imperfect. Our sins and shortcomings place obstacles in the way of our relationship with God. But the saints in heaven know no such obstacles. So they're able to pray in perfect accord with the will of God. That makes them perfect intercessors. And most of us, it would seem, can use all the intercession we can get.

Then too, because each saint lived out the Lord's call to holiness and discipleship in his or her own way, each one offers us a unique witness and example of how we can live out our faith. If St. Francis doesn't inspire you, maybe St. Ignatius of Loyola will. If St. Catherine of Siena doesn't get you fired up, look to St. Thé rèse of Lisieux.

Take the two of us writing this article, for example. We both have had profound experiences of the communion of saints while on pilgrimage. Our respective experiences vary widely in particulars but are closely similar in themes.

For me, Father Rob, my most memorable pilgrimage experience occurred when I went to Rome for studies in 1997. It was there — specifically, while visiting the cata-combs and the tombs of Sts. Peter and Paul — that I really started to “get” the communion of saints in a life-changing way. It was as if I could reach out, touch and actually feel the presence of these saints. I knew, in a way far beyond conceptual understanding, that they were interceding for me and for the whole Church. All at once, my prayers to various saints took on a new significance and immediacy. That sense continues in my prayer life to this day. In fact, you could say that my life has been one of intensified faith — in motion — ever since.

Yours can, too. Just plan to make your next vacation a pilgrimage.

Father Rob Johansen is associate pastor of St. Joseph's Church in

St. Joseph, Michigan. Mark Windsor is a Catholic writer and travel agent based in Plano, Texas.