Welcome. We're Back! Now let's go on Pilgrimage.
New year brings new goals, maybe one of them should be a Scottish Pilgrimage?
Happy New Year - the Coracle is back after our hiatus over Christmastide. January for me means finding and talking to current and new contributors to sketch out the year ahead. Thank you for subscribing; I began this with the hope that it might add to the conversation in the Scottish Catholic Church, be a means of drawing out debates and refreshing ourselves on the history of this country. We are focused almost entirely on Scotland which hopefully means we publish material that makes sense in our backyard. It is not about ‘being’ Scottish (I am Northern Irish) but about living our faith in this land and what that means. The question I am always driving at is, what will make our faith flourish in this country? What can we do, under the grace of God to see vibrant and growing parishes? Some people might say this flies in the face of what we are seeing before us; but I don’t care. I do not believe God gives us the option to be pessimisitc - realistic, strategic, but not hopeless. God is good all the time and has not forgotten us. Which is to say, if the Coracle can add even a matches weight to a future flourishing Church then I will feel it’s doing its job.
To kick off this year we are having a look at Pilgrimage in Scotland. I hope you enjoy it and it encourages you to plan to put God into your travels this year - whether its a national or internationlly known route or even just in your own local area - you might be surprised at just how Catholic the landscape is around you.
This week’s edition includes two possible routes in Scotland for making a pilgrimage written by the organisers of these routes plus a deeper look at what Pilgrimage means from our long term contributor - Stephen Watt. There are of course many pilgrimage routes to choose from and I suggest having a look at the Scottish Pilgrim Routes Forum for more information.
The St Kentigern Way
A 150 mile (240 km) long-distance walking/pilgrimage trail leading from St. Kentigern’s episcopal Seat at Hoddom near Annan to his tomb in the Crypt of Glasgow Cathedral.
“Annan Tweed and Clyde
A' rise in the ae hillside”
We can assume that Kentigern travelled widely throughout Clydesdale, upper Tweeddale and Annandale on his missionary activities and would have journeyed periodically between the two important religious centres in Glasgow and at Hoddom. The exact route of these journeys is, of course, not recorded but we can indulge in some informed speculation. He would almost certainly have followed riverside pathways south eastwards along the Clyde Valley and beyond Lanark. It is recorded that Kentigern frequented Stobo Kirk for occasional retreats and it is likely that he would have stopped there en-route. Continuing his journey southwards over the head of Tweeddale on ancient but well-trodden pathways he would have reached the head of the Annan river near where the town of Moffat is now situated, whence he could continue down Annandale along the road system left behind by Agricola’s legions and so directly to Hoddom.
This is the route adopted as the basis of the Kentigern Way. Taking Hoddom as the starting point a 150 mile, off-road walking route has been established leading to Glasgow Cathedral and Kentigern’s burial Crypt as the final destination. From Hoddom the Annandale Way can be followed to Moffat where a section of the Southern Upland Way leads over to Traquair. From there the Cross Scotland Drove Road heads across to Peebles where it links up with the John Buchan Way and on to Biggar. A series of byways can then be followed past Tinto Hill to the start of the Clyde Walkway which offers passage all the way, through Bothwell, to Glasgow Green and finally to Glasgow Cathedral. In total this represents a journey of some 150 miles which can be undertaken in a dozen relatively easy stages with food and accommodation available to the weary pilgrim at the end of each day.
The Kentigern Way represents a fine addition to a growing number of Scottish pilgrim routes and long-distance walking trails. It traverses a wide variety of landscapes, encompasses superb scenery and leads the traveller past a great many places of interest spanning several millennia of Scottish history. It passes through a number of attractive Border towns and can be tackled either as a single expedition or, if preferred, in a series of separate outings.
The entire route has now been surveyed and sub-divided into walkable sections with accommodation options identified for each stage. Discussions have been held and agreement reached with representatives of the five Local Authorities who are responsible for the upkeep of the various sections of the paths. The creation of walking maps and the construction of an initial website has been completed which you can find below. The website will give you more detail on each section of the route, accommodation and transport options. The route itself is necessarily a compromise of the authentic, the practical and the aesthetic, but we believe that it is substantially authentic.
http://www.kentigernway.com
Oversight of the project is undertaken by the Kentigern Way Steering Group, affiliated to the Scottish Pilgrim Routes Forum (SPRF).
For more on St Kentigern click the button below.
Bill Jack | Steering Group Member (and keen Pilgrim)
Faith In Cowal: Pilgrimage in the South-West of Scotland
All maps, Saints and sites can be found by clicking the button below:
The idea of developing a pilgrimage route is not new and in Cowal's case it was envisaged that several sites of early Christianity could be linked physically, with a focus on the historic site of Kilmun church which also incorporates Argyll Mausoleum – the burial place of the Clan Campbell.
Building on earlier work by Dr Gilbert Márkus, who succeeded in identifying fifteen sites of early Christian influence within the Cowal peninsula and with financial backing from a bequest left by Augusta Lamont (a member of the Lamont clan originally based near Toward at the southern tip of the peninsula) a small project team was assembled to identify viable walking routes with the intention that they would ultimately link to other pilgrim routes being developed in Scotland with the support of the Scottish Pilgrim Routes Forum.
Fairly early on we determined that we weren't going to get involved in constructing, signposting and maintaining paths since a lot of that work has already been done by other groups e.g. Forestry & Land Scotland, so where possible we made use of existing forest roads and existing waymarked paths such as the Cowal Way which runs through Cowal from Portavadie on the shores of Loch Fyne to beyond the Rest and be Thankful, leaving Cowal for Arrochar and beyond. Our main aim in taking this approach was to provide routes that were as far removed from motorised transport as possible, allowing for a quieter and more reflective experience. That doesn't mean that we didn't make some use of public roads but rather that we concentrated on new and established paths whilst, if necessary we took to the hills and walked over rough ground which was possibly something that early pilgrims would have been used to.
Initially the location of the early Christian sites was communicated by leaflets dispersed to churches throughout Cowal and also via a very silent website but this was clearly insufficient for a wider audience, so making use of modern technology was a must and we decided to produce a more audio-visual experience for the Pilgrim. The result was redevelopment of the website to incorporate a couple of short films highlighting the sites and providing a musical accompaniment to the journey, alongside route guides and detail on each historic site. There's also mention of some additional enjoyable journeys that are suitable for those who might want to walk or travel by bicycle whilst staying in the area. The inclusion of music was one of the most pleasing aspects of the redevelopment as we commissioned a local Christian youth organisation (https://expyouthwork.org.uk/) to write and record the music for one of the films. In a sense they were themselves pilgrims and discovering their own faith in using their musical talent, we were not disappointed.
All of this work was interrupted by the global pandemic of COVID but we see this as nothing more than a modern day obstacle similar to the obstacles that pilgrims have always faced on their journey in faith as the word itself illustrates. 'Peregrinus' (from which the word pilgrim is derived) was the word used in early Latin translations of the Hebrew Bible for someone who ‘dwelt as a stranger’. They lived as aliens, strangers in the land, people uprooted, refugees, wanderers. Such people lacked worldly security, so their status was a mark of humility and trusting dependence on God. This is what underlies the early use of the word ‘pilgrimage’ by Christians. It was not fundamentally to do with a long walk to a holy place. It was a way of being in the world, while retaining a kind of freedom: as Jesus said, ‘They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world’.
So as the result of our labour begins to bear fruit we have much hope for the future in bringing pilgrims to Cowal. They may well come as strangers but they will find a welcome and be free to discover the peace that Cowal offers through a re-discovery of its early Christian heritage.
Douglas McHugh