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Click here for Useful Information on the National Pilgrimage
2010 National Pilgrimage 12 noon Concelebrated Mass (Abbey Grounds) Principal Celebrant - The Rt Revd Martin Warner, Bishop of Whitby 2.30 pm Sermon (Preacher: The Rt Revd Gordon Mursell, Bishop of Stafford), Procession and Benediction
Bishop Lindsay Urwin OGS writes: WALSINGHAM : HOUSE OF GLORY A good crowd gathered at Walsingham for the National Pilgrimage this year to celebrate this House of Glory. The day, if a little chilly in the morning, was filled with warmth, good humour and devotion. To get to Walsingham and back in a day is all but out of the question for pilgrims in many parts of the country, though I met one pilgrim who had made it from Exeter to London in time to cadge a lift with a group from the capital. Perhaps the long journey made the arrival and the day at the Shrine all the sweeter. It was a joy to welcome two new bishops, ordained since the last National; Bishop Mark Sowerby of Horsham and of course our own Bishop Martin Warner, now of Whitby, and Master of the College of Guardians who presided as to the manor born! The Mass was offered with a lovely mixture of solemnity and informality, with music and hymnody that gathered the congregation up in song and celebration. As usual, we were well and graciously marshalled by the Sea Cadet corps from Brighton led by Canon Brandie, and of course there was an efficient team of servers and assistants. It is always an encouragement to have a number of deacons serving the liturgy, and carrying the image in procession. God is still calling and ordaining! The afternoon sermon was preached by Bishop Gordon Mursell, the now retired bishop of Stafford. It was just about his last event as a serving bishop. He has retired on the grounds of ill health, but this did not prevent him delivering an engaging and interesting homily, the text of which appears below and is worthy of your reflection. The procession through the village followed and this year as we prepared we sang a lovely litany of Our Lady that originates from the Shrine at Lourdes, and then the pilgrim hymn interspersed with the saying of the Rosary led by the familiar voice of Sister Alma Mary who in this month of June celebrates the 50th anniversary of her religious profession.
Those who have been to the National will know that each year we are joined by a small group of fellow Christians who feel so strongly that we are wrongheaded in our devotion that they come to make protest. The moment when the image turns from the High Street into the Common Place where the protestors gather is one which fills me with sadness. Two groups of people who love the Lord sing their hymns less in adoration of him than as two opposing sides winding each other up with song as in a football stadium. And yet, a few minutes later all is hush as the Blessed Sacrament is brought to the Altar of Light in the Shrine grounds and the assembled company kneels in stillness to receive the great Blessing in his presence, before the journey home. Well not quite, more than a few make their way to the Bull public house to meet friends and continue the celebration before a gentle quietness falls on the village.
Outside the Bull I met a young family who had come to Walsingham by chance that day. They were absolutely overwhelmed by it all, and most of all, by the sense of joy, ‘and you seem like ordinary people’ said the young mum, ‘aside from the clothes!’. Next year’s National will be on Monday May 30th and the theme: ‘1061 and all that’, celebrating 950 years of living with a vision. There will also be regional celebrations : March 5th in St Albans Abbey, May 7th in Exeter Cathedral and September 17th in York Minster.
Visit the Shrine's PhotoGallery for a full selection of photographs taken on the day.
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THE
NATIONAL PILGRIMAGE In 1938 the Whitsun weekend saw a huge influx of pilgrims to Walsingham to witness the blessing of the much enlarged Shrine Church. As had become customary, there was a great procession from the Parish Church to the Shrine . It was estimated that the procession took "one hour less three minutes" to pass the Common Place and that 6,000 pilgrims passed through the Holy House. In the report of the weekend in the 1938 Our Lady's Mirror (the forerunner of the present Walsingham Review) the intention was announced to hold a similar day pilgrimage "as an annual event every Whit Monday." This indeed happened in 1939 and 1940, but then, for the remainder of World War II, the pilgrimage went into abeyance. 1946 saw its highly successful revival - but pouring rain meant the procession had to be cancelled! The Whit Monday great pilgrimage became known as the "National" in 1959 - after one of the guardians, the present Earl of Lauderdale, had written to The Church Times urging people to join the Whit Monday pilgrimage, describing it as "the first National Pilgrimage in the history of the Church of England to the Shrine of the Incarnation at Walsingham." In 1971 the Whit Monday bank holiday was moved to the last Monday in May and the National Pilgrimage moved from Whitsuntide to this date. The only cancellation since 1946 was in 2001 because of the Foot and Mouth epidemic. The Walsingham Archive pages contain fascinating accounts and much more information on the history of the National. Did you know, for example, that there were not enough cows in Walsingham to supply the milk needed for the pilgrims' tea on Whit Monday 1938? Or that 106 pilgrims had breakfast at The Clock Restaurant in Welwyn Garden City on their way to Walsingham and between them, left 4d (four pence) in tips! Go to the Archive home page, enter the Archives and find "Whit Monday Pilgrimages". Since 2004, when the programme of the National Pilgrimage was recast to include a lunch-break, the practice of formal picnicking in The Abbey grounds has grown. Last year, there was a wonderful sense of togetherness as pilgrims from all over the country produced hampers, tables and chairs - and the Walsingham National Pilgrimage lunch party began! If you are coming to this year's event, do think about bringing a picnic - of course the sun will shine and the grass be dry!
The Procession in Common Place in 2009
Our Lady of Walsingham and Our Lady of Lourdes 2009
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Useful information about the NationalThe weather - (dare one say it) the National is
remarkably blessed with good weather. Washouts, fortunately, are
very rare. Last year (2006) whilst the rest of Britain had
torrential rain, this little bit of north Norfolk remained
sunny and dry until the evening (see picture opposite). But
do come prepared. STOP PRESS: 2007 saw the worst weather for
the National since 1983. You never can tell! 2010 National Pilgrimage - sermon delivered by the The Rt Revd Gordon Mursell, Bishop of Stafford.Some years ago, while on a family holiday in south-west France, my wife and I came upon a small rural church which was situated close to the route of the Tour de France, the national cycle race. The enterprising parish priest had rebranded the church, putting it under the patronage of Notre Dame des Cyclistes: when you entered it, photos of previous Tours de France were up on the walls, there was a votive candlestand where prayers could be offered for cyclists and travellers in particular, and to the left of the high altar was a statue of Our Lady wearing a yellow jersey. In fact what this priest had done was not as original as it appeared, for there is a long tradition of devotion to Mary as patron saint of travellers and nomads. Ancient titles such as porta caeli (gate of heaven) or stella maris (star of the sea) underline this belief that Mary could be a guide to all who journey: we will return to this theme shortly. Let me say at once that for me this is no academic subject: as someone about to begin the journey into retirement, I am aware of needing all the help I can get; and for those many faithful Catholic Anglicans who wait to see whether the General Synod will allow them to remain with integrity in the Church they love, devotion to the Virgin Mother who guides us on our journeys may have something powerful to offer. Let’s begin with the first journey that Mary makes, and the theme of today’s feast, the Visitation of Mary to Elizabeth. We are told that Mary “set out”(Lk 1:39: the Greek here is ἀναστασα, lit. “rose up”, the spirit of resurrection already at work within her even before her child was born), and journeyed to Elizabeth. As Archbishop Rowan and others have said, this makes Mary the first - and in a sense the exemplary - Christian evangelist, consciously carrying the yet-to-be-born Christ on her journey and into her personal encounters: yet to be born because Christ chose to be born only through humble human agency, through Mary’s flesh and blood and ours. What we carry with us on our journeys and in our personal encounters will communicate, whether verbally or not, whether we want it to or not: resentment, envy, self-centredness, wrongly-directed desire. Mary was human, and must have had those too: disappointment or even anger that her and Joseph’s plans for their future were to be replaced by something else. She had to learn, as we must, to travel light: to let go of what embitters and damages us, and to carry only the love of God that waits to be made flesh through us. That love communicates as though by an electric charge, the new life of God that is in Mary spontaneously igniting the new life that still lies hidden in the womb of Elizabeth (“as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy”, Lk 1:44). This surely is real evangelism, heart speaking to heart in a way beyond all words - not so much my taking God to people, as the love of God deep within each person evoking and calling forth an echo deep within someone else. And it all depends on our willingness to “rise up” and set out. But it also depends on something else. Mary is remarkable for believing, as Elizabeth says to her, “that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her by the Lord” (Lk 1:45). It is precisely at that moment that Mary sings her Magnificat. In fact it is perhaps only because of her shared conversation and reflection with Elizabeth that she comes to see the true cosmic significance of what the angel has said to her. The love, the call, that have been conceived in her are not only, or even primarily, for her, but for all the world. What is remarkable about the Magnificat is not so much its content, which is rooted in Old Testament scripture, but its context: two lay women, without either power or status, have a conversation, share their experience of God; and from that sharing comes the bold envisioning of a new future for humanity (“he has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly”, 1:52). This is the way the Church will be renewed, has always been renewed - not by bishops and synods, but by small groups of people, small Christian communities and congregations, sharing their faith, dreaming together of a new future and praising that new future into being in liturgy and prayer. And that surely is why we need holy places like this: people set out and travel here, and our shared encounters are miniature Visitations, where the love that God has implanted in each one of us is called forth, and bears fruit for the world.
Not all the journeys that Mary makes are as joyful as that one, for the child to which she gives birth will cause her terrible suffering. Perhaps that’s not surprising: good mothering - not simply the literal giving-birth that only a woman can do, but the capacity to show and share a mother’s love and care which all of us can offer - is always costly. One of the most extraordinary of the many ancient legends about Our Lady comes in The Golden Legend, the thirteenth-century collection of saints’ lives and stories which proved enormously popular. It tells of how a pious widow whose only son, whom she loved dearly, was kidnapped by enemies. So the widow prayed earnestly to the Blessed Virgin, to whom she was devoted. When she got no answer to her prayers, she went into a church, stood in front of the statue of Our Lady, and said “O Virgin blessed, I have often asked you for the liberation of my son, and so far you have not come to the aid of this pitiable mother. I have sought your patronage for my son and see no return for my prayers. Therefore, as my son has been taken away from me, I will take your Son away from you and hold him in custody as a hostage for mine.” So she grabs the image of the Christ child from the Virgin’s lap, rushes home and locks it up in a cupboard. The following night Our Lady appears to the kidnapped young man, sets him free, and tells him to go home and get his mum to return the image of her son, which he duly does (Jacopus de Voragine, The Golden Legend, trans. Ryan (1993), vol.2 p155). We may find such a story amusing, and that kind of prayer brazen and manipulative. But then most of us don’t experience the sudden loss of a child. Mary did: first, at the Finding in the Temple, when her son slipped quietly away, and it took three days’ desperate searching to find him - Mary’s anguished prayer to Jesus (“why have you treated us like this?” Lk 2:48) both anticipates, and gives voice to, the prayers of all who have ever lost something incredibly precious - a child, a loved one, a vocation, a cherished hope, a sense of belonging - and who cannot understand where God is in such terrible loss. Then, at the foot of the Cross, Mary the mother becomes Our Lady of Sorrows as she suffers her most terrible loss, and watches her child die. And yet it is precisely at that most traumatic moment that new life breaks forth: the dying Christ sees a new future for Mary as the mother of his closest friend, and a new future for the friend as her son - and invites each of them to see that new future, that new potential, in one another (“Woman, behold thy son...behold thy mother! And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home” Jn 19:26-7 AV). This too is how renewal happens, this too is why we need places like this, where not just the confident and the strong but the broken and the desperate and the disappointed can, by sharing their grief at the foot of the Cross, receive in return the unimaginable gift of a new hope and a new future. And notice - two people, who hitherto had in common only one thing - a love of Jesus above all else - discover that together, and only together, they can bear his love into the world: if that isn’t an image of the Church of the future, I don’t know what is. So Mary shows us the way to renewal and hope, even - in fact precisely - in the midst of disappointment and despair. But, and finally, she does something even more important than that. She is the person in whom, and through whom, the ultimate journey takes place, the journey of God from heaven to earth, from the divine to the human. In the womb of the Virgin, God becomes a migrant (remember that old hymn, “Thou didst leave thy throne and thy kingly crown,/ When thou camest to earth for me”?), and the greatest of all borders is crossed and opened up. Mary crossed borders literally too, becoming with St Joseph and their child asylum seekers in Egypt when they fled from Herod’s wrath. No wonder Mary is the patron saint of border crossers: no wonder the great shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico attracts hundreds of thousands of poor migrants, whose only crime is to seek a better life for their families, and who ask for her intercession before embarking on the desperately dangerous road to the United States border. Perhaps a key role for all great Marian shrines such as this is to be, not just a hospitable place but a prophetic one, where the migrant and the nomad (of whom eastern England must have a disproportionate number) can be honoured and made welcome; where the border controls that seek to cut us off from those who are not like us, and to exclude those who do not fit in to the prevailing view of church or society, can be breached; where those who, for whatever reason, are made to feel a failure in their own or the world’s eyes, can say “here at least I am at home.” For you and I are migrants and nomads, and we belong to a church that is not something like a club but something like a caravan, not an institution but a people on the move; and we need safe places that can be for us what the womb of Mary was for almighty God - crossing-points, places of healing and care and welcome. One final question. Why Mary? Why not Christ alone? Mary herself would surely be shocked at such a question, for her entire life and vocation consisted in pointing beyond herself to him. In 1920, the great Anglo-Catholic writer Evelyn Underhill told the story of a convert from agnosticism who was receiving instruction from “a devout and simple-minded nun. They were discussing the story of the Annunciation, which presented some difficulties to [the convert]. At last she said to the nun, ‘Well, anyhow, I suppose that one is not obliged to believe that the Blessed Virgin was visited by a solid angel, dressed in a white robe?’ To this the nun replied doubtfully, ‘No, dear, perhaps not. But still, you know, he would have had to wear something.’” And Underhill continues: “Here, as it seems to me, we have a great theological truth. The elusive contacts and subtle realities of the world of spirit have got to wear something if we are to grasp them at all. Moreover, if the mass of men are to grasp them ever so little, they must wear something which is easily recognized by the human eye and human heart; more, by the...soul existing in each one of us, stirring in the depths and reaching out in its own way towards God” (Upton Lectures 1922, pp140-1). Mary doesn’t need to wear a yellow jersey for us to see, in and through her, a God with clothes on, and in both her joy and her sorrow she shows us how the love of that God can take on clothes and flesh in us too. Sing of a girl who will never grow old, joy in her eyes and gold in her hair. Through the ages men will be told of the child that mother will bear. (Damian Lundy)
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 Brightly dawns the 2006 National day! - early arrivals await the procession from the Shrine (above) - the organist gets organised (below)
The procession to Mass leaving the Shrine Church in 2005 - the Shrine's famous "Maltese" lanterns to the fore (above); the return procession passes the Common Place (below)
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