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Today most Evangelical and other Protestant Christians think of pilgrimage, if they think about it at all, is as something done by Roman Catholics that Protestants must reject because the practice is unbiblical. The only exception to this negative view of pilgrimage is the use of the term as an analogy for a spiritual journey. This usage is best exemplified by John Bunyan’s [1628-1688] classic work A Pilgrim’s Progress [1678] and later writers, like C.S. Lewis who use similar ideas in books like The Pilgrim’s Regress [1933]. Therefore, before we can talk of Christian tourism in terms of a pilgrimage, it is necessary to look at what the Bible says about travel and visits to particular places.
All Christians recognize that the Bible speaks of an individual’s journey through life as a pilgrimage [Genesis 47:9] and that Biblical writers compare life on earth to a journey or walk [Hebrews 11; 3 John 3-4]. Thus, Jesus gathered his disciples with the words "follow me" [Matthew 4:19; Luke 5:27] and told people to "take up" their "cross and follow" him [Mark 8:34]. With such a life changing challenge from the mouth of Jesus it is no wonder that the writer of Hebrews describes believers as "aliens and strangers on earth" [Hebrews 11:13]. Nor is it surprising that the authors of the King James version of the Bible translated the Hebrews passage as "strangers and pilgrims on the earth."
The actual practice of pilgrimage developed among the Jews, and later Christians, when the Biblical emphases on the importance of seeing life as a journey, was linked to Biblical commands to remember the acts of God. Throughout the Old and New Testaments of Biblical writers constantly remind the reader about the things God has done. Indeed, the act of remembrance on the part of both God and His people is a central theme of the entire Bible. Genesis 9:8-17 has God pointing to the rainbow as a perpetual reminder of His everlasting covenant. Thus a visible sign is clearly said to represent a spiritual truth. Later in Genesis 17 God re-establishes His covenant with Abram who is renamed Abraham. Now the sign of the covenant becomes the physical act of circumcision that distinguishes all Jews from other peoples. Later still God enlarges His Covenant through Moses. One again remembrance is a recurring theme. In Exodus 2:24 we read "And God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac and with Jacob" and frees the Israelites from Egyptian bondage. But, there is a catch. God liberates His people. In turn He is to be "remembered throughout all generations" [Exodus 3:16].
To ensure that the people do not forget their God, and His deeds, God institutes the Passover [Exodus 12]. Henceforth the People of Israel are to celebrate this feast from generation to generation "for ever" [Exodus 12:14]. What’s more, the meaning of this celebration is to be taught and re-taught annually to the entire household, especially to children [Exodus 12:26-27]. This emphasis on teaching children the acts of God is repeated throughout the entire Old Testament and taken up by various writers in the New Testament as will be seen. The negative side of this emphasis on remembrance is that when the prophets judge the People of Israel one of the greatest charges against them is that they have forgotten the Lord their maker [Isaiah 51:13; Jeremiah 23:27].
When we turn to the New Testament we find a similar emphasis on remembrance. At the center of Christian ritual practice stand the twin institutions of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Baptism is the act of admittance into the Christian community and as such corresponds to circumcision in the Old Testament [Romans 4-6; Colossians 2:11-12]. The Lord’s Supper, or communion, corresponds to the Jewish Passover [1 Corinthians 5:7; 11:23-25]. In these and numerous other ways the Bible continually teaches Christians to remember the acts of God.
Further examination of biblical texts shows that the association of particular places with the acts of God was not merely tolerated, but positively encouraged in the Bible. Thus Jacob marks the place where he encountered God with a stone [Genesis 28:16-22]. Later, Joshua commands the children of Israel to build a memorial of stone to remind them, and their children, and their children’s children, that God led the people across the Jordan. What’s more these stones were supposed to stand as "a memorial for ever" [Joshua 4:1-7]. When we come to the New Testament the importance of physical marker for the remembrance of God’s great acts are not neglected by the apostles who continue to journey to Jerusalem because it is a "holy" city [Acts 3:1; 11:2; 20:16; 21:17-26].
Of course, like later reformers throughout the centuries, Paul warned against spiritual abuse. Christian, he maintained, are at liberty to practice their religion however God and their conscience leads. Therefore, they are not bound by "questions of food or drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath" [Colossians 2:16-17] Nevertheless, nowhere does he discourage Christians from using numerous means to strengthen their faith. On the contrary he constantly urges Christians to take their faith seriously, grow in the knowledge of God, and roots his preaching of the Scriptures in a knowledge of history [Colossians 1:10; Romans 15:1-33; Acts 13:16-42; 17:22-32]. Consequently, it seems safe to conclude that biblically there is a place for pilgrimage in the Christian life even though, like most other things, it can be abused.
Today the idea of Christian pilgrimage as travel with a purpose is slowly reviving. This revival began among Roman Catholics who, like Protestants, had largely abandoned the practice of pilgrimage in the late 20th Century. Since 1980, however, Roman Catholics have once more seen the value of pilgrimage and the number of pilgrims visiting ancient sites has grown phenomenally.
Among Protestants, especially Evangelicals, the idea of pilgrimage is less easily revived. Nevertheless, today Evangelicals are realizing that there is a flow to history and that remembering the great deeds of God is a Christian responsibility. As Edith Schaeffer writes: "Memories of paintings, sculptures, museums, churches last a lifetime after a concentrated time … those memories color understanding not only of art, but of the history of the periods of time surrounding the artists' lives … Somehow time is multiplied in a few days spend digesting art, and the rare wonder of a city like Florence …" [The Tapestry, Waco, Word, 1981:347].
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