Walsingham - England’s Nazareth

The date is 1061, and Harold Godwinson, son of Godwin of Wessex became Earl of East Anglia on his father’s death. He had been promised kingship of the entire land by King Edward the Confessor but in the years just prior, he had a paralysis that was cured at the miraculous cross at the abbey at Waltham.

In this year, the Virgin Mary appeared several times to a Saxon noblewoman, Richeldis de Faverches and instructed her to build a replica of the house where the Archangel Gabriel appeared to the Virgin Mary, and where he told her she was to bear a son, whose name would be Immanuel - ‘God is with us’. Richeldis followed Mary’s instructions, and one night, whilst she was deep in prayer, the building materials that she had bought, suddenly assembled themselves into a holy house in the tiny village of Walsingham on the Norfolk coast. This quickly became a major centre of pilgrimage, one of the very first in this country. It was built because pilgrimages to Jerusalem were dangerous and, during this time, there was serious conflict between the French and English. An Augustinian and a Franciscan monastery were soon erected nearby. When gazing up at the night sky, the Milky Way was called the Walsingham Way of the heavens. 

 

Then in the mid 1500s, Henry VIII commissioned all wealth within the Roman Church, and their convents, monasteries, great abbeys and cathedrals were destroyed in the Reformation.The statue of Mary at Walsingham was burnt and the pilgrimage centre was closed. 

100 years ago, a new statue of Mary was erected and the centre was rebuilt with accommodation. Pilgrims began to arrive in trains from London. Hope Patten, the local priest, set his heart on a pilgrimage revival at Walsingham. Now a pilgrims’ footpath from Norwich has been established and several cycle routes created. The remains of an old priory is still retained as a ruin from Reformation days. Father Kevin Smith is the duty incumbent. It seems strange that the high Church of England both destroyed and has revived this centre of Marian devotion, which usually more of Roman  Catholic antiquity, but the Roman Catholics have a presence nearby in the Slipper Chapel, where pilgrims remove their shoes to make the last few steps of their pilgrimage. 

Reconnecting with the experience of pilgrims of a millennia ago, the focussed practice of pilgrimage is gaining interest. Lindisfarne and Iona are popular, and Glastonbury’s Chalice Well and Tor are heaving with all kinds of pagan and Wiccan revellers all year. Santiago de Compostella in Spain attracts 350,000 a year. 

Article by Wendy Stokes https://wendystokes.co.uk