Learn to make the most of this pilgrim year

Friday, Jan. 17, 2025

PARK CITY — St. Mary of the Assumption Catholic Parish in Park City is offering a presentation on how to make the most of the idea of pilgrimage during this Jubilee Year, which has as its theme “Pilgrims of Hope.”

Luke Stager, a teacher at the Madeleine Choir School who has many years of experience in campus ministry, will present the history and spirituality of a pilgrimage, examples of ancient and modern pilgrimages, and information on how to make a pilgrimage in local communities.

“I decided to present this theme as a variation of a previous talk I gave at the Utah Catholic Conference,” Stager said, adding that he supposes that, with the theme of the Jubilee Year, “Pope Francis is not speaking only of literal walking pilgrimages.”

Stager hopes his talk “will springboard us into a very grace-filled jubilee year journey,” he said. “Most of all I am hoping that people will be inspired to go on their own pilgrimages, especially more local ones.”

Bishop Oscar A. Solis has designated five local churches as pilgrimage sites for this year: the Cathedral of the Madeleine in Salt Lake City; St. George in St. George; St. Francis of Assisi in Orem; St. Joseph in Ogden and Notre Dame de Lourdes in Price.

One of the main themes of Stager’s talk is about “how we often think of pilgrimage as being something done in a faraway land, usually Europe or the Holy Land, but pilgrimage is something that can be done in your own local church,” he said.

A few examples of local pilgrimages already have taken place, and “I have a few ideas I’ve encountered in the past that I will share with the group, and hopefully someone will be inspired by the ideas and try them out,” either by undertaking a pilgrimage or by having something at their own parish, he said.

Stager also plans to present a handful of prayers that can enhance pilgrimages. 

“I know I tend to imagine pilgrimage as walking or traveling to a site in order to pray at that site, but the pilgrimage itself is a form of prayer and can be made richer with deeper understanding,” he said.

Learning the history and spirituality of pilgrimages is important because it connects Catholics to the past and the future of the faith, he said. 

“Our faith is something that transcends time and space but is also in time and in space. … When we go to a holy site, we are connected with those who have been in that place before,” Stager said, sharing that he was first inspired to undertake a pilgrimage after reading Hilaire Belloc’s book The Path to Rome many years ago. 

“My best friend and I tried to retrace, as best as we could, Belloc’s footsteps through France, Switzerland and Italy, and though Belloc died nearly a century ago, we felt connected to him,” Stager said; that pilgrimage occurred in 2014, when he was the campus minister and theology teacher at Judge Memorial Catholic High School.

“Pilgrimage: The Spiritual and the Practical” by Luke Stager will be Thursday, Jan. 23, 6:30 p.m. in the social hall of St. Mary of the Assumption Parish, 1505 White Pine Canyon Road, Park City. RSVP to https://www.stmarysparkcity.com/summit