Companions

Pilgrimages are becoming increasingly important in times of growing stress and mental strain.

More and more pilgrims want to travel with pilgrim guides. They are looking for a community so that they are not completely alone on this adventure with themselves in a foreign place. They choose to retreat from everyday life in order to pause and reflect, and seek support on these new and unfamiliar paths.

The Wilheringer Pilgrimage Route has specially trained guides for this purpose.

They provide pilgrims with structure and inspiration for a holistic experience of the route and an encounter with God.

Pilgrim guides are signposts. They show the way, know the route and are familiar with many places of power, healing sites and treasures of nature and culture. With their inspiration, they also point to inner paths. They encourage us to open our eyes to the treasures along the way and help us to discover sources from which we can draw strength for our everyday and professional lives.

Pilgrim guides are providers. They offer guidance on the pilgrimage route and on the path of life. They create a frame of reference between places and words, places and sensory impressions, places and experiences, and places and opportunities for change. They inspire others to live consciously and fully.

This ‘infection’ helps us to break away from the old, the familiar, the rigid and the lifeless in order to change. Change means transformation and development, becoming more and more the person God intended me to be. Such a spiritual experience – in which the heart opens up, transforms and heals – needs to be interpreted.

Pilgrim guides are companions. They accompany you as you ponder: What do I need? What am I carrying? What am I lugging around with me? What baggage can I throw off? What can I endure? How little can I get by with, and what do I actually need for a good life?

Christine Dittlbacher, MAS