Fading Colors of the Tibetan Prayer Flag

2014 was a Horse Year. Such a year, occurring every twelve years in Tibetan calendar, is considered the best time for a pilgrimage, particularly to sacred mountains. In the region of Golok, the most prominent of them is Amnye Machen (A myes rma chen). It takes about one week to perform circumambulation of Amnye Machen in the usual way: on foot. But in 2014, a new possibility opened: to perform the pilgrimage by car. This paper describes the experiences of a car pilgrimage around Amnye Machen which the author performed in 2014. It shows how different the new pilgrimage route is from the one followed by non-motorized pilgrims and how different experiences it brings. It also describes the landscape affected by the establishment of Mt. Amyesrmachen National Geological Park in the area of Amnye Machen and construction works connected to it

The 1936 Vimy Pilgrimage

This article explores the significance of the 1936 Vimy Pilgrimage. More than 6,200 Canadian veterans and their families voyaged to France for the unveiling of Walter Allward’s Vimy Memorial on 26 July 1936 by King Edward VIII. The symbolism of the pilgrimage, along with the messages presented during the unveiling ceremony, played a key role in establishing the importance of the Vimy Ridge memorial to Canadians

Eros and Pilgrimage in Chaucer’s and Shakespeare’s Poetry

The paper discusses erotic desire and the motif of going on pilgrimage in the opening of Geoffrey Chaucer’s General Prologue to The Canterbury Tales and in William Shakespeare’s sonnets. What connects most of the texts chosen for consideration in the paper is their diptych-like composition, corresponding to the dual theme of eros and pilgrimage. At the outset, I read the first eighteen lines of Chaucer’s Prologue and demonstrate how the passage attempts to balance and reconcile the eroticism underlying the description of nature at springtime with Christian devotion and the spirit of compunction. I support the view that the passage is the first wing of a diptych-like construction opening the General Prologue. The second part of the paper focuses on the motif of pilgrimage, particularly erotic pilgrimage, in Shakespeare’s sonnets. I observe that most of the sonnets that exploit the conceit of travel to the beloved form lyrical diptychs. Shakespeare reverses the medieval hierarchy of pilgrimage and desire espoused by Chaucer. Both poets explore and use to their own ends the tensions inherent in the juxtaposition of sacred and profane love. Their compositions encode deeper emotional patterns of desire: Chaucer’s narrator channels sexual drives into the route of communal national penance, whereas the Shakespearean persona employs religious sentiments in the service of private erotic infatuations

The experience of pilgrimage in the Roman Empire: communitas, paideiā, and piety-signaling

Pilgrimage of various types is well attested in the pre-Christian religions of the Roman Empire, but there is comparatively little evidence for the personal experiences of pilgrims. Some recent studies have argued that typical pilgrims of this period were members of the intellectual elite highly versed in literary culture (paideia) who saw sacred places as museums of Greek culture. In this paper, I try to reconstruct what we can about the experience of pilgrimage in early Roman Empire, looking at three cases studies: a. Philo’s somewhat idealized account of Jewish pilgrimage to Jerusalem, which stresses intense common feeling (or communitas, to use Victor Turner’s term) between participants; b. Pilgrimage to the oracle of Apollo at Claros, to which cities of Asia Minor and elsewhere sent sacred delegations, largely made up choirs of children who performed hymns at the sanctuary. It may be suggested that the experience of the pilgrimage was in large part an educative one - learning about Greek culture and learning how to behave in public; itmight even be seen as a sort of rite of passage. c. The healing-pilgrimages of Aelius Aristides to Pergamum and elsewhere. Aristides’ experience at Pergamum is full of paideia, though that was not the primary motivation, and it sometimes approaches communitas, though in the end the presence of other people tends to serve the purpose of an audience and foil for his own brilliance. Key aspects of his experience seem to be: a) suffering and b) a feeling of closeness to the god, sometimes bordering on identification with him

A Journey of a Lifetime

A 1,000-kilometer pilgrimage is spiritual and emotional

Economic Significance of Pilgrimage: A Focused Micro Level Study from Kerala, India

Pilgrimage to any sacred or divine place is of great importance to express the socio- cultural sentiments of a person or society. This study attempts a focused approach of Sabarimala pilgrimage, by looking in to the involvement of a group of people. Sabarimala is significant not only as a renowned and well-visited pilgrim centre, but it is deeply attached to the very life of a group of people on the fringe and buffer zones of PTR. The economic dimension of the pilgrim season is quite impressive and the generated income has spin off effects. Along with its economic side, its environmental aspects are explored in the study.Pilgrimage tourism,economics of pilgrimage, Sabarimala, Lord Ayyappa, Periyar Tiger Reserve, eco-development,bio-diversity conservation, pilgrimage economics, Eco-development committees, grass-root democratic governance committees.

In Antarctica: An Amundsen Pilgrimage by Jay Ruzesky

Review of In Antarctica: An Amundsen Pilgrimage by Jay Ruzesky

The Abrahamic Pilgrimage Story in Sermons: An Ontological-Narrative Foundation of Asian American Life in Faith

Sang Hyun Lee and many other Asian American scholars have found that the Abrahamic pilgrimage story has been an ontological-narrative backbone of Asian American faith constructs. This article further explores their previous research by suggesting three distinct theological narrative styles of the given Abrahamic pilgrimage saga: the allegorical- typological narrative style, the illustrative narrative style, and the eschatologicalsymbolic narrative style. However, though distinct, the styles are closely associated with one another. I will show sermon excerpts by Asian American preachers that are good examples of the theological-spiritual embodiment of the three styles

Book Review: Gandhi\u27s Pilgrimage of Faith: From Darkness to Light

A review of Gandhi\u27s Pilgrimage of Faith: From Darkness to Light by Uma Majmudar

Review of Jainism - A Pictorial Guide to the Religion of Non-Violence by Kurt Titze (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1998)

A review of Kurt Titze's Pictorial Guide to Jain pilgrimage sites with contributions of Klaus Bruhn, Jyoti Prasad Jain, Noel King, and Vilas A. Sangave