17/04/2026
This summer, the Church of England offers a new set of reflections centred around pilgrimage – places and stories that help us feel part of something bigger on our journey towards God. You can learn more about these reflections here. This blog unpacks the different resources available and how you could get involved with ‘Pilgrim Places’ on your digital channels.
Explore ‘Pilgrim Places, Holy Lives’ on the Everyday faith app
The ‘Pilgrim Places, Holy Lives’ resource shares devotional reflections exploring the lives of eight English saints. You can get these reflections in a printed booklet, or engage with reflections digitally via the Everyday Faith app. The reflections will be shared from 25 May to 20 June and available for a further 90 days on the app after publication for those who want to begin the journey at another date.
Tag your ‘Pilgrim Place’ on AChurchNearYou.com
On AChurchNearYou.com you can tag your church and your services/events with the ‘Pilgrim Place’ tag to help those interested find you. You can also head to Faith in the North’s Pilgrim Places page to learn about their pilgrimage initiative, see an interactive map of ‘Pilgrim Places’ and register your own church as a Pilgrim Place, as well as find a wealth of resources including those for children, young people and families.
Explore pilgrimage on your digital platforms
The theme of pilgrimage offers an exciting opportunity for generating conversation and engagement on your social media channels. It’s a chance to talk about travel, faith, goals, and the journeys we take in life both as individuals and in community. And thanks to our phones it’s easier than ever to capture visual highlights from pilgrimages and share them with others.
How could you explore the pilgrimage theme? You could try:
A ‘Come with me on a pilgrimage’ video: Tell the story of a pilgrimage through the eyes of those involved, filming/narrating their way through the trip, reflecting on what it means to them.
Generate conversation with a poll/prompt: e.g. ‘where’s a place you would like to make a pilgrimage to this year?’
Photo competition: e.g. ‘Send us photos from your pilgrimage or a site of significance to you!’
Explore your church’s history: Do a graphic-based, text or video explainer on your church’s saint, a significant part of its history or connection to pilgrimage - or explore another site of significance near you.
If you’d like to be involved with the content we’ll be sharing on our national channels in coming weeks about pilgrimage, get in touch with us at [email protected].
Use the downloadable templates
We have a range of striking pilgrimage-themed templates and design resources for churches to use and customise, including:
Poster templates
Social media templates
Invitation templates
A PowerPoint template
A range of Illustrated pilgrimage-themed icons (see examples below)
Logos, backgrounds and brand guidelines for using the assets in your own designs
You can find all these on the Resource Hub on AChurchnearYou.com. Below are some visual examples of how you could use the Pilgrim Places, Holy Lives templates on social media. There are backgrounds you can download e.g. for a Story on Instagram, or you can customise existing templates in Canva and edit/adjust the different elements to fit your context. You could use these templates to promote a prayer group, invite people to a pilgrim walk or church service, or as a graphic to generate conversation about pilgrimage.
Share your own pilgrimage-themed social media content this summer
Following in the footsteps of our previous summer social media campaigns like #ChurchDoorChallenge and #GreatAndSmall (celebrating animals in churches), this summer we’ll be inviting you to share pilgrimage-related content that encourages people to visit your church. Have a think about:
Is your church a pilgrim place, or is it near a historic pilgrimage route?
Does it have any interesting features or history that have made it popular with visitors over the years?
Are you, or your church congregation, planning a pilgrimage this summer?
You can tag us in your posts to get involved. There’s plenty of time to get thinking and creating content as we'll be featuring posts on our channels up until the beginning of September.
Catch up on the launch webinar
Watch this webinar to hear from the Church of England’s Publishing and Digital team to hear more about all of the above, and hear some practical ideas for running pilgrimage events in your context.
