PILGRIMAGES AND MISSIONS

Every spring break the Newman Center organizes either a pilgrimage or a FOCUS mission trip. These extended trips, though requiring effort and resources, pay huge dividends and have the ability to uniquely bring students together, forging great friendships. 

A pilgrimage is a trip undertaken for a spiritual reason and/or undertaken to a spiritually significant location. Pilgrimages have a long history in the Church and contain a profound capacity to broaden one’s understanding of the Church, the Faith, and mysterious ways in which Christ has been present in various places and cultures. 

A mission trip—or perhaps more aptly titled, a religious-cultural-exchange—is a beautiful opportunity to visit another part of the world or country, typically characterized by a certain level of poverty. These trips involve some kind of service to these communities, from visiting the lonely/homebound, catechesis and instruction of the Faith, to physical building. Invariably, the trips are valued by the participants because of the connections made to these local communities, one’s fellow participants, and the kind of knowledge and appreciation of the diversity of our world that is uniquely afforded by first-hand experience.

Both the pilgrimages and mission trips tend to be smaller trips not exceeding twenty people.