Sacred pilgrimage has journeyed to commercial boom

The writer is director of the religion think-tank Theos When Archbishop Sarah Mullally made the six-day pilgrimage from St Paul's Cathedral in London to her installation at Canterbury Cathedral last week, she was walking the pilgrim path her predecessor Thomas Becket had walked more than 850 years before her. In her first sermon, delivered at the ceremony I attended alongside 2,000 others, she described having made the journey "in the footsteps of the past". While the notion of pilgrimage -- long arduous journeys on ancient, well-worn routes to holy sites or destinations -- may conjure up images of medieval piety, the pilgrimage industry is booming. Last year, 1.67mn pilgrims travelled to Mecca for Hajj -- the most significant pilgrimage in Islam. While the biggest Hajj recorded was 3.16mn in 2012, Saudi Arabia is expecting growth in the future and planning to improve its infrastructure to significantly increase the capacity of the Hajj to accommodate 6mn people within the next five years. This expectation of a significant increase in demand is echoed across routes associated with various other religions and spiritual traditions. Europe's most famous Christian pilgrimage, the Camino de Santiago (the Way of St James) is a network of ancient routes leading to Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain. In 1984, 423 people completed the 100km-plus route. In 2025, that number was more than 530,000, following years of increase -- most markedly in the years post-Covid. In 2024, the global religious tourism market -- including the Camino, the Hajj and other famous pilgrimage destinations such as Lourdes and the Vatican -- was valued at $286.6bn, and is expected to reach $671.9bn by 2030. This may come as a surprise in an age of declining religiosity, but it suggests the appeal of pilgrimage reaches beyond faith traditions. It reflects a deeper search for meaning, not just among the religious but those of all faiths and none. As Catholic thinker Thomas Merton said: "The geographical pilgrimage is the symbolic acting out an inner journey." We're all -- no matter our religious identity -- seeking answers to existential angst and turbulent times. The BBC television show Pilgrimage sees celebrities come face to face with these truths. Authentic pilgrimages often involve an element of endurance, of denial of self and body. Some are more gruelling than others. St Patrick's Purgatory in County Donegal involves three days of fasting, sleep deprivation and standing on sharpened rocks. This feat might be attractive to Hyrox fans inclined to display their superhuman achievements on Instagram. To some extent, it captures the intensity that many ancient pilgrimages involve. But the increase in popularity of gentler pilgrimages could signify yet another element of a consumer culture: modern spiritual practices operate with market logic. Pilgrimages become another option in a catalogue of wellness products, novelty travel, heritage walk packages and fandom. You can go on Pride and Prejudice pilgrimages and Harry Potter pilgrimages. You can journey to locations associated with your popular culture hero of choice: Abbey Road for Beatles fans, Graceland for Elvis fans. You can walk in the footsteps of the stars on Game of Thrones or go on Lord of the Rings tours. For many, craving the freedom to wander through rugged landscapes on foot sprang from the claustrophobia of Covid-19 lockdowns. For some, pilgrimages mean reconnecting with their heritage, finding answers in the paths walked by their forefathers, connecting to something ancient. So pilgrimage isn't merely a retreat from modernity but a way of navigating it. Rather than a revival of past habits, pilgrimages help us in the present. In a supposedly secular age, the ideas, rituals and practices of religious traditions aren't just concerned with the otherworldly, but the everyday stuff of being human, then as now. And there may be something of the sacred and the secular found in any type of reverential journey, whether in the 14th or 21st century. But perhaps at their most basic level, those pilgrimages that still maintain some connection to religious or spiritual tradition nevertheless answer today's needs. It is no surprise, then, that the industry is booming. Modern-day pilgrims feel the draw of open space, connecting with nature, space for quiet and reflection. Perhaps they feel a pull to disconnect from a world that feels increasingly frenetic. Pilgrimages have always offered refuge from the everyday. Now that means the delightful sound of the thud of walking boots on grass rather than the slow, numbing silence of the never-ending social media doomscroll.