In one of the smallest churches in England, a couple of dozen people are taking the weight off their walking boots for a moment of quiet reflection in the cool gloom. Outside, an unlikely April sun pours over the South Downs.

It seemed, says Will Parsons, a good moment to learn the lyrics of John Bunyan’s To Be a Pilgrim – perhaps, he adds, adopting neutral terms “to be more inclusive”.

The group was soon belting out the 17th-century hymn, drawing curious passersby to peer into the tiny hillside Church of the Good Shepherd, in Lullington. Come wind, come weather, regardless of lions, giants, hobgoblins or foul fiends, “there’s no discouragement / Shall make them once relent / Their first avowed intent/ To be a pilgrim”, they sang.

This merry band are part of a new boom in pilgrimage which has seen the re-establishment of ancient routes and the growing participation of people on a spectrum of belief from religiously devout to committed atheists.



On the pilgrimage in East Sussex. Photograph: Will Parsons

Clutching wooden staffs – both for practical assistance and to distinguish them from other ramblers and hikers – the group was journeying from Lewes Priory to the Holy Well in Eastbourne over two and a half days. They stopped at churches, ancient sites and places of natural beauty, picnicked on lush spring grass and slept on the floors of an Anglican church and a non-conformist chapel.



Parsons and Guy Hayward, who founded the British Pilgrimage Trust in 2014, say there is a “buzz” around travelling with purpose among strangers. This year they have doubled the number of public pilgrimages they offer to meet demand. “Bring your own beliefs,” they urge their participants.



Guy Hayward and Will Parsons. Photograph: Will Parsons

“It’s beautifully slow. It simply works,” said Parsons. “You encounter so much of this land when you go on foot. On the path, you lose all that insulation we strive so hard for in our lives: brick walls, gates, cars, earphones.”



Hayward added: “For most of our evolutionary history, we were travellers. This is about connecting with our traditions, our lineage.”



In medieval times, you could barely move in England without encountering groups of pilgrims, often heading for shrines to Thomas Becket at Canterbury and the Virgin Mary at Walsingham in Norfolk. Pilgrimages were undertaken for religious reasons, but were also often something of a holiday, a chance to escape the humdrum of daily life, to meet new people along the way, to swap stories.



Passing the Long Man of Wilmington. Photograph: Will Parsons

Chaucer chronicled this phenomenon in the hugely popular Canterbury Tales, written in the late 14th century. The epic yarn describes a group of pilgrims travelling from London to Becket’s shrine, with each obliged to tell a story for the others’ entertainment along the journey.



The tradition came to a sudden end in 1538, when Henry VIII and Thomas Cromwell banned pilgrimages as part of sweeping moves – including the dissolution of the monasteries and the abolition of saints’ days – to obliterate the pre-Reformation church. Relics could no longer be displayed for worship, and the shrines at Canterbury and Walsingham were destroyed. Pilgrimages did not make a reappearance in England for more than 300 years.

The resurgence in interest in recent years began with the Camino de Santiago, the pilgrimage across north-western Spain to Santiago de Compostela. In 1984, 423 pilgrims completed the final 100km stretch of the Camino, entitling them to an official certificate. By 2006, the figure was 100,377 – and by last year, it had exceeded 278,000. Of those, 6,000 were from the UK – a fourfold increase in a decade.



“It’s very, very busy on the main route, a constant stream of people,” said Leslie Gilmour, who runs Camino Adventures, a website which advises pilgrims and shares stories from the Camino.



Pilgrims with the British Pilgrimage Trust. Photograph: Will Parsons

Gilmour, an atheist who has walked the Camino three times, attributed its growing popularity to a desire for a break from daily life that had a spiritual or contemplative dimension. “Sometimes people are facing big decisions and want time and space to reflect. Sometimes people want to find a community of sorts. Religion is often not the main motivation,” he said.



The British Pilgrimage Trust aims to tap into this. “We’ve opened up the definition of a holy place to include prehistoric burial sites, ancient trees, river confluences, hilltops,” said Hayward. “Lots of people simply want to connect with the natural world at a pace at which you can appreciate it.”



In “normal” life, he said, “our minds are speeding up while our bodies are staying put. Here, the mind and the body can meet up.”



All proceeds from Trust pilgrimages are ploughed into Hayward and Parsons’s goal of re-establishing the Old Way, a medieval 220-mile (350km) pilgrims’ route from Southampton to Canterbury, which they hope will one day rival the Camino. Using the Gough Map, dating from 1360, the pair are retracing the route using public footpaths. It will take 18 days to walk from start to finish.

In Scotland, six pilgrimage routes are being developed in response to a resurgence in interest. A route in honour of St Magnus will be launched in Orkney on Sunday, the 900th anniversary of his death.

But organised pilgrimage is not to everyone’s taste. Adrian Smith, a teacher from Hatfield, Hertfordshire, last week walked alone from London to Canterbury, retracing the steps of Chaucer’s pilgrims – although amid a markedly different landscape.



Walking on the South Downs. Photograph: Will Parsons

“I needed to unwind after a long term, and doing something physically arduous helps the process,” he said. His route took him down the A2, with some minor deviations, a total of about 65 miles in four days.



“Some of it was really grim. I was unprepared for quite so many pound shops, vape shops and boarded up pubs. But I felt humbled by the hospitality I received, and grateful that I’m free to do this kind of thing. The best conversation I had was with three homeless guys.”



Smith said walking alone was important – “just to feel the rhythm of your own steps”. Describing himself as a “quiet churchgoer”, he had not been looking for a spiritual experience, “but I feel calm and at peace having completed the walk”.



In the Church of the Good Shepherd on the South Downs, there was also much talk of peacefulness, connection and spiritual nourishment. On the first evening of the pilgrimage, the group walked in darkness and silence to reach St Peter’s, a 13th-century church in the Sussex village of Firle.



“Walking across open countryside at night, encountering startled animals, was really quite beautiful. There was a sense of wonderment,” said Elizabeth Sinclair-House. “The rhythm of walking really helps with reflection.”



According to Parsons, “there’s a lot of baggage around the word pilgrimage. But this is part of our indigenous tradition. This is part of who we are.”

