In recent years, there has been a major rediscovery of Celtic Christianity, although the enthusiasm that has surrounded this has not always been matched with genuine insights into the traditions and spirituality of the Celtic church. Lightline has twenty years of experience in bringing Christians from the USA to discover the story of the Celtic saints of northern Britain, and to visit the places associated with this remarkable flowering of mission and ministry in the 6th and 7th centuries of the Common Era.
Many of our pilgrimages combine the history and geography of the Celtic mission to Britain, starting with a few days on the island of Iona, where St Columba landed in 563. From this extraordinary base, the Celtic saints gradually re-evangelized northern Britain, journeying across modern-day Scotland to Holy Island (Lindisfarne) in Northumbria, and across much of the North East of England. Our pilgrimages offer visits to all the major places touched by the ministry of these saints, usually culminating in some days based in Durham City, where the Norman cathedral was built as the final resting place of St Cuthbert, the most beloved of these saints. Throughout the pilgrimage, as we learn of the lives of Columba, Cuthbert, Aidan, Hild, Bede, Wilfrid and others, we learn much from them that will sustain Christian discipleship in the 21st Century.
