The Commercialization of the Places of Christian Pilgrimages
These days money is everything, and the second someone sees the
opportunity to make a bit of cash they jump at the chance. For
example, places of pilgrimage are visited by many of the millions of
Christians in the whole world, yearly, and never does the number of
these pilgrims fall drastically; giving merchants customers
continuously. In this essay you will hear of just exactly how these
merchants affect the value of Pilgrimage for Pilgrims.
To me, there are two main views here to be looked at. There is the
view of the people, who are affected, and the people who aren’t
affected. So firstly lets talk about those of whom are affected. The
main reason that people go on pilgrimage is so that they can be closer
to God. If we were to take Fatima as an example, then I would most
definitely assure you that on the way, the streets are very very
congested. So, many people decide that instead of driving the rest of
the way, that they will walk there instead. Doing as such is fine, but
the local merchants (a lot) can see this, and take advantage. They set
up their stalls across the street and stuff goods in your face
literally. I mean even if they don’t speak the same language as you,
they’ll still persist and figure out some way of selling you their
goods. And most of the time their goods are quite, well… rubbish. To
some Christians this can get in the way of the real focus of actually
visiting the places of pilgrimage and taking the time to reflect. This
view shows that there is a problem with the commercialised side of
Pilgrimages.
Now onto the second point of view, of the people who aren’t really
affected by all the commercialised parts in Pilgrimage. People who
share such views still go on Pilgrimage but are not concerned with all
the merchandise. I mean, there are people who do purposely want to buy
some of this merchandise, but the important thing is that they don’t
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If you are ready to leave father and mother, and brother and sister, and wife and child and friend, and never see them again… then you are ready for a walk. -Henry David Thoreau (Haberman 12)
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