A Weekend of Pilgrimage

Canterbury is probably my favorite city so far, even though it is fairly touristy there is something about this historic city that compels me to want to come back.
As I've said before, Canterbury is historically a place of pilgrimage, and as pilgrims we walked into the Cathedral. While we didn't walk the Pilgrim's Way barefoot, we did a number of other things pilgrims (even today) still do. If you announce yourself a pilgrim to the Cathedral staff, they will allow you to visit the shrine of St. Thomas Beckett (where his body used to reside), which is fenced off from the general public. The staff acknowledged us as literary pilgrims. The Archdeacon herself gave us a candlelit tour of the Cathedral after Evensong. As she read excerpts from T.S Eliot's essays we walked through the Roman crypts, visited the murder site of St. Beckett, and visited the two places where the saint's body historically lay.

This hipster picture of St. Thomas Beckett's shrine during the Candlelight Tour was taken by Danielle. 

Visiting the Cathedral as a pilgrim rather than a tourist is a completely different experience. In one sense you are aware that this is a journey thousands of others have made before you since the 12th century. You come to the space with a purpose other than checking off another site off your check-list, for the purpose that the Cathedral was originally made for. The sick came to be healed. Others came to seek purpose in life. So as we circled around the candle shrine for St. Thomas Beckett holding candles, I began to wonder why pilgrims come to visit the shrine.
The first thing we did, however, was attend Evensong, and the Archbishop of Canterbury just happened to be there that night. Evensong in the quire was fantastic. The next morning we took a normal tour of the Cathedral, where I took pictures of cats.

Taken outside in the cloister, where the monks hung out. 

The Paladins of Chivalry, a medieval historical re-enactment group, also happened to be on their annual pilgrimage to the Cathedral as well. So we saw people dressed in armor walking around and Cathedral staff looking bewildered.  Later we visited the Pilgrim's Hospice, where poor pilgrims to Canterbury could stay at little or no cost.

For over 800 years pilgrims of all kinds stayed at the hospice. Now it is a museum, though it is still run by the clergy. As English students we of course recited the General Prologue of the Canterbury Tales, and afterwards went through The Canterbury Experience, which was like its namesake: QUITE THE EXPERIENCE. 

Chaucer will haunt you in your sleep. 

Basically it was a museum with creepy figures like this. The audio tour took you through 10 stories (thankfully in modern English). It was fun, mostly because I had forgotten how great some of the stories are. The Wife of Bath's tale is probably my favorite, although I had also forgotten how scandalous the Miller's Tale is. 

Next weekend we go to Oxford, where we plan to: 

• visit Tolkien's grave 
• visit the C.S Lewis Pub
• go punting 
• buy Oxford College sweaters