ABSTRACT
In this volume we have used three case studies of Christian pilgrimage from different denominational and national contexts in order to explore the relationship between pilgrimage, landscape and heritage. Meteora, Subiaco and the Manx keeills have in common a compelling blend of history, faith heritage and present day practice, and are each set within visually appealing landscape settings. While on the surface the keeills appear distinctly different in character to Meteora and Subiaco, which centre on religious communities and the material cultures of icons and frescoes, the keeills were established as or by monastic communities and their acolytes, and the materiality of the ruins of the keeills and the tangible aesthetics of the carved stone Celtic crosses were deeply significant to many participants. Across the different traditions and settings examined, the landscape explicitly informed a hermeneutics of life-as-pilgrimage (notably for Protestants), prompted awe in the case of the Orthodox monasteries of Meteora, a sense of enchantment and the immanence of God through Celtic Christian theology, and was storied as the arena which both shaped and was shaped by St Benedict’s faithful and miraculous life at Subiaco. Christians from all denominations and those of little or no faith reported transcendent experiences in the landscape in each pilgrimage setting, reflecting Solnit’s (2002, 50) description of ‘a world where geography has been spiritualised’. Indeed, the landscape appears to have lacked affective-spiritual impact only for those focusing on their inner spiritual life to the exclusion of all else.
