Away from the City: Our Lady of the Garden Enclosed

In my Quest for Authenticity (see previous post) I decided to visit the hermitage of the village of Warfhuizen in the north of Groningen province. Situated in the extreme north of the Netherlands in seclusion, the hermitage became famous in Middle Ages as a site to venerate Mary because of a life-size statue, the “Sorrowful Mother of Warfhuizen”

As you may already have guessed, I am not a Christian nor a religious person. This fact invokes formal (from the standpoint of tourist studies) and rather relevant question: ‘If I visit pilgrimage sites without any religious intentions, can I still be called a religious tourist?’

Famous statue of Mary

According to Rinschede (1992): “Religious tourism includes the visit of religious ceremonies and centers”. Moreover, in terms of motivation, one can classify religious tourism as the tourism whose participants are motivated exclusively for religious reasons, and should be distinguished from cultural tourism which has solely educational reasons. However, Rinschede (1992) also claims that today cultural tourism and religious tourism are closely interconnected and one can be a subgroup of another (think of ‘Da Vinci Code’ example).

Therefore, I can be considered as a religious tourist despite not being motivated for religious reasons, which is pretty important in my Quest for Authenticity.

Scene depicting the birth of Christ with toy figures

Calling myself a religious tourist because of theory was not enough, so I decided to acquire at least a little portion of pilgrim travelling experience by traveling to the hermitage by bike instead of a bus or taxi. Although the trip was dangerous and deadly exhausting (21.2 km with my physique felt like 100 km, not mentioning the return trip), I can definitely say that I had the most authentic and rewarding experience. Apart from the feeling of tranquility while in the countryside, I felt unusual serenity the moment I stepped into the quiet atmosphere of the chapel. The famous statue and large crucifix made the inside of the small chapel look as if it was the hall of the grand cathedral while at the same time filling my mind with such Christian values as humbleness and acceptance. I was also lucky to visit the chapel during Christmas, as there were additional decorations depicting the Biblical episodes of the birth of Christ. Finally, the most thrilling part of the trip was also the fact that I, for the first time in my life, was given a chance to ask the hermit to say prayers later for my close ones which I gladly accepted.

References:
Rinschede, G. (1992). Forms of religious tourism. Annals of Tourism Research, 19(1), 51-67.