A pilgrimage from Prudhoe to Portishead 

Baptist minister Paul Revill is walking from the North East to his new home 530 miles away in Somerset

 
Paul is undertaking the challenge as spiritual preparation for his new role in a Webnet project called the Salt House. Paul and his wife Barbara will be inducted in October as bivocational pioneer ministers to help plant the gospel in Pill and Portishead.
 
Paul, who completed the famous Camino de Santiago pilgrimage as part of a sabbatical in the autumn of 2019, describes his current challenge as “one of my boldest undertakings yet”.
 
He has dubbed it “Camino Portishead” and began from his former home in Prudhoe, Northumberland on Saturday 26 August. He is providing regular updates through his Facebook page Pilgrim Pathways. 
 
The five week route includes several spiritual centres of pilgrimage such as cathedrals and historic churches; and sections of recognised pilgrimage routes, such as the Northern Saints trails, Peak Pilgrimage route, Two Saints Way and St Kenelm’s Way.
 
He’ll be breaking briefly to be part of Barbara’s ordination on 16 September, and is planning to arrive in Portishead on Saturday, 7 October when he and Barbara will be inducted into their new roles.
 
The purpose of the pilgrimage is three-fold, he explains:
 

1. First and foremost a period of spiritual preparation for the new ministry which awaits in the West of England
2. To symbolically carry some items which symbolise Barbara’s and my vocation, from the old home to the new one. The aim is for this to be a prophetic act, in the manner of the people of God carrying the Ark of the Covenant, or the community of St Cuthbert carrying his coffin: a statement that we are bringing all the many gifts that God has given into our lives with us as we begin this new ministry in Portishead and Pill.
3. To generate interest in and support for the new Salt House project in Portishead and Pill, as well as Pilgrim Pathways, my new ministry of leading pilgrimage walks. 

 
‘Pilgrimage walking has become an interest and joy to me over the past few years,’ Paul says, 'particularly after I had the opportunity to walk the Camino de Santiago. I found it an inspirational and transformative experience and as a result I have wanted to encourage others into pilgrimage walking.'
 
Pilgrimage walking is 'walking with a spiritual or transformative aim,' he continues, ‘seeking to encounter God or deepen your own understanding of yourself.
 
'The journey itself is just as important as whether or not you get to the destination. A time for prayer and reflection. It's also about how God meets you and provides for you on the way.
 
‘It's about going more slowly, having time to process and to think and to allow the deeper things that are maybe hidden in the busyness of regular life to come up to the surface.’
 
Paul is staying with friends and friends of friends along the way, seeking to bless them as they are blessing him with their hospitality. He is inviting people to join him, whether for part of that day’s walk, or for morning or evening prayer. He is also offering to give short illustrated talks on the theme of pilgrimage and its growing popularity in post-Christian Britain to interested churches.
 
Until the end of last year Paul served as a Regional Minister for the Northern Baptist Association but has now been called to a different part of the country.
 
The Salt House is a new project set up by Webnet under the leadership of Lindsay Caplen, one of the Regional Ministers. 
 
The aim is to engage in community listening in both Portishead, a town, and Pill, a village, and in Portishead in particular to seek to develop one or more fresh expressions of church for people who are not already connected with an existing church. 
 
Paul explains that Lindsay and husband Andrew have been in Portishead for a number of years, and have developed good relationships with many people - Christians without a church or people seeking faith or on a journey discovering God. They feel there's potential for something new to respond to all that God's doing here, but could benefit from assistance as they're both in full time roles. That’s where Paul and Barbara (pictured) come in.
 
'We're coming to help provide some more support really,’ Paul says, ‘and be people on the ground who can who can develop and work with Lindsay and Andrew and what they've been doing.'
 
Paul and Barbara will be living in Pill three miles away, and their plan here is to get involved in village life, meet people, and 'see where God wants us to play our parts. The priority is lots of prayer, worship and developing some kind of rhythm of life where we have hospitality in our home. There will be lots of listening. Something of the new monastic about it.'
 
'We're not coming with a big agenda except to follow where God's at work. And be part of what God is doing.'
 
Lindsay said, 'It will be a joy for me to be part of a local team, as well as part of the regional team. Planting the gospel here in Portishead has been exciting but a bit of an overstretch of my capacity!

'Further, most of the folk involved in the gospel planting are non-believers and while that is fantastic on one level, it’s going to be great to have a couple of strong believers to regularly worship alongside.
 
'Please pray for both Paul and Barbara as they adjust to what is, for them, a significant, but sacrificial calling.'
 
 
 

To help fund his pioneering work, Paul is developing a business ministry – Pilgrim Pathways – that takes people on an accompanied pilgrimage. Alongside the pioneering, Barbara hopes to help churches in transition.


Paul is also using his Pilgrim Pathways Facebook page to provide regular updates and reflections from his Camino Portishead. Contact him there by direct message.