Catholic vacations/tours/pilgrimages or Catholic travel agencies?

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teddyruxpin

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Could you recommend some places that ‘‘every Catholic should visit’’? I’m looking into vacations, and it’s very tough to find travel agents/agencies that cater to those wishing to strengthen their faith and ‘‘get out of dodge.’’ Agents typically don’t know the necessary history to make recommendations, and frankly I don’t either (you don’t know what you don’t know right?).

I notice there’s no shortage of Protestant ‘‘tour companies,’’ but I fear that I’'d be receiving their doctrine along the way from the guides/docents, etc.

Could anyone make some trip suggestions based on ideas they’ve had or trips they’ve actually taken or recommend any firms (I cannot find any online that are specifically ‘Catholic’!) especially any that are reputable and would treat the client as not just a tourist but perhaps a pilgrim?

Some sample ideas might be ‘footsteps of St. Paul’ and hit the cities of a particular apostle’s or saint’s ministry. Another I’ve had is a tour of a certain regions monasteries. I’m really open and am looking for something interesting. I’m young (29) so I can handle whatever physical strain would be involved in getting somewhere.

However, I’d like this thread to be for more than just ‘me.’ There’s surely different trips suitable for different ages, and couples vs. singles vs. families, etc. so let’s start the discussion for everyone!

I saw one site today while searching, but they were geared around the religious, not the lay, which clearly isn’t me (I probably wouldn’t be able to take advantage of the same lodging they would).

By the way, I live in California, so I’ve already hit the missions! 🙂

I look forward to your (name removed by moderator)ut(s)!

God Bless,
Joshua
 
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teddyruxpin:
Could you recommend some places that ‘‘every Catholic should visit’’? I’m looking into vacations, and it’s very tough to find travel agents/agencies that cater to those wishing to strengthen their faith and ‘‘get out of dodge.’’ Agents typically don’t know the necessary history to make recommendations, and frankly I don’t either (you don’t know what you don’t know right?).

I notice there’s no shortage of Protestant ‘‘tour companies,’’ but I fear that I’'d be receiving their doctrine along the way from the guides/docents, etc.

Could anyone make some trip suggestions based on ideas they’ve had or trips they’ve actually taken or recommend any firms (I cannot find any online that are specifically ‘Catholic’!) especially any that are reputable and would treat the client as not just a tourist but perhaps a pilgrim?

Some sample ideas might be ‘footsteps of St. Paul’ and hit the cities of a particular apostle’s or saint’s ministry. Another I’ve had is a tour of a certain regions monasteries. I’m really open and am looking for something interesting. I’m young (29) so I can handle whatever physical strain would be involved in getting somewhere.

However, I’d like this thread to be for more than just ‘me.’ There’s surely different trips suitable for different ages, and couples vs. singles vs. families, etc. so let’s start the discussion for everyone!

I saw one site today while searching, but they were geared around the religious, not the lay, which clearly isn’t me (I probably wouldn’t be able to take advantage of the same lodging they would).

By the way, I live in California, so I’ve already hit the missions! 🙂

I look forward to your (name removed by moderator)ut(s)!

God Bless,
Joshua
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Are you looking for local places, or anywhere in US, or anywhere in America, or anywhere in the world?
 
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lifeisbeautiful:
Are you looking for local places, or anywhere in US, or anywhere in America, or anywhere in the world?
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Well, I gave an example:

“Some sample ideas might be ‘footsteps of St. Paul’”

Paul’s ministry was in Syria, Greece, Asia Minor et. Al., so that pretty much opens up the ‘world’ :rolleyes:
 
Check with your diocese as there are often pilgrimages being planned by groups and led by priests or bishops.
 
Teresa Tomeo from Ave Maria Radio just did the pilgrimage In the Footsteps of St. Paul last week with 80 people. You can email her and see if she is going to do it again soon or even who her travel agent was…I heard on the radio that the pilgrimage was amazing. You can find her email on www.avemariaradio.net
 
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teddyruxpin:
Well, I gave an example:

“Some sample ideas might be ‘footsteps of St. Paul’”

Paul’s ministry was in Syria, Greece, Asia Minor et. Al., so that pretty much opens up the ‘world’ :rolleyes:
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Lol, sorry, I thought you were telling us you live in CA so we’d gear towards that. Do you want an organized thing or something on your own?
 
I went to Ireland with Miraculous Journeys, based in Omaha. There were two priests with us, so we had Mass daily, sometimes in old cemetaries, sometimes in local parishes, sometimes by the sea, sometimes near the ruins of ancient churches, and a couple of times at the shrine of Our Lady of Knock. One of the priests with us was the last living priest to have worked with Fr. Flanagan, of Boys Town. Part of the tour was dedicated to Our Lady, part was to forge ties with the little village of Ballymoe where Fr. Flanagan had been born, and there was also time for sightseeing. The Angelus and the Rosary were said on the bus, too. I had looked at regular tours but decided that I wanted a prayerful trip, and it was just right.
 
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lifeisbeautiful:
Lol, sorry, I thought you were telling us you live in CA so we’d gear towards that. Do you want an organized thing or something on your own?
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I’m open! I could go either way, and as I said in my post, this isn’t just for me, others might get ideas from this thread as well!
 
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Courtneyjo:
I went to Ireland with Miraculous Journeys, based in Omaha. There were two priests with us, so we had Mass daily, sometimes in old cemetaries, sometimes in local parishes, sometimes by the sea, sometimes near the ruins of ancient churches, and a couple of times at the shrine of Our Lady of Knock. One of the priests with us was the last living priest to have worked with Fr. Flanagan, of Boys Town. Part of the tour was dedicated to Our Lady, part was to forge ties with the little village of Ballymoe where Fr. Flanagan had been born, and there was also time for sightseeing. The Angelus and the Rosary were said on the bus, too. I had looked at regular tours but decided that I wanted a prayerful trip, and it was just right.
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Wow! That sounds right up my alley!
 
Have you checked the ads in your local diocesan newspaper? Local folks who give tours often advertise locally. You could also ask your pastor. He may know of some, or know priests who act as chaplains on tours.
 
I too was going to say the Catholic newspaper.
Here in the Toronto area we get the “Catholic Register” and it has many tours, trips and cruises - some even out of the States.
Good luck finding a suitable one. Have fun!
 
look for tours that hit Marian apparition sites. Companies that do those are bound to be Catholic-friendly. Then see what else they have.
 
The old-fashioned way to go might be to check a book on pilgrimages out of the library. There are several good ones out there that have been published in the last 5 or 10 years. I used to buy them as gifts for my family, since we couldn’t afford to actually go on a trip like that!
 
Look on Catholic Websites you trust, they often have ads for pilgrimages or religious tours. I was just looking on the Catholic Exchange web site and found a link to a Catholic travel agency

Regina Travel

If you have never been to Rome, I would definitely go there. There are so many of our Church’s treasures in Rome, plus you could visit Assisi from there, or travel to other places in Europe after Rome. I’ve been blessed with the opportunities to go to Rome on three occasions and am still looking forward to going there some day with my husband and family.
 
I just got back from a wonderful pilgrimage of Rome. I can’t imagine anything could be more moving that attending Mass in and touring each of the four Papal Basilicas (St. Peters, St. Mary Major, St. John Lateran, and St. Paul Outside the Walls), visiting the catacombs, touring the Vatican Museum, and all the many other religious sites in Rome like the Church of the Holy Stairs, the Church of the Holy Apostles, the Church that has the chains that bound St. Peter, the Church w/ the crypt of St. Monica, and so many more.

Our diocese uses Peter’s Way Tours, Jericho NY to arrange its pilgrimages. It tried another agency for the World Youth Day and I guess it is now totally resolved to never not use Peter’s Way again.
 
Definitely, without a doubt my favorite pilgrimage was to the Holy Land. It’s completely life-changing to walk in Christ’s footsteps. I also really enjoyed being in Egypt and seeing where the Holy Family lived there.

I also would recommend going to any of the major European cities and getting the travel book: Catholic Shrines of Western Europe by Wright - you can make a Catholic pilgrimage just about anywhere that has some history. All of Europe was Catholic for centuries.

If you go to Italy not to be missed is definitely Rome (duh!), Assisi and Orvieto (site of a Eucharistic Miracle) - all three of these are within a couple hours train ride of each other. If there’s time also visit San Giovanni Rotondo (Padre Pio). I would also recommend Padua (you can still see St. Anthony’s throat) and it’s right next to Venice if you want to ride on a gondola and visit St. Mark’s body.

In America I would visit D.C. and the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, our national basilica. It’s really breath-taking - even when you’ve seen every cathedral in Europe, you’ll love it. About a mile away from there is a Franciscan Friary that has amazing gardens (esp. visit in the spring but any time of year is great). Right around the block from the basilica is the USCCB (disappointing in it’s moderness, but still a good place to see) and down the street is Dominican House of studies that has a great chapel with a long history and tours are available. Also down the street is the John Paul II Cultural Center that has some interactive exhibits and sometimes has stuff on display from the Vatican Archives (I personally didn’t love it, but hey, at least it’s there).
On the west side of DC is Georgetown and it’s got pretty, old buildings but go to mass on the east side of the city - I’m not sure what you’d get if you went to Georgetown. And of course, you are in DC and can then visit all of the American cultural heritage that we have in that city (definitely try to get into the reading room of the library of congress) and although expensive, I really enjoyed visiting the National Spy Museum there, and of course the Smithsonian.
 
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Courtneyjo:
Have you checked the ads in your local diocesan newspaper? Local folks who give tours often advertise locally. You could also ask your pastor. He may know of some, or know priests who act as chaplains on tours.
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Believe it or not folks, my parish was astonishingly unhelpful 😦

So, here I am.

I’ve also thought of Rome, that’s a pretty obvious one.

Another I really wanna do is Oberammergau (Germany), but that only makes sense in 2010 (as they only do the promised play every 10 years)

I also finally found some other sites (dunno why it didn’t work yesterday when I Googled ‘Catholic tours’ and ‘catholic vacations’):

thecatholictour.com/ has quite a few options.

and some great links to tour companies and pilgrimage ideas (regina-tours is on here!) at:

catholicity.com/links/categories.html?catid=141

Keep 'em coming folks, the Holy Land trips are a magnificent idea.

Has anyone heard of this ‘little country’ (more a city state or principality perhaps) that is 100% monastic? It’s a little country dedicated to monasteries, and you can’t travel there without permission. Anyone heard of this?
 
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teddyruxpin:
Has anyone heard of this ‘little country’ (more a city state or principality perhaps) that is 100% monastic? It’s a little country dedicated to monasteries, and you can’t travel there without permission. Anyone heard of this?
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Answered my own question, it’s ‘Mt. Athos’:

inathos.gr/athos/en/

From the link:
“It has been divided into twenty self- governed territories. Each territory consists of a cardinal monastery and some other monastic establishments that surround it (cloisters, cells, cottages, seats, hermitages).”

It appears to be under Orthodox governance though ⭕
“The Holy Mount is a self- governed part of the Greek state, subject to the…Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinopole as regards its religious aspect.”

Odd, I’m completely sure I read a Roman Catholic writer discussing his trip there a year ago. Hrm…:confused:
 

Vacation time is important as an antidote to “daily wear and tear in the frenetic course of modern life,” the Pope said. He suggested that the time away from work could afford opportunities for visiting friends and relatives, reviving “those human contacts that the pace of our daily lives keeps us from cultivating.” He added that the time would be ideal for visiting the sick and the elderly, helping to break their loneliness.​

oliviaharis
Vacation Packages
 
Two places I would definitely recommend. Italy with all of the Church history and places. Especially Rome and the Vatican Truly awe inspiring. Also Israel. More specifically Jerusalem and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. There are many others, but if you have not been to these, I would put them at the top os the list.
Prayers & blessings
Deacon Ed B
 
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