Information for Friends and Supporters

The British Pilgrimage Trust CIO (Charity No 1176045) aims to advance British pilgrimage as a form of cultural heritage that promotes holistic wellbeing. By championing a time-honoured form of access to Britain’s spiritual heritage – its churches, shrines, and cathedrals – the Trust seeks to improve awareness of that heritage, while also providing improved physical and mental health, community engagement, and connection with nature. In this way, pilgrimage is a practice that can be of significant benefit to the general public, and to many different faith and non-faith groups in Britain.

Governance and Executive Team

The CIO was co-founded by William Parsons and Dr Guy Hayward in Dec 2017. The Board of Trustees and the Trust’s panel of advisors brings together experience from a wide range of sectors; from to heritage, academia, fundraising, legal and accounting. The Chairman of Trustees, Peter Gangsted, spent half his career at Unilever before becoming a founding partner of Allianz Capital Partners, the direct investment arm of Allianz AG, and then a partner of Cinven, a pan-European private equity investor. The day-to-day running of the Trust is the responsibility of a small team of two nearly full-time workers and two part-time freelancers.

What we’re doing

– gathering pilgrimage routes around Britain on our website’s directory, both older and newly formed routes, and making available digital maps that can be accessed free of charge via smartphones that make use of a phone’s GPS capability to tell you where you are. – providing free of charge templates for anyone to create their own route and host their own guided pilgrimage event. – overseeing our Sanctuary project, helping pilgrims seek, and local communities provide, sleeping sanctuary at a very reasonable price that will generate income for the local community. Pilgrims will bring their own bedding and donation to sleep in a church, or church or village hall. – establishing free of charge access to our new Old Way Pilgrimage from Southampton to Canterbury – a 250-mile pilgrimage route discovered on a C14th map. – partnering with organisations like English Heritage, National Churches Trust, Association of English Cathedrals, and other nature-based organisations. In the future, we hope to introduce pilgrimage as a new but ancient rite of passage for schoolchildren, especially for those children who may never have walked in the countryside before, or those who are going through a difficult time.

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Please make cheques payable to “The British Pilgrimage Trust CIO” and address to 56 Ferry Street, London, E14 3DT.

For bank transfers, please send to ‘The British Pilgrimage Trust CIO’ at CAF Bank, Sort Code 40-52-40 and A/C No. 00031278.

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