Philip West, Assistant Curate to South Holderness Deanery Churches, reflects on his 120-mile walk over the 11 days of Thy Kingdom Come, from Ascension to Pentecost.

“Would you like me to say a prayer for you now?” I asked the couple enjoying a post lunch drink at their local pub.

“Why not?” replied the man I had met a few moments before.

It was the last day of my prayer walk round the 23 churches of South Holderness Deanery, my response to Thy Kingdom Come as their Deanery Priest.

For the 11 days between Ascension and Pentecost, I walked 120 miles between and around the variety of parishes scattered throughout the Deanery. I walked on my own, usually between two parishes a day, and started each morning where I left off the evening before. It was a marvellous time of self-reflection. As well as singing praises and giving thanks for the beauty of field, flower, sea, sky, I brought to God things troubling me and discovered that walking in prayer is a powerful way of making retreat.

At each parish, I prayed with church members inside the church, using the Daily Office booklet provided for the occasion and singing to music piping forth from a portable speaker. Then, church members would accompany me round the parish to pray with me.

I told people I met what I was doing, and asked if they would like me to pray with them there and then. The majority agreed and were grateful. Some responded with “Oh yes please”, some with “If you like”, and often “Why not?” from those who confessed to have no faith or “religion” and yet were touched, by the Spirit, I think, to make a small step of faith. I prayed for dozens of people on streets, in shops, pubs, cafes, and schools, or I simply walked round praying for the folk who lived and worked in the homes, farms, and places I passed.

I occasionally laid hands on the sick or troubled, and on a village’s favourite but diseased chestnut tree, and prayed for patients at a hedgehog hospital (without the hands!) Throughout my journey, I had several opportunities to share and discuss faith.

I knew the villages and the 2 towns, but kept seeing small housing estates I had never noticed before, so many “fields ripe for the harvest”.

I now wonder if I should focus my ministry on prayer with strangers. It seems challenging, and yet: Why not?

- Philip West, Assistant Curate to South Holderness Deanery Churches