Talk:Pilgrimage church

Misleading, poorly named and built

F0lks, this page is in deep trouble.

• The topic is rich, but the page is poor - the lead is terribly wanting, and the huge list underneath it shouldn't even be there. Lists are not helpful in clarifying a concept. WP usually separates them onto their own pages and links them via "See also" or "hatnotes" or other tags. N.b.: the chosen title is "Pilgrimage church", in the singular, so the topic is the CONCEPT, not the multiplicity/list of such churches.
• Pilgrimage SITES better than CHURCH[es]. Some of the prime pilgrimage sites in the Holy Land and the original "motherlands of Christianity" (Egypt, Asia Minor, Syria) are churches no more, but keep their importance. I don't see two pages appearing any time soon (p. sites AND p. churches), so think about it.
• The list is CATHOLIC-ONLY. So even less useful, and actually MISLEADING: the topic is by far richer than the (Roman) Cath. angle. Not even Uniates get much from it.

Some examples of quintessential Christian pilgrimage sites which are currently not part of churches: the oldest traditional sites of the baptism of Jesus (Al-Maghtas; see also Qasr al-Yahud), of the ascension of Jesus (part of a mosque for 800 years), the tomb of Lazarus, the hall of the Last Supper. The Church of Saint Simeon Stylites and the sites in Asia Minor. Many sites associated with John the Baptist (Aenon, Machaerus, Sebastiya, the fmr. Damascus cathedral a.k.a. the Umayyad Mosque). Enjoy the task ahead, ArmindenArminden (talk) 15:30, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

I don't think I disagree with your opening remarks, but in my defence this was a straight translation of the German Wiki article which I did because there was nothing on English Wiki at all. I would support editors expanding the description and no problem with a separate list which includes churches of all denominations. I haven't checked whether every church in the list is Roman Catholic - I assume you did that.

I wouldn't support changing the article name to "pilgrimage site" or making it multi-faith because other articles can do that and the history and extent of pilgrimage churches is certainly enough to warrant an article.

Finally what you say here probably also applies to calvary hill although that may be a peculiarly Catholic tradition, I don't know. And again I wouldn't want to see it morphed into a generic article; it just needs fleshing out. HTH. Gruß. --Bermicourt (talk) 19:40, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

That's why I should be more cautious with my wording... Sorry, I didn't check out the history of the page. It's great that you got it started, thank you for that; it will mature with time, like all new pages.
Just to clarify: I don't want to make it multi-faith in any way, just multi-denominational. With one caveat: I find it quite fascinating how churches functioned for long periods of time with certain parts being either reserved for Muslim use, or shared with Muslims (Church of the Nativity, Church of the Kathisma near Bethlehem). But that's a very small topic, can be dealt with in a couple of sentences.
I guess the Catholic view does stand between your approach and mine. European and other Catholics are used to their pilgrimage churches, a different kind of pilgrimage site is hard to conceive. That's probably as true with all other denominations (Eastern Orthodox, Armenian, Coptic, Ethiopian...) That's why I thought you might want to have a separate "Catholic p.ch." page, and allow for a different one on "Christian pilgrimage churches/sites". But we're talking in theory, there aren't all that may pages yet, so better keep this one more widely defined.
Have no reason to suggest any different approach to calvary hill, as opposed to the one Golgotha hill in Jerusalem (no matter if one locates it in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre or at Gordon's Calvary). It's a Catholic concept, much like the 14-station Way of the Cross. (For that one there isn't even a real-life equivalent, the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem being just a changing convention, all-Catholic and only used in part and with reservation by other Christians.) Gute Nacht und danke für das interessante Gespräch, ArmindenArminden (talk) 22:34, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

No offence taken - your points are valid. I don't really have a "Catholic" view (actually I'm not Catholic), so very happy for this to be multidenominational, but just can't think of pilgrimage sites that aren't churches... except the calvary hills of course, but they're covered already. I guess if we ended up with a long list of RC pilgrimage churches and another long list of Orthodox, etc., churches and sites we could just have separate list pages that all linked to and from this article page. But as you say, there is some work to do first. Bermicourt (talk) 19:26, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

Great. Except that Orthodox editors are hard to come by, Armenian, Georgian, Syriac, Ethiopian, Coptic, Indian... etc. even more so. So I guess this will linger on for some time. I know well that the Orthodox are huge on relics and important ones attract large masses of pilgrims, but we need somebody who really knows the proper sources. The Ethiopians are firm about holding the Ark of the Covenant and hold annual processions when the relics are taken out from the Aksum church where they are kept. And so forth.
I did mention some holy sites where the Byzantine-era church is long gone and the new owners wouldn't have new ones built at the exact same spot (see above: "the oldest traditional sites of the baptism of Jesus (Al-Maghtas; see also Qasr al-Yahud), of the ascension of Jesus (part of a mosque for 800 years), the tomb of Lazarus, the hall of the Last Supper. The Church of Saint Simeon Stylites and the sites in Asia Minor. Many sites associated with John the Baptist (Aenon, Machaerus, Sebastiya, the fmr. Damascus cathedral a.k.a. the Umayyad Mosque).") You can add the rediscovered, once important Byzantine Church of the Seat of Mary (Kathisma) near Bethlehem, and the Nea Church in Jerusalem. So all over the Holy Land and the wider Middle East, wherever Islam defeated Christianity. Don't know much about Turkey, but I suppose many places once venerated as the homes of Church Fathers and other early Christian communities are now to be visited as archaeological sites (if they were not transformed into mosques), but were once pilgrimage destinations. Much of historical Armenia lies now in Turkey and Azerbaijan, including their holy mountain, Ararat. But I can see why "Pilgrimage church" can be considered more appropriate, since all of those sites I mentioned once used to have functioning churches. ArmindenArminden (talk) 20:55, 8 March 2016 (UTC)