Lough Derg is one of three esteemed traditional pilgrimage locations to be designated by the Irish Bishops’ Conference as national places of pilgrimage in the Jubilee Year.
Saint Patrick’s Purgatory in Co. Donegal, alongside Knock Shrine and Croagh Patrick in Mayo have been selected as national pilgrimage sites for 2025.
Members of the Irish Catholic Bishops’ Conference gathered this week for their Spring 2025 General Meeting in Saint Patrick’s College, Maynooth.
During the meeting, the bishops commended Monsignor Laurence (La) Flynn (Prior of Lough Derg), Father John Kenny, Administrator of Westport Parish (Croagh Patrick) and Father Richard Gibbons (Parish Priest and Rector of the International Eucharistic and Marian Shrine at Knock) for creating the concept of the ‘Pilgrim’s Passport’.
The Pilgrim’s Passport encourages people to set themselves the spiritual goal of visiting the three national sites during this Jubilee year.
Bishop Fintan Monahan of Killaloe, the Jubilee 2025 designate of the Bishops’ Conference, will participate in the online launch for the Pilgrim’s Passport which will take place at 3.00pm on 26 March on www.pilgrimspassport.ie
Bishops say that this Jubilee 2025 not only represents a time of grace and spiritual renewal for the entire Church, but also offers the opportunity to the faithful to experience reconciliation, mercy, and renewed communion with God and with our brothers and sisters.
Lough Derg or St Patrick’s Purgatory, as it is traditionally known as, is Ireland’s most ancient place of pilgrimage and is situated on Station Island, near the small village of Pettigo.
Pilgrims have been travelling to this sacred site on Station Island, County Donegal, for centuries.
The pilgrimage has Saint Patrick as its patron because of his association with the monastery founded at the lake a few decades after the arrival of Christianity in Ireland.
