Last Saturday 9 March, the first of four planned Gaza ceasefire pilgrimages for Aotearoa kicked off in in Ōtautahi-Christchurch with a dozen pilgrims journeying 41km from Rangiora to the city centre, and many more joining for sections along the way.

Last Saturday’s walk is part of a Christian movement of more than 145 Gaza ceasefire pilgrimages planned to take place across 18 countries during Lent 2024. These walks offer Christians an opportunity to amplify urgent calls for ceasefire in Gaza and Israel, echoing UN resolutions and calls from humanitarian aid and development organisations around the world, including by Aotearoa New Zealand church agencies. 

Three more Aotearoa-based Gaza ceasefire pilgrimages are planned over the next two weeks: on Saturday 16 March in both Auckland and Whanganui, and Thursday 28 March in Wellington. 

Christchurch pilgrimage organiser Cole Yeoman reported that last weekend’s pilgrims included preschoolers in prams, walkers in their 70s, and several church leaders who joined in solidarity for sections of the journey. 

While a core group of a dozen completed the whole Rangiora-Christchurch journey walking, cycling or rolling, others will join for large stretches of the between 36-41km that represents the distance people in Gaza have travelled to flee bombardment.

Christchurch pilgrims also stopped off at Al Noor Mosque in solidarity with their local Muslim community, to call for ceasefire in Israel and Gaza together, and to remember those killed in Gaza and in the terror attack on the Christchurch mosques on 15 March 2019. 

Looking to Auckland this Saturday, over 150 people have already registered to take part in the pilgrimage which sets out at 6.00am from Te Mīhana Māori’s Holy Sepulchre Church in Khyber Pass. 

The Tamaki makaurau pilgrims will take a route that follows the pattern of the fourteen stations of the cross. 

“We will be stopping at churches as well as sites of significance for our own setting in Aotearoa, with the intention of weaving our story a little deeper with those in Palestine.” said organising team member Sophie Fasi-Mohenoa.
The Gaza ceasefire pilgrimage scheduled for Pōneke Wellington on 28 March, will include a 'last supper' picnic lunch on Parliament lawn, and a chance to eat with the Muslim community as they break their Ramadan fast at Kilbirnie mosque in the evening. 

Each of the pilgrimages will raise funds for Christian World Service’s Gaza Appeal which supports the Middle East Council of Churches’ Department of Service to Palestinian Refugees medical clinic in Rafah, that currently serves 400 patients a day.

Common Grace organiser Kate Day encourages everyone who longs for peace in the Holy Land to find a way to take part in a pilgrimage.

“Whether it's walking, cycling or skating the whole 41km or just a section, or helping to host a stop along the way, there's so many ways to be involved in these pilgrimages of solidarity and love.” 

To register for one of the upcoming pilgrimages, or to find out more, go to the Gaza pilgrimages page.