GREEN BAY/ALGONQUIN—On May 2, the annual 22-mile Walk to Mary pilgrimage to the National Shrine of Our Lady of Champion welcomed around 10,000 people of all ages “from 47 states, Canada, Trinidad, Mexico, Poland and Brazil,” according to an article by OSV News, which added, “More than half of this year’s participants came from
outside Wisconsin.”
This year, those not from Wisconsin included parishioners from St. Margaret Mary Parish in Algonquin who were joined by pilgrims from other area parishes.
“Last year we had two buses with 80 people; this year we had three buses with 140 pilgrims,” says St. Margaret Mary parishioner Barbara “Basia” Strzemecka who organized both trips and speaks enthusiastically about the shrine and the walk that spans bridges, rivers, cities and farmland. Pilgrims left Algonquin at 2:30 a.m. and returned at 11 p.m. that day.
The walk begins at the National Shrine of St. Joseph on the grounds of St. Norbert College in De Pere, Wis. The walk is starting to be called a ‘mini-Camino,’ a smaller version of the 1,200-year-old Camino de Santiago in Compostella, Spain, that can be walked in 74 miles or 1,066 miles depending on the starting point.
Wisconsin’s mini-version offers the entire 22 miles, or participants can traverse four smaller 7-mile paths. There is also a 1.7-mile Children’s Walk. On May 2, there were confessions and six Masses held at the Champion shrine also.
After suffering from an unidentified but painful condition a couple of years ago, Strzemecka says she was healed. “For me it was a miracle,” she says. “I had said to Mary, ‘I have to do something for you.’”
Organizing the bus trip became her gift to the Blessed Mother.
“I’m waiting for this day a whole entire year to be able to join Walk to Mary and be there again to see
Our Lady of Champion,” Strzemecka says, sharing her hopes to “spread the word and bring over to (Mary) more and more pilgrims. … I know that Our Lady of Champion is waiting for each of us to join the walk and be there with her. I know that she is walking with us and through us on that day.”
The Algonquin-area pilgrims, she says, included kids and people over 80 years old.
“We had healthy, young and strong pilgrims, but we also had people with a poor condition to walk. They decided to do it and … make two or five or 15 miles and offer their pain and suffering, everything to Our Lady of Champion,” she says. “We had pilgrims who made all 22 miles. All pilgrims were so blessed and happy to do a Walk to Mary … even if some of them didn’t make all the distance. The Walk to Mary is changing people’s hearts. It is changing our life and is changing us.”
Strzemecka describes a few pilgrims who experienced healing on the walk last year and this year, saying, “the hip and knee problems went away, just right after the walk.”
She describes Anna, who planned to walk for three miles in spite of her painful hips. She kept going after three miles, then thought after 15 miles she’d have to quit because “her hips hurt,” Strzemecka says. “They took a break with sandwiches and drinks and then she was perfectly fine.” She notes that Anna walked the entire 22 miles.
“I have so many testimonies from people who are healing,” Strzemecka says, adding that she “just got a text message from a friend who decided to do seven miles. Age 48. Chronic pain. A doctor told her not to go. She made seven miles; she doesn’t have pain anymore. She’s so happy.”
Such stories, of course, are rare, but smaller successes came also. “Some didn’t finish the walk, but some (planned to do) two to three miles, and they made 8-16 miles,” Strzemecka says, describing them as “very happy.”
The mystery of suffering can also be “amazing” she says, describing people who were in pain after walking the
22 miles.
“You can look at suffering and how happy they are because they are doing this for the holy mother. So even in pain, they are extremely happy,” Strzemecka says.
She’s already talking about next year and hopes to get the parish school students and parents involved, perhaps with the Children’s Walk or one of the 7-mile stretches.
“As you can see, I love Walk to Mary,” she says. “I love Our Lady of Champion, and always everything that I do is from the bottom of my heart!”
About the Walk to Mary
Bishop David L. Ricken of Green Bay declared the Marian apparitions in Champion, Wis., “worthy of belief” in 2010. It is the only Church-approved apparition of Mary in the United States. Earlier this year, Bishop Ricken opened the sainthood cause of the shrine’s visionary, Adele Brice (Brise).
Pat Deprey of Two Rivers, Wis., co-founded the walk with Tom Schmitt in 2012, after a challenge from Father Francis “Rocky” Hoffman of Relevant Radio, says OSV News.
