Local bishops help launch first ever pilgrimage of California missions
California pilgrimage meets National Eucharistic Pilgrimage as both conclude on June 22
By Christina Gray
Archbishop of San Francisco Salvatore J. Cordileone, Oakland Bishop Michael C. Barber, S.J. and Santa Rosa Bishop Robert F. Vasa helped launch the first-ever Eucharistic pilgrimage of California’s missions June 6-22 with separate liturgical events.
The 17-day driving pilgrimage organized and hosted by the Southern California-based nonprofit group, Camino de California, is a response to Pope Francis’ designation of 2025 as a Jubilee Year of Hope. Under the theme, “Pilgrims of Hope,’ hundreds of registered pilgrims from all parts of the state are following a north-south route that on its first weekend, began with Mission Solano in Sonoma, Mission San Rafael in Marin County, and Mission Dolores in San Francisco. It will conclude on June 21 at Mission San Gabriel in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.
On June 22, pilgrims of both the Camino de California and the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage, which started in 2024, will celebrate the conclusion of their journeys at a Mass at the Cathedral of Our Lady of Angels in Los Angeles. Prayer intentions collected and carried by the pilgrims will be presented at that Mass.
“What a blessing it will be to see our Eucharistic Lord processed through all the missions of California and arriving in Los Angeles on the Feast of Corpus Christi,” Archbishop Cordileone said in a statement to organizers about the ambitious pilgrimage.
The Camino de California pilgrimage officially began early the morning of June 6. In the town of Sonoma, Santa Rosa Bishop Robert F. Vasa offered a Mass and led a Eucharistic Procession to Mission San Francisco Solano, the last of the 22 California missions to be founded in 1823. Pilgrims met again hours later in Marin County, where San Francisco Archbishop Cordileone led the Blessed Sacrament through downtown San Rafael to a benediction at Mission San Rafael, the 20th of California’s 21 missions. The pilgrimage followed the Holy Eucharist at day’s end to the foot of the Golden Gate Bridge in Sausalito for benediction and rosary prayer. The next morning, Oakland Bishop Barber, who was baptized at Mission Dolores, celebrated a pilgrim’s Mass in the basilica church next door.
“My friends, this house, this place, this Mission is a temple built to a living God,” he said in his homily.
The Camino de California was established to encourage and support spiritual pilgrimage along California’s Camino Real, according to organizers. Other groups have worked to re-establish the route as a hiking route, it explains on its “Pilgrim Passport,” but “our focus is God-centered, and the evangelistic purpose for which the missions were founded.”
At Albert Park, a short walk from Mission San Rafael, hundreds of pilgrims sang and prayed in anticipation of the Archbishop’s arrival in a special van with the Blessed Sacrament. Incense swirled in the air above, as did a low-flying drone camera of unknown provenance capturing the scene. Festively dressed local families tossed handfuls of yellow rose petals in the path of the eclectic group of pilgrims, which included Franciscan friars, priests, seminarians, women religious and seasoned lay pilgrims. Most carried the same simple wooden cross that will bear the “stamp” of each mission visited. Some wore a small abalone shell on a cord around their neck — a symbol that borrows from the scallop shell that has become symbolic of the Camino de Santiago, or Way of St. James, a popular pilgrimage through Portugal, Spain and France.
Camino de California pilgrims enjoy fellowship with pilgrims from around the state, and the opportunity to attend daily Mass, Adoration, Benediction, Eucharistic procession and other liturgical events, according to organizers. Fifteen designated Jubilee Year of Hope sites will be visited that offer special indulgence opportunities. Each day also includes an opportunity to serve the incarcerated, the homeless, women’s shelters, food banks, workers in the fields, and more in daily works of mercy.
“I don’t like walking much,” Susan Moeckel told Catholic San Francisco as she sat in the shade of a tree outside Mission San Rafael following Benediction. Pilgrims in the Camino de California drove from mission to mission themselves and arranged their own lodging and most meals. But when you do walk as a pilgrim, she said, you are “walking with a purpose.” A resident of rural Cazadero in Sonoma County who did the Camino de Santiago 10 years ago, Moeckel said, “It’s a calling that stays with you.”
Waiting in line at the Mission San Rafael gift shop to buy a postcard, Frank DeSaracho of Morro Bay said habitual pilgrims, which is what he considers himself, are often called to it, like a vocation.
“It’s a personal need, including fellowship with other pilgrims,” he said.
Ellie Moline of Huntington Beach said she was on the Camino de California alone with rocks in her pocket, one for each member of her family. It’s a well-known tradition of the Camino de Santiago. There, some pilgrims carry a stone from their starting point to the end where they leave it behind. It’s a symbol of the shedding of worries and a renewed trust in God. She said the journey is compelling and contagious.
“You pray for people, and you show them your joy,” she said. “People today need that kind of hope.”
For more information on the Camino de California, visit caminodecalifornia.org.
Christina Gray is the lead writer for Catholic San Francisco.
Photos by Br. Chris Garcia and Gregory Scafidi
