Pilgrim of peace on the way to Jerusalem

date: 16.01.2013.

The unusual pilgrim from Germany, Elijah Maria Thomas Joachim Uhlig, who travelled on his personal pilgrimage called “Pilgrimage from Berlin Wall to walls in Holy Land and Jerusalem”, came to Medjugorje for New Year’s Eve. He began his pilgrimage in 2009, from Potsdam in Germany to Jerusalem where he plans to come this Easter. He decided to take his journey moved by the great suffering of people in Auschwitz and he wanted to ask for forgiveness and reconciliation. He lived close to Berlin Wall and as 14-years old boy who experienced peaceful revolution in 1989-1990 he still remembers people who were protesting peacefully with candles in their hands. Those images of burning candles woke up within him a desire for peace and justice in the world, for goodness that exists in human hearts. During his pilgrimage that lasted for several years, he visited places of the greatest suffering in 24 concentration camps around Europe, including towns and places that experienced great destruction in former Yugoslavia, and he also visited numerous European shrines where people pray to God. After his first year of pilgrimage, he was baptized by Capuchins in Germany and he continued travelling to Jerusalem. He prayed for peace in himself and in the whole world. He usually travels on his feet, sleeps in homes of good people that he meets who usually provide him a meal and a shelter. In that way, he is collecting experiences with people and places that he visits, but he relies on God as the “best organiser” of his pilgrimage.