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A near-2,000 mile pilgrimage by an Irish missionary could become a recognized European cultural route and trigger a tourism bonanza, campaigners said.<\/p>\nA near-2,000 mile pilgrimage by an Irish missionary could become a recognized European cultural route and trigger a tourism bonanza, campaigners said.<\/p>\n
A satnav map of the evangelizing journey of Bangor monk St Columbanus from Ireland to modern-day Italy in the early days of Christianity has been created.<\/p>\n
It follows a donation from French benefactors.<\/p>\n
Europe\u2019s leading human rights organization has been urged to bestow official status on the saint\u2019s route in the month ahead.<\/p>\n
The hope is that this can become a symbol of peace and understanding and it could see a platform for significant educational and cultural exchanges<\/p>\n
Deborah Girvan, president of the European Columban Way, said: \u201cThis is escalating, it is growing, there is huge momentum behind this.<\/p>\n
\u201cRegardless of the outcome of Brexit, this is an era of intolerance and uncertainty.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe hope is that this can become a symbol of peace and understanding and it could see a platform for significant educational and cultural exchanges.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt has potential to unite Europe and not disunite it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Columbanus\u2019s peregrination from Ireland to Bobbio in what is now northern Italy, where he set up a monastery, is celebrated as a golden age for Irish influence and learning in Europe.<\/p>\n
Robert Schuman, one of the founding fathers of the European Union, said Columbanus was an inspiration for the modern Europe.<\/p>\n
He traveled more than 3,000 kilometers across Ireland and Europe at the end of the 6th and the beginning of the 7th century.<\/p>\n
Columbanus was born on the Wexford\/Carlow border and became a monk in the monastery at Bangor, Co Down, under the abbot St Comgall for more than 20 years.<\/p>\n
He crossed the Irish Sea with 12 companions, among them St Gall from whom the city St Gallen in Switzerland takes its name.<\/p>\n
The saint founded monasteries in Annegray, Fontaine-les-Luzeuil and Luxeuil-les-Bains in the foothills of the Vosges mountains in eastern France, in Bregenz on the banks of Lake Constance in Austria and in Bobbio near Milan.<\/p>\n
His journey forms the basis of the pilgrimage route called the Columban Way beginning in Bunclody, Wexford, where he was born and ending in Bobbio, where he died.<\/p>\n
A stone from Bangor outside a church in Bregenz represents the post-Second World War rebuilding of Europe.<\/p>\n
Kenneth Irvine, from the Friends of Columbanus Bangor, said a satellite navigation system paid for by the French had been a major advantage for tourism.<\/p>\n
A phone app contains all the monastic sites, places to stay and eat and other places of interest.<\/p>\n
Mr Irvine said he hoped it would become a cultural route of the Council of Europe, a post-Second World War human rights organization which pre-dates the EU, but that needed a lot more planning and work.<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cThe potential for tourism and bringing people is significant.\u201d<\/p>\n
A Co Down tour guide has suggested there are 18 million faith tourists in the US who are interested in how Christianity started and the monastic movement.<\/p>\n