The Pilgrimage Annual Report
I was trying to think of a catchy title, but I might as well just call it what it is
The Pilgrimage - a contemporary ministry for a timeless community
The metaphor of a journey is often used to describe life. But a pilgrimage is a specific kind of journey--a holy, faith-honing trek, intentionally pursuing God. The Pilgrimage, a ministry founded and directed by Rev. Jennifer A G Layte, is a spiritual-direction-based ministry aiming to provide resources for spiritual growth and companionship to those moving God-ward, as well as for the churches who hope to support them.
Through the Pilgrimage, Jennifer Layte provides individual and group spiritual direction, small-cohort spiritual formation courses, online Bible study, as-needed workshops, and—increasingly—individual consults for people in ministry looking to diversify their own spiritual care offerings. Recently Jennifer has also been invited to provide workshops, plenary sessions, and micro spiritual direction sessions at denominational conferences.
Since its inception in 2015, the Pilgrimage has contracted—for nonprofit status and accounting—with other nonprofit ministries as follows:
2015-2019: a ministry of Missions Door, associated with their campus ministry, Campus Ambassadors
2019-2022: fiscally sponsored by The Sanctuary at Woodville, dba (doing business as) the Pilgrimage
2022-present: fiscally sponsored by, and independently contracted to, Build a Better Us
As of the spring of 2025, with the affirmation and support of Build a Better Us, Jennifer has begun the process of incorporating the Pilgrimage as an independent nonprofit by the end of the 2025 calendar year. From the end of August 2025, the Pilgrimage will also become Jennifer Layte’s full-time work.
The bulk of this report reflects the actual activity of the Pilgrimage since July 2024. The budget will be sent under separate cover before the end of July 2025, to reflect actual start-up/relaunch costs and significantly increased financial needs as the ministry itself expands in time and scope.
Objectives
To provide an online “safe place” for new or renewed encounters with Jesus Christ and the exploration, development, and growth of Christian spirituality.
To provide resources and spiritual support to pastors and other ministry leaders seeking to enfold a diversity of people in the love of Jesus through their ministries.
Goals
By God’s grace and with God’s help:
To provide supportive yet gently challenging communities for people in spiritual transition.
To equip people to find, engage, or re-engage with the Bible and churches/Jesus-communities on a more secure but less rigid footing.
To encourage and facilitate the individual’s pursuit of, and connection with, the God who loves and pursues them through Jesus Christ.
To educate and assist church/ministry leaders in a biblical understanding of stages of faith, so that they may be well-equipped to shepherd their members who are “in the wilderness” or “on the fringes” with wisdom and compassion.
To provide individual or cohort spiritual care to pastors and ministry leaders to ground them as they provide care to others.
To facilitate gracious interaction between wounded leaders and wounded congregants outside their in-person context.
Project Outline
The Pilgrimage was founded in October 2015. Initiatives continue to be prayerfully added. The following is a list of current active projects.
The Listening Post is a real-time, twice-a-month Bible exploration group where we listen to Scripture and listen to each other with respect and openness, in order to engage in fruitful, God-and-other-centered conversation.
The group meets twice a month (second and fourth Wednesday mornings at 10:00AM Eastern) on Zoom.
This initiative is a low-commitment, no-cost entry point to the Pilgrimage as a whole.
The group has been shrinking over the last year and is in discernment about whether to continue as is, make some changes in focus or method, or discontinue for now.
As part of this discernment process, and to accommodate the larger changes to the Pilgrimage beginning this summer, the Listening Post is on hiatus from June-August 2025.
Individual sessions facilitate people’s relationship and interactions with God.
$75 per hour session. This cost is below standard for this service and will be increasing slightly in 2026. Directees with financial need may receive a 15% discount.
Currently Jennifer works with approximately six women receiving spiritual direction once every one to two months.
In May 2025, Jennifer was invited to be a plenary speaker at a denominational conference. She also provided 15-minute spiritual direction “taster” sessions and is now available to do this at other retreat and conference events.
The Pilgrim Caravan
In March 2025, the first Pilgrimage spiritual direction group was launched. The group meets for two hours per month and have a commitment to each other for 13 months. During sessions, participants share and lead each other in spiritual practices, and listen to God on each others’ behalf. The pilot group has been proceeding extremely well, and there is the possibility and hope of another one beginning in September 2025.
Individual Consults
In the last year, pastors and ministry leaders have occasionally reached out to Jennifer to request consultation about other types of spiritual care training (specifically chaplaincy and spiritual direction). Although not (yet) certified to train anyone in either of these spiritual care methods, Jennifer does have the experience to inform and advise about the differences between these types of care and what might be a good fit for each individual, as well as considerations for each. So far these consultations are free, but they absolutely fall under the purview of the work of the Pilgrimage and have happened enough times to be noted.
Spiritual Development Courses and Retreats
Jennifer created and teaches two spiritual formation courses multiple times each year. With the expansion of the Pilgrimage ministry to full-time, the possibility of the creation of a third course is very great—as well as hoped-for by Pilgrimage course alumni.
Stepping into the Story (SITS)
SITS is the Pilgrimage’s flagship course and is 12 weeks long.
There was one 2024 Summer/Fall cohort and one 2025 Winter/Spring cohort. Enrollment is open for two 2025 Summer/Fall cohorts.
The course takes participants through 12 weeks of methodically looking at their lives in light of God’s story, journeying into more integrated lives.
Participants practice journaling and reading the Bible through an ancient Christian technique called lectio divina, in order to create their own Life Map for presentation at the end of the course.
SITS costs $400. Cohort size is no fewer than 3 and no more than 4.
The Walk (8 weeks) is another essential program in the Pilgrimage course line-up.
Two spring cohorts of The Walk concluded in June 2025.
The Walk provides context for those who are troubled/confused either by changes in their own faith, differences between expressions of Christianity, and people who are concerned about changes they are observing in the faith of loved ones.
The Walk is a course in awareness and growing understanding of Stages of Faith, particularly but not exclusively designed for ministry leaders and teams, in order to help them minister effectively to those who may be “on the fringes” or struggling with their faith.
Participants will discuss various readings (including but not limited to the Bible), in order to create a report on, or their own model of, their understanding of stages of faith, as well as their assessment of what stage they may be in, themselves.
The Walk costs $300. The ideal cohort size is 6-8.
The Oasis
In the fall of 2024 a new offering was added to the Pilgrimage “menu.” The Oasis is an in-person small spiritual retreat offered to experiment with contemplative practices, experience refreshment from God, and enter into face-to-face fellowship with other humans on the journey. Six people attended this first retreat. It is not being offered in 2025 due to Jennifer Layte’s starting a DMin program at the same time, but the hope is to reinstate it in 2026 as a regular offering.
Winter Solace
Winter Solace is an online retreat. First offered in January 2021, it continues to be held each year over the second weekend in January on Zoom.
The theme of Winter Solace 2025 was “Still.” In 2026 it will be “Resurrection.”
The retreat incorporates 5-7 additional presenters/faculty besides Jennifer Layte, each of whom (excluding Layte) receives an honorarium, amount partially determined by retreat enrollment.
So far the retreat has hosted 30-40 people including faculty each year it has run, and participants report life-changing shifts in perspective and relationship with Jesus.
In 2025, the presenters agreed that extending the event from Friday evening to Sunday afternoon was too taxing, and so the program concluded slightly later on Saturday evening than in previous years. This proved to be good restructuring, and we will follow this schedule going forward.
Other Aspects of Pilgrimage Ministry
Books
Jennifer A. G. Layte’s second novel, Favored One, was published in 2019 as a direct response to some biblical interpretation requests/needs from Pilgrimage participants. In the last year, she has been invited to visit multiple church book clubs to discuss this work.
Additionally, on April 2, 2025, Layte’s third book (nonfiction), Follower: How Getting Close to Jesus Brings You to Yourself was published. This book was born out of Layte’s pastoring an in-person church, but written for people like those who participate in and support the Pilgrimage.
Recruiting and Financial Support Development
Recruiting for Pilgrimage programs continues to be challenging in spite of the very enthusiastic reviews each program receives. So far the most effective (but nevertheless painstaking) method seems to be Jennifer’s relationship-building over time and then direct invitations. This process enables people to feel seen and known, which facilitates what they are able to glean from each course. This remains the preferred approach of both Jennifer Layte and Pilgrimage participants. However, as the Pilgrimage expands, realistically less time will be available for this long, slow process. Jennifer Layte will be grateful for counsel as to more efficient but still personal methods of recruitment going forward, and is also open to the possibility of a social media volunteer whose donation to this ministry would be to maintain social media presence while Jennifer continues to cultivate the relational side.
Regardless of method, financial support from donors and churches remains vital. As the Pilgrimage moves to becoming a free-standing ministry, significant new sources of funding will need to be found, partly to pay her newly full-time salary/health insurance, but additionally to cover nonprofit start-up costs, internet platform fees, and an accountant.
During the summer of 2025 and into the fall, while also beginning a DMin program, Jennifer will be engaged in increased financial support discovery. Any information about grants, or people who might donate their time to help promote the reach of the Pilgrimage, would be gratefully received.
The support schedule/annual budget of the Pilgrimage is still being researched and calculated for the coming year. Thank you for acquainting yourself with the above updates, and for your patience as you wait for the final segment of this report.
Respectfully submitted,
Jennifer A G Layte, The Pilgrimage