With God in the countryside
Paths around the Jager chapel
Routes
“See, I am sending
an angel before you,
to guard you on the way ”
– Exodus 23:20
“For God did not give us
a spirit of cowardice
but rather of power and love
and self-control.”
– 2 Timothy 1:7
“There is an appointed time for everything,
and time for every affair
under the heavens.”
– Ecclesiastes 3:1
Events
Welcome
Our times are characterized by acceleration and rush, often we move exclusively by car and not on foot. Nevertheless, hiking and pilgrimage are becoming more and more a trend.
We would like to encourage you to discover the treasures of the paths on your doorstep. Together we walked the individual routes. We were impressed by the undiscovered diversity right in front of our noses.
We would like to invite you to explore the wonderful paths around Jager and, to paraphrase Werner Heisenberg, “perhaps God is waiting at the end of the path...”.
“The first gulp from the cup of natural science makes one atheistic, but at the bottom of the cup God is waiting!”
– Werner Heisenberg
The title “With God in the Green” has an even deeper meaning. Every human being has something divine in them, a divine core. This brochure is intended to inspire you to take God with you in your heart, to discover the divine power within yourself and to linger in nature with this power.
While writing this brochure, the words “pilgrimage” and “pilgrimage tour” kept cropping up. The well-known question of what the difference is between hiking and pilgrimage is not easy to answer. For many people, pilgrimage may conjure up the idea of a spiritual journey on the way to Santiago de Compostela, Rome, Jerusalem, Trondheim or other holy places. However, more and more people, regardless of religious affiliation, are going on pilgrimages today. One of the key words of pilgrimage mentioned by Saint Bridget of Sweden is spirituality. Today, we would perhaps speak more of spirituality.
May your journey, whether a pilgrimage or a hike, be full of experiences, encounters and inner peace.
Buen Camino, Ultreia, Shalom and Godspeed,
Sabine Petters und Sandra Pixberg
Suggestions & Prayers
All routes start at the chapel in Jager. So it is literally obvious to pause in the chapel before the hike.
In a figurative sense, the prayers of people from our distant past are inscribed on the walls of our churches, or something like that, as Heinrich Bedford-Strohm once put it. This is certainly one reason for the atmosphere in churches, where people may be able to feel the special spirit of God.
Letting go
When people set out on a pilgrimage in the Middle Ages, it was associated with great dangers and they did not know whether they would return safely.
Therefore, it was part of the process to say goodbye to family and neighbors and to settle possible debts, be they material or a matter of thanks or reconciliation.
What do you want to leave behind today so that you can move forward with a light heart? You can express it in words or simply light a candle for it in the chapel.
Prayer
Pilgrimage is also called praying with your feet, whereby praying is a very broad concept. Therefore, a short excursion to possible forms of prayer. Silence, prayers from books, ancient prayers from the Bible, your own words, whether they are stammered, murmured, clearly formulated, sighed, cried, all this is prayer.
The posture for prayer can also go far beyond the usual clasped hands, resting quietly and relaxed, sitting upright or standing with open hands in front of or above the body, or holding hands on the chest.
A very active form of prayer is body prayer, in which the body is incorporated.
Impulse
As an impulse, you can read the word of the respective tour to yourself aloud or quietly. The respective daily watchwords of the Moravian Church in Herrnhut are also well suited, or personally selected words with which you would like to start the day. You can see an impulse as a nudge, but it can also be let go in order to leave the door open to coincidences.
The Moravian Church in Herrnhut is best known for the Moravian stars. Since 1731, it has published the Daily Watchwords, each with a Bible verse from the Old and New Testaments, for daily devotions. The Daily Watchwords are now translated into over 50 languages and used on all continents, with an annual print run of around 1.75 million.
Blessing
Blessing means “to say something good”, derived from the Latin benedictio, from benedicere from bene (“good”) and dicere (“to say”).
You can try this out in different ways. There are ready-made words of blessing. It can also be a special experience to say something good to each other.
Try it out!
Walk at your own pace
There is such a thing as a personal feel-good pace, which can vary from day to day.
Allow yourself to do this.
Breaks and leisure
Take time for yourself whenever the weather and your mood demand it.
You can find suggestions for this in “Leisure – the beginner's tour”.
Mindfulness and silence
In a group, and perhaps when people have not seen each other for a long time, there is often a lot to talk about. Deliberately walking a certain part of the way in silence can create a new kind of shared experience.
Maybe you would like to try it.
Arrival
The chapel is the destination of every route. Take another moment of conscious silence. What have you encountered and what are you grateful for?
And just as at the start, you can end the tour with prayer and blessing and a lit candle.
The way back
…is important. Take time for the way home and take time to digest what you have experienced. Some insights are not always immediately obvious or take time to really understand.
Be patient if you have not yet found the answer today.
Body prayer to start the day
Spirit of the living God,
arms up, watching them go
Refresh me like the morning dew,
bring arms back, until hands are at heart level, moving fingers in a wave-like motion
Open me,
spread arms, palms facing forward
Fill me
cross arms in front, hands towards body
Shape me
Turn hands forward
I need me
Lower arms; spread arms again; turn palms up
Blessing
Go now with God's blessing.
May He hold you in the shelter of His hand,
preserve your courage and your health.
Open your eyes and ears
to the wonders of this world.
Make your heart glad
God be above you to bless you.
Amen.
God bless the earth I stand on today
God bless the path I tread anew
God bless the goal I live for today
Psalm 23
The LORD is my shepherd;
there is nothing I lack.
In green pastures he makes me lie down; to still waters he leads me; he restores my soul.
He guides me along right paths for the sake of his name.
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff comfort me.
You set a table before me in front of my enemies;
You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.
Indeed, goodness and mercy will pursue me all the days of my life;
I will dwell in the house of the LORDf
for endless days.
Open my eyes
Open my eyes, God,
to see your glory in the diversity
of plants and flowers.
Open my ears, God,
to hear your voice in the song of birds
and the rustling of leaves.
Open my heart, God,
to sense your love in the abundance
of fruits and seeds.
Open my hands, God,
to care for and preserve
your creation.
Open my life, God,
and enable me
to recognize you in everything.
Opening my heart
Franz Ferstl
To the new that wants to lead me onwards
To the constant that is the basis of my trust
To the gift that I can build on
To the experience that has shaped me and is part of my life
To the unexpected that wants to shake me up and make me think
To the future that God trusts me for
Prayer of St. Bridget of Sweden
Lord, show us the way
and make us willing
to walk that way.
Swedish:
Herre visa oss din Väg,
Och gör oss villiiga
att vandra den
Body prayer at the end of the day
Based on a body prayer by Sr. Anna-Maria a. d. Wiesche, Selbitz
God, I spread out my day before you and thank you,
palms together at chest height; spread arms, palms open, facing upwards
I surrender everything, I let go
turn hands and let palms face down
to your mercy.
Lower arms
I am yours for time and eternity.
Cross hands in front of chest; stand still for a while and pay attention to the breath
Leisure
The “Beginners' Tour”
Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you more important than they?
– Matthäus 6,26
Before you set off, I would like to invite you to take a leisurely stroll as an introductory tour, so to speak. The original meaning of the word (Old High German “muoza”, Middle High German “muoze”) was opportunity or possibility.
So not mindless idleness or lounging around, as we may have heard pejoratively in childhood, but an opportunity to
- let your soul dangle
- let your thoughts run free
- surrender to the moment
- let go
Look at how wonderful the world around you is, take time to perceive it in all its abundance, how wonderfully everything has its place and fits into a greater whole. Choose a detail from your immediate surroundings, immerse yourself in the bark structure of a tree, explore the diversity of leaves or flowers.
Listen to the sounds, the twittering of birds or the rustling of leaves. Explore the air around you by concentrating on the smell.
Leisure and silence are a breeding ground for new thoughts and ideas; it is literally creativity that can come into play here.
MIND WALK
How are you?
So-so
Gotta go on somehow
No more
Run off
Follow through
Find yourself
Want to make a difference
How moving...
Accessible
Detours
Rise – fall – crash
Pass
Assistants – walking aid
Run away
Escape
Go under
Decline
Career
It gets to me
Exit and entrance
Shift down a gear
Happy outcome
Found a way out
I'm slowly getting back on track
Things are looking up
I'm coming to
It's coming to me
Arriving
ARRIVAL
Sabine Petters
The authors
Sandra Pixberg
Sandra Pixberg studied cultural studies, Romance languages and education in Bremen. After graduating, she worked as a freelance journalist for the Bremen daily press. She and her husband started a family and moved to Sassnitz on the island of Rügen in 2002.
Since 2007, she has published non-fiction and novels with various publishers. Through her research for the books, she immersed herself in the history of Rügen and was able to create information boards for the towns of Sassnitz, Putbus and Stralsund.
She took on numerous editorial tasks for local newspaper projects and specialist magazines, gave creative writing courses for schoolchildren and still works as a freelance editor. Together with the poet Silke Peters, she ran the “Schreibwerkstatt Frankenthal” writing workshop from 2021 to 2023.
In 2022/23, she designed the traveling exhibition “Im Gegenstrom - Frauen auf Rügen im Wandel der Zeit” for the Rügen Soroptimists.
She also gathered botanical and geological knowledge of the Baltic Sea coast, explored hiking and biking trails, which resulted in seven travel guide publications between 2014 and 2020. Her most recent travel guide, “Pilgrim Route of Birgitta,” which she designed with Pastor Ellen Nemitz, was published in 2020. She lives with her family in Altefähr on Rügen.
Sabine Petters
Born in Stralsund, she is a pilgrim coach, accompanies pilgrimages and, together with her husband Olaf, runs the “Alter Heuboden” hostel in Jager. During the summer months, she is the spiritual director of the Jager chapel, providing calligraphic texts, food for thought and devotions for quiet reflection.
She studied agriculture in Rostock. Further professional stations were the environmental agency of the district of Stralsund, an organic farm near Züssow, her own animal healing practice and event management at the Gutshof Groß Behnkenhagen. At the University of Applied Sciences in Stralsund, she supported female students in their career entry as part of the “KarriereStartMentoring” project.
