Spiritual ‘walk’ takes Conlisk around the globe

John Conlisk Jr. can thank his wife Mary for expanding his faith life from local care centers to venues around the world. And he doesn’t have to leave Porter County.

A Eucharistic minister and lector at St. Paul Catholic Church in Valparaiso, Conlisk took over the parish’s Walk to Bethlehem ministry that his wife started, and which he has been running for eight years.

The “walk” is a spiritual journey, a 12-week program done at Christmastime. Participants pray and meditate as they walk the distance from Valparaiso to the Holy Land.

Over the past 10 years, more than 1,200 walkers have spiritually trekked 188,000 miles. They have spiritually “visited” more than 30 shrines, cathedrals and holy places that would have been along their pathways.

Through the walk, Conlisk said, “we’re able to encompass our faith and do physical exercise and grow spiritually as