Jay McGuiness on Catholicism being ‘too judgmental’ as he does pilgrimage

Pilgrimage: The Road Through The Alps sees The Wanted star McGuiness, The Traitors winner Harry Clark, comedian Helen Lederer, and TV personality Jeff Brazier among the celebrities in the three-part series.

The seven pilgrims begin their walk in the Austrian village of Inzing, 17km outside the Tyrolean capital of Innsbruck, and end in the foothills of the Swiss Alps, Einsiedeln Abbey, near Zurich.

The show will see them hiking through the mountains with a backpack and sharing rooms in a convent and pilgrim hostels.

Strictly Come Dancing winner McGuiness, 34, said: “I agreed to go on this pilgrimage because it just sounded the perfect thing to do.

“I was born and raised in Nottinghamshire to an Irish Catholic family and we’d go to our Catholic school and sing church songs and on Sunday, we’d all go and sit next to each other on the pew.

“But as time’s gone on, I think that the rule book that comes with being a Catholic, is too judgmental for where I am.”

He added that he would consider himself “agnostic” as he has no firm belief if there is or is not a god.

“I think it’s impossible for us to know, and maybe that’s what being a human is; we are stuck here in this mortal realm, and you only find out once you go beyond the curtain,” the Los Angeles-based star added.

“But I would love to know a little bit more about what I am. So, I’m looking forward to that. Who knows what I’ll find on this pilgrimage.”

In contrast, British army engineer Clark, from Slough, says he has “always had faith”, as he played violin, and was a server in the Catholic church.

He added: “I’m so excited to go on this Pilgrimage, to meet the other pilgrims and find out about their religions, what they believe in and why, and if they don’t believe, why?

“Because I’ve questioned who God is my whole life, not in a bad way, but as in no-one knows who God is.”

Lederer says she is a “mix” as she thinks she was christened, and has Czechoslovakian grandparents, who were “cultural Jews”.

“Being a mix means that you have respect for both things and there is a particular quality I’m learning and feeling more as I get even older, that you can’t shed your background,” she said.

“So, with my mixed background, with all the pain of my family that isn’t mine, but theirs, I want to be able to turn it into something that will give me a bit of peace.”

Other trekkers include stand-up comedian Daliso Chaponda, who grew up in a Christian family and is exploring the Baha’i faith, retired Paralympian and practising Christian Stefanie Reid and journalist Nelufar Hedayat, who refers to herself as a modern Muslim.

Their journey takes them through the Arlberg mountain pass, the highest point on the Camino de Santiago, a European pilgrimage route.

The final destination, an abbey of Benedictine monks, houses the Black Madonna – which dates from around the 15th century.

Pilgrimage: The Road Through The Alps will air on BBC Two and BBC iPlayer next month.