BBC star says there's a fear about getting 'cancelled' over religious views

One of the stars of the BBC show Pilgrimage has admitted there's a real worry about talking about their religion over fears they could be "cancelled". The new series of the faith-based adventure programme starts on Sunday, 20th April, and sees seven well-known personalities, of differing faiths and beliefs, tackle a challenging 300km journey through the breathtaking Austrian and Swiss Alps.

BBC 2's Pilgrimage: The Road Through the Alps follows stars - Jay McGuiness, Helen Lederer, Harry Clark, Daliso Chaponda, Jeff Brazier, Stef Reid, and Nelufar Hedayat - as they bond and discover new elements of their faith. The epic journey starts just outside Innsbruck on the Austrian Camino and sees them travel west across the Arlberg pass and into the foothills of the Swiss Alps to Einsiedeln Abbey. The journey was originally inspired over a thousand years ago by followers of the famous hermit St Meinrad. The abbey attracts almost a million pilgrims and visitors every year, drawn by its venerated Black Madonna.

Speaking ahead of its launch, one of the stars of the show gave an insight into how the adventure affected them and what they hoped viewers might learn from the series.

During the first episode, retired Paralympian and practising Christian Stef Reid, 40, candidly revealed that when she had to have part of her leg amputated at 15 following a boating accident, she was resentful of God and questioned why it had happened to her. However, it was through her relationship with religion that helped her come to terms with the ordeal.

Detailing what she hopes viewers, whether religious or not, might get of the programme, she said: "I think more than anything, it just makes the conversation okay. I was at a Christian event once and my agent was with me and she spent the entire time telling a girl who was helping us about Christianity, and I'm sitting there thinking, 'oh gosh, this poor girl, like, leave her alone, she's just trying to do her job'."

She continued: "After the whole day was done and I got back in the car, I was about to apologise to her but she said it was actually the first time anybody had ever asked her about her faith and listened to what she had to say. And that was a reminder to me. People want to talk about these things. We have to talk about them, and I think maybe, in the culture that we are in, it's not cool, or maybe people are afraid that if they say something that's wrong, they're gonna get cancelled. It's really scary to open up the space where actually people are talking about these things and actually they do matter, they're really important."

Reflecting on the end of the journey, Stef added: "I sat in the church, and I felt an overwhelming sense of God's presence. I felt like there was a weight on my shoulders - not in a bad way. A weight that was solid and reminded me that even though I don't have all the answers, I know God is present. I'm glad God is a bit mysterious. I would be disappointed in a God I fully understood."

Pilgrimage: The Road Through the Alps, launches on Sunday 20 April at 9pm on BBC Two and BBC iPlayer