The faith that unites

Melbourne lies spread out on the banks of the river Yarra and is considered a city of great fascination, thanks also to its lively mixture of old and new architectural styles, its many elegant streets and the different ethnic communities that compose it. Capital of the State of Victoria, Melbourne is the second largest city in the country, and was the capital of Australia from 1901 to 1927. At the present time the city is invaded by some 25,000 youngsters who have chosen to spend the Days in the Dioceses there, in other words, the period of exchange and twinning that precedes the official programme of WYD in Sydney (15-20 July).A riot of colours. Wrapt in their national flags, with brightly coloured hats, shoes and jackets, the youngsters swarm through the streets of downtown Melbourne singing and dancing. Nor are touches of creativity lacking, such as the twenty youth from the English diocese of Nottingham, who are going about dressed as Robin Hood, as if they were in Sherwood Forest, or the French youth from the diocese of Bourges and Tours equipped with mini tricolour flags that they wave about to the sound of the Marseillaise (Bastille Day on 14 July, after all, is drawing near). The Polish participants, some hundred of them, are the champions of banners; they march behind one banner several metres long, splashed with the word Poznan.Faith, a resource. “John Paul II showed us the way – says Jakub Bielawsky, a student from Poznan (Poland) – that we are now continuing with Benedict XVI, whom we have chosen to follow here, on the opposite side of the Earth. In this journey it’s of fundamental importance to share our difficulties and our faith. Faith should not be confined to the private sphere, as some in Europe and elsewhere would prefer, because faith is a resource that changes the face of man, his life and society as a whole”. The student does not disguise the difficulties: “of course the greatest is the surviving legacy of the Communist regime which destroyed every religious value with its ruling atheist ideology until 1989. Today, however, we are living in quite the opposite situation: before we could not express our faith, today we can but people are almost afraid to do so; they are ashamed to show it. WYD helps us to acquire the courage of witness”.Need for roots. His views are echoed by Craig Fitzpatrick, from Sheffield (England) for whom WYD “helps us to rediscover confidence in our faith and in bearing witness to it. It reminds us we form part of a Church”. Another aid comes from ecumenical dialogue, “in which faith tends to unite rather than separate us, also in the social sphere. Europe has an urgent need to rediscover the roots of its own faith to be able to recover the identity it is in danger of losing”. According to 20-year-old David Coudriau from Tours and Marie Marteau from Angers (France), “experiences of faith like World Youth Day need to be shared with others because they give us confidence in witness and the consciousness of belonging to the same Church. Secularism, correctly understood, in mutual respect for the ideas of others, helps to foster this dialogue; it does not deny it. It is an exaggerated individualism and liberalism that make it difficult. In France – they add – ever less people go to church and that goes also for the young. Those who do so are looked at askance by a part of those of their own age group, who consider them ingenuous and out of touch with the times. Moments like this – and we still remember WYD in Paris – can encourage us to experience faith as an act of witness and mission useful not only for the Church but also for society”. Swiss youth are also sharing this experience of communion. Some 80 of them have arrived in Melbourne, from all four cantons of the country: “meeting again together means rediscovering each other through our shared faith in the one God”.