Together in joy

“Dear friends”, your “very existence has been willed by God, blessed and given a purpose! Life is not just a succession of events or experiences”, but “a search for the true, the good and the beautiful”, said Benedict XVI, in his speech on 17 July during the welcoming celebration by youth held in his honour at the harbour of Barangaroo at Sydney. “It is to this end – added the Pope – that we make our choices; it is for this that we exercise our freedom; it is in this – in truth, in goodness, and in beauty – that we find happiness and joy”. The Holy Father then urged the young: “Do not be fooled by those who see you as just another consumer in a market of undifferentiated possibilities, where choice itself becomes the good, novelty usurps beauty, and subjective experience displaces truth. Christ offers more! Indeed he offers everything!” For “only he who is the Truth can be the Way and hence also the Life”. The catecheses for language groups, held by the bishops of each country for their respective youth, began on 16 July. In Europe various initiatives have been organized for those who were unable to travel to Sydney. Oneness of faith and unity of life. “Faith is like a germ that grows in the perseverance of listening”. Speaking in Sydney to a group of Italian youngsters, the general secretary of the Italian Bishops’ Conference, Monsignor Giuseppe Betori, based his catechesis on the Acts of the Apostles, recalling that “listening to the apostolic testimony” forms the foundation of the Church”. “The apostles – said Mgr. Betori – are witnesses par excellence , i.e. those who are able to establish the relation between the earthly Jesus and the risen Jesus”. From their witness derives the mission of the Church to proclaim the Word, assisted by the “Spirit of truth” that “enables believers to share the oneness of the faith”, which was also unity of life for the apostles and the first disciples: “The multitude of those who had become believers – added Betori, citing the biblical text – were of one heart and one soul and no one considered what belonged to him as his personal property: for everything was held in common”.A witness of “joyful communion”. Bearing a witness of “joyful communion”: that was the invitation made by the Archbishop of Corfu, the Most Rev. Ioannis Spiteris, to Greek-speaking youth during his catechesis for WYD. He urged them, through their witness, to make “the secularised men and women” of our time understand “that life in Christ enables us to overcome selfishness and self-centredness”. Secularized man “each day experiences the self-centred individual who uses everything to his own advantage”, but by conducting himself in this way “he destroys the rapport with his neighbour and with nature”. “The young people gathered here – he explained – by their truly catholic, i.e. universal, presence, show they are able to overcome those selfish forms of life, and to live in brotherhood and in mutual self-giving”. Remaining in Europe. The Catholic Church of the Republic of Moldova has organized for Moldavian youth a national meeting at Rascov (130 km northeast of Chisinau) “to unite ourselves with the youth from all over the world gathered in Sydney”, explains Mgr. Benone Farcas, vicar general of the diocese of Chisinau, in a briefing to SIR. The meeting began on 17 July and will end on Sunday 20 July. Some 150 youth are expected to attend. “Thirteen Spanish bishops are participating in the simultaneous day that in being celebrated in various places in Spain, from 16 to 20 July, in communion with WYD in Sydney”, reports a press release issued by the Spanish Bishops’ Conference. Four venues have been chosen for the Spanish day: the cathedral of Almudena (Madrid), the cathedral of the Apostle, at Santiago de Compostella, the Castillo de Javier (Navarre) and the Sanctuary of the Virgin of Rocío (Huelva). The main celebrations presided over by Benedict XVI in Sydney will be transmitted live by satellite. In Germany, almost all the dioceses have organized various programmes for those who have remained at home: the images of the Pope are being transmitted on giant screens and various collateral events are being held. The largest “WYD camp” was set up by the archdiocese of Cologne at Odenthal-Altenberg and can host up to 2,000 youth. The participants at World Youth Day organized at Lourdes, in France, arrived on the morning of 15 July; their number surpassed the organizers’ wildest dreams. On 16 July, in the presence of the bishop, the Most Rev. Jacques Perrier, the last appearance of the Virgin to Bernadette (16 July 1858) was re-evoked, followed by a torchlight procession. The day ended with an international mass celebrated in the square in front of the Basilica of Nôtre-Dame du Rosaire. Today, 18 July, “Live from Sydney” begins in Belgium, at the sanctuaries of Banneux that are celebrating the 75th anniversary of the apparitions this year. Large screens provide live coverage of WYD in Sydney; there are also moments of catechesis and a festival aimed at Belgian youth. The website Jmj.be has been active since 4 July: it contains updated news about WYD complemented with photos and video podcasts.