” “"A spiritual pilgrimage involving the whole Christian community, especially the young". This is how Pope Benedict XVI called the long journey that the Cross of the WYD will cover, from Rome to Sidney, Australia, which will be the venue of the XXIII World Youth Day. This was recalled in the meditation that every Sunday comes before the Marian prayer of Angelus, which yesterday was particularly impressive because of the Cross being handed out from the young of Cologne to the young of Sidney. "The handing over the Cross said the Pope has become a "tradition", in the literal sense of a traditio, a highly symbolical transition, to be experienced with deep faith, by committing oneself to set on a walk of conversion in the footsteps of Jesus. This faith is taught to us by the Most Holy Virgin, who was the first "to believe”. That’s why, "the Cross of the young is accompanied by an icon of the Virgin". The Pope recalled that the Cross and the icon of the Virgin will stop in some countries of Africa, "to show the closeness of Christ and His Mother to the peoples of that Continent, who are worn out by a multitude of sufferings" and who "from next February will be the guests of some regions of Oceania, to go through the dioceses of Australia and get to Sydney in July 2008".” “
