World Youth Day Summary

“Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy” (Mt 5:7)

This verse was the theme of World Youth Day 2016, as announced by Pope Francis, and is the basis for Pope Francis dedicating this year as the Holy Year of Mercy.

This verse launched the preparation not only for 300 pilgrims from the Parramatta Diocese, but the hundreds of thousands of young Catholics from all around the globe as they made their way to the “City of Mercy”; Krakow, Poland continuing the vision started by St John Paul II in 1985.

After months of fundraising events and formation training we, Martin Mangahas, Miss Nikki Valleri and Mr Harry Sadsad, finally embarked on our pilgrimage on July 15, along with 195 fellow pilgrims, made up of teachers, students and parishioners from the Parramatta diocese.

Our first stop was to the town of Tagbilaran City, located on the island of Bohol in the Philippines. It was here, each of the pilgrims were assigned a school project. We were fortunate enough to visit San Agustin Academy, a high school of 700 students. Upon our arrival, we immediately felt the love and excitement from the teachers and students by our presence. We helped paint their new senior building, immersed ourselves in the teaching and learning activities of the school, learnt traditional cultural dances, were challenged in Basketball and Volleyball by their junior varsity teams, helped serve in the school Mass, participated in fun playground games, and took part in a very moving Bible study session with teachers and students.

Our time at San Agustin’s opened our eyes to the passion and dedication of teachers to bring out the best in their students in conditions that we were not used to. Likewise, we truly admired the enthusiasm and resilience of the students, who truly valued the opportunity to receive an education. Education was not viewed as a right, but a privilege, which was never taken for granted.

After 6 days in the Philippines, we travelled over 30 hours to make our way to Krakow, Poland.

Our first stop was a visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau, a former German and Nazi concentration camp. It was a very solemn and reflective walk through the campgrounds, which serves as history’s great reminder of the potential of man’s inhumanity. We later celebrated Holy Mass with the rest of the Parramatta Diocese at Kalwaria Zebrzydowska, a World Heritage listed site, and one of Poland’s most sacred sites which a young St John Paul II would frequently visit to pray. The days that followed consisted of many events and activities, beginning with an all Australian pilgrim gathering where 3000 young pilgrims including 19 bishops, 120 priests, 36 nuns and brothers from all over the country along with teachers and students joined together in song and prayer.

The Opening Holy Mass was celebrated by Cardinal Stanisław Dziwisz (long-time personal secretary of St John Paul II) in an open grass field where the Holy Spirit could be felt amongst the thousands of people gathered together in prayer. The Catechesis sessions were led by Bishops and Cardinals from the US and Australia and included animated youth activities, cultural performances, worship and adoration in an 18,000 seat filled arena. We were able to visit and pray at the Basilica of St John Paul II and St Faustina, who initiated the painting of the sacred image of the Divine Mercy. During mass we were witness to a beautiful presentation of the Way of the Cross, and were able to acknowledge the hardships Jesus encountered through an creative and interpretive account of the Stations of the Cross.

To end our pilgrimage, we walked with over 1 million pilgrims to Campus Misericordiae, where we slept overnight under the stars. World Youth Day then concluded with the Holy Mass celebrated by Pope Francis and the announcement of the World Youth Day 2019 to be held in Panama.

All of these events provided many moments which allowed us not only to look into our own spiritual lives, but also encouraged us to live through God’s mercy in teach day. Sr Elizabeth, at our Australia pilgrim gathering, appropriately outlined “In experiencing mercy, showing mercy and observing mercy, we discover God,”.

Pope Francis personally addressed the hundreds of thousands of young pilgrims on several occasions over four days of World Youth Day. He would often ask those present to move away from what makes us comfortable and challenge the norms that we have become accustomed to in our present world.

God expects something from you. God wants something from you. God hopes in you. God comes to break down all our fences. He comes to open the doors of our lives, our dreams, our ways of seeing things. God comes to break open everything that keeps you closed in. He is encouraging you to dream. He wants to make you see that, with you, the world can be different. For the fact is, unless you offer the best of yourselves, the world will never be different.(Pope Francis, WYD Prayer Vigil, 30 July 2016)

World Youth Day was a pure celebration of faith, diversity and humanity. Throughout the whole event, we could feel the spirit and passion from all pilgrims on display at every moment. It was truly awe inspiring to be in a place where you could see all nations represented. We would often walk past groups of people various parts of the world - Asia, Africa and the Americas and high-five one another in a shared procession of joy and mutual respect. We felt this is what the world should be like every day and want to be able to bring that feeling to St Agnes.

We would love to once again thank the St Agnes community for your support and especially your prayers while we were away. Refreshed by the Holy Spirit, we have been forever changed by our experience and will continue to share what we have learnt with each of you in the months to come.