A World Youth Day Experience

World Youth Day is a week-long worldwide Catholic pilgrimage. It is an opportunity where young people from all different nationalities come together in one place and worship the Lord. World Youth Day (WYD) was started by Pope John Paul II in Rome and has been flourishing and growing ever since.

WYD allows young people from the ages of 18 - 35 to participate in different activities that aims to connect young people to each other and to Christ. The pilgrims share meals, accommodation, festivities, adoration and Mass together. It sure is an amazing faith community that is fully alive and thriving.

In addition to the main WYD week celebrations, pilgrims are invited to retreat to surrounding countries to dive into a spiritual experience and learn about saints from that country, or different religious events that happened there.

One of my friends from my parish, Joanna, has kindly offered to share her experience of WYD that took place in Lisbon, Portugal this year.

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"Lisbon World Youth Day (WYD) was my second time attending WYD and it was spiritually one of the best things I have done. It’s like attending a wonderful retreat but on a global scale and I now have a new family with my pilgrim friends who I journeyed together.

My first WYD was Poland in 2016 and this opened my eyes. I saw the Catholic Church on a world wide scale, with over a million joyful young Catholics, all saying Mass in their own languages, all united in our faith in Jesus. Seeing young people embrace their Catholic faith and identity with such joy and passion inspired me to deepen my own faith and have that same joy for God.

My top WYD moment was the Saturday night Adoration with 1.5 million other people on an open dirt field with Pope Francis. The reverence and silence during Adoration and seeing everyone kneel was profoundly faithfilled. The silence also helped me to listen to God. I reflected that while I was on an amazing pilgrimage, my ultimate pilgrimage and final destination is heaven, and only following God can satisfy my desires. As St Augustine said ‘You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until it rests in you’.

One of my top encounters with God was visiting Fatima in Portugal. As a child I learnt about Mary appearing at Fatima to the three children- Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta and the children’s faith greatly inspired me to pray the rosary. We had the privilege of walking the Stations of the Cross and visiting the sites where the Virgin Mary and the Angel of Portugal appeared to the three children, and we prayed for peace and unity. It was deeply prayerful and Stations of the Cross now take on a deeper meaning for me. Bishop Anthony spoke about the need for human suffering as it makes us humble and empathetic to the needs of others (such as the poor, those in war and conflict) while the world tells us to avoid suffering at all costs. Because of Jesus’ suffering especially in his final moments, Jesus carries our burdens and is always with us, even in our suffering.

While WYD has officially finished, I hope to bring the joy of the Gospel back home and to our parish community."

- Joanna

The video below shows the 1.5 million people that attended the final Mass in Lisbon.