5 Vancouverites join IVE America group for WYD 2011

Imagine spending your summer with two hundred and fifty young people, accompanied by fifty priests, religious sisters, and seminarians, on a thirty-day pilgrimage across Spain.  Imagine that group joining two million other individuals from 193 different countries in just one city--despite heat and rain--to celebrate one Mass with the Vicar of Christ.

That's what my friends and I did this year!

Photo courtesy of Miriam Olzewski (IVE pilgrim from the Archdiocese of Toronto)

World Youth Day is an international week-long event where young Catholics from around the world gather in one city to celebrate their Catholic faith.  Pope John Paul II started celebrating it every two or three years from 1985 onwards, and this year, Pope Benedict XVI chose to celebrate it in Madrid, Spain, a modern, cosmopolitan city that continues to preserve its rich Catholic history and tradition today.

 My friends and I joined this celebration representing Canada and the Archdiocese of Vancouver: three of us are from Canadian Martrys Catholic Church (Poli Pelingon, Janille Uy, Catherine Uy), and two from St. Paul's Parish (Susan Lee and Nicole Hauck).  We joined a pilgrimage group organized by the North American religious family of the Institute of the Incarnate Word (IVE), a community of religious with the unique charism of evangelizing all cultures.  The IVE consists of both priests and religious sisters who work in various missions or live out the contemplative life around the world, and during our pilgrimage, we had a chance to hang out with fifty IVE priests, sisters, and seminarians, and over two hundred other youths from across North America, and share with each other our experiences of our faith.

Our pilgrimage group first went on a pre-WYD pilgrimage to visit Fatima (Portugal), Lourdes (France), and other important Spanish sites like Santiago de Compostela, Montserrat, Avila, and Barbastro, to better appreciate the Catholic roots of Spain and its surroundings.  Like many other pilgrimage groups, we culminated the pilgrimage in Madrid, where we participated in various specific WYD events that were being organized all around the city.  This included a Catechesis session with Cardinal Francis George of Chicago, volunteer-guided tours of the city churches, and a large-scale Stations of the Cross that showcased Spain's best new and old sculptures of Christ in different stages of His Passion.  The WYD events eventually ended with a final Prayer Vigil and a Closing Mass presided by Pope Benedict XVI at Cuatro Vientos airfield, where two million people gathered in dry, 40-degree weather during the day and braved a little storm during the night just to pray together and show solidarity with each other, our Pope, and Christ.

It was unforgettable to be part of this, and be among millions of youth from around the world proudly waving their countries' flags while chating, in unison, "iEsta es la juventud del Papa!" - "Here we are, the youth of the Pope!"

The details of our trip can be found on the IVE blog here:

http://iveamerica.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=299:world-youth-day-madrid-pilgrimage-&catid=9:latest-news&Itemid=15

I believe the pilgrimage helped us develop a greater love for what the IVE calls the "three white things" of the Church.

The Union of the Natures: The center of our life must be Jesus Christ, true God and true man, who unites both natures in His one, unique, divine person; for in truth we profess that ´the Word was made flesh` (Jn 1:14) and He is the ´one mediator between God and men` (1 Tim 2:5), and that He is the Only One who has the words of eternal life (cf. Jn 6:68). He is the resulting person of the Incarnation. In a particular way our devotion to Jesus Christ must manifest itself in the mystery of the Incarnation; (and) in His second humiliation in the mystery of the Passion—the supreme priestly act—that, by contrast, makes us admire the profound “Kenosis” of the Incarnation all the more… Intimately united to ´the mystery of our religion which was manifested in the flesh` (1 Tim 3:16), and therefore united to our love, are the three white things of the Church: the Eucharist, which prolongs the Incarnation under the species of bread and wine by the action of the Catholic priesthood; the Most Holy Virgin Mary, who gave her ´yes` so that from her flesh and blood the Word would become flesh; and the Pope, the incarnate presence of the Truth, the Will and the Sanctity of Christ.

-- IVE Constitutions & Directory of Spirituality 

 The first is the Eucharist, the body and blood, soul and divinity of our Lord, and the Source and Summit of our faith.   Every morning of our pilgrimage started with Mass, and doing this for thirty days made us appreciate the habit of starting each day with prayer, before things got busy with our various excursions activities.  Time with the Blessed Sacrament, especially at Communion, invited us to collect ourselves and speak to Christ from the heart, and to offer the rest of our activities of the day to Him.  At the Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament during the final Prayer Vigil, I was moved when we all sang "Tantum Ergo" along with the Pope and the crowds.  I remember reflecting on how many of us around the world knew this hymn, and adored Christ in the Blessed Sacrament so lovingly and reverently.  The thought made me feel grateful for Christ's gift of the Eucharist, as it unites all of us in Him, in His True Presence--whether in Spain, or at my own home parish at CMCC.

The second is Mary, to whom our pilgrimage group offered our daily Rosaries.  Spain has such a beautiful devotion to our Lady, and many sites we visited honoured her by her various titles, like Nuestra Senora del Pilar, or the Black Madonna of Montserrat.  Being on this pilgrimage opened my eyes to many facets of her relationship with Christ--and her relationship with us--that I had not had the chance to reflect much on before.  The religious sisters of the IVE the (Servidoras - Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matara) also all took on a Marian name with their vows, so it was extra catechesis for us to learn their names and what those titles of Mary signified.  Some of sisters' names, for instance, were Sr. Lily of the Valley, Sr. Inmaculada, Sr. Peace (Our Lady of Peace), Mo. Mary of the Blessed Sacrament, and Sr. Nikopoeia (Our Lady of Victories)--all beautiful names of Our Lady!

Finally, the third is the Pope.  Because of this pilgrimage, my friends and I read "Jesus of Nazareth" and "Light of the World" to better get to know our Holy Father through his books and writings.  Seeing him in person at WYD--just two meters away from us!--and hearing him read his homily to us himself, was a surreal experience.  I still cannot believe we saw the Pope wave and smile at our direction, and having had the chance to listen to him talk gently onstage, while surrounded by two million people excited to hear every word he was saying!  His presence made me feel the "bigness" of our faith, yet also how personal it was to choose to believe it and stand by it in our world today.  We also loved the Pope's personal gift to us, the "YouCat" (youth catechism).  The breadth of the book has proven to me that our faith can be understood (with God's grace, and if we tried), and that every aspect of our lives definitely has something to do with our faith--from our personal struggles, to big questions about war, suffering, and even practical economics.  It provides a beautiful way for our generation to get to know our faith and pass it on to others, especially after coming home to Vancouver.

One other important thing I learned from this pilgrimage was a little bit about how to live "simple" lives.  For a month, we city girls could only use what we could carry in our backpacks, and every night we had to sleep next to each other in gyms, seminaries, elementary schools, and even a Spanish military base camp--sometimes with no hot (or running) water.  This was something we're not used to!  As pilgrims, we also had to wake up early despite sleeping late (and snoring neighbours), had to take turns preparing our sandwiches for lunch and dinner or cleaning the washroom, and line up to use the washroom, eat, or wash our laundry by hand...when we can.  During World Youth Day week, especially the vigil, we had to share space and amenities with two million people, too.  The IVE priests, sisters, and seminarians were keen to remind us to always be "super pilgrims", and to live our the three P's of pilgrimhood: prayer, penance, and participation.  (Given what truly counts in eternity, our pet peeves, busy madness, and struggles were not really worth the pain of sin!)  Of course, we were also strongly reminded to be "holy" by the examples of Christ and the saints, whose lives were often reflected in the breathtakingly beautiful religious art and architecture we saw during our excursions in the day.  

We left World Youth Day missing our crazy daily routines, like waking up to the blasting music of La Voz en el Disierto--a Spanish rock group consisting of seminarians, but with tons of great memories with our new friends from the IVE family and our fellow pilgrims.  We also loved that we gained new friends in heaven, having learned about and prayed to so many saints in Spain throughout our pilgrimage: St. James, for instance, who was alive even in the time of our Lord, and St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avila, who were already writing what would become classic books on spirituality even before Christianity reached Canada! (In fact, St. Ignatius, another later Spanish saint, was responsible for bringing Christianity to our country!)  Many of our new Spanish saint-friends even lived as recent as this past century: the martyrs of Barbastro, St. Josemaria Escriva and St. Maria de Maravailles, for example--reminding us that  we can be like them, too, if we wanted to and tried, and so mold ourselves closer to Christ. 

The challenge we've brought back home with us after World Youth Day is to continue striving to live this holy life in the amazing ordinariness of our daily lives.  With the help of our newly-rekindled love for Christ in the Eucharist, Mary, the Pope, and our Church, we hope we can find ways to live out the answer.

For more information about World Youth Day and our IVE pilgrimage, please see:

Official WYD Website - http://www.madrid11.com

IVE America Website - http://www.iveamerica.org

IVE America Official WYD blog: click this link

Salt + Light TV Coverage of WYD - http://wydcentral.org/

Psalm98 Music Ministry at work in WYD Madrid

Psalm98 Music Ministry at work in WYD Madrid!

By Emee Wenk



1) Tuesday ~ Palacio de las Desportes
PS98 and St. Matthew’s Vietnamese Youth Group, in their red and white jerseys, sang the opening and closing songs for this first Canadian gathering at World Youth Day. Archbishop Miller was delighted to see our group from Vancouver and prayed with us before the start of the ceremony. You can hear Maria singing “Light of the World” on youtube, while the WYD Cross was carried in.
Many of us started volunteering today for the Salt and Light TV booth on the main lobby.

2) Wednesday to Saturday ~ Palacio de las Desportes
Every morning, we made our way to the Love and Light Centre in our grey t-shirts to volunteer from 9 am to 2 pm for the Sisters of Life, during Catechesis and Celebration of Mass. Our entire PS98 group of 40 (including 5 from St. Anthony’s Agassiz and 18 from St. Matthew’s) performed various duties such as traffic flow and security. From my assigned spot, I was awed to see smiling priests and bishops processing in for Mass “skipping” over the hump (electrical cords) and Fr. Rosica beaming to see us volunteers.


3) Thursday night ~ Retiro deTemplete de Musica
This was the night PS98 had been looking forward to and had seriously committed to. The rotunda was decorated with Canadian flags, the sound techs were ready, the Aussies and Brits had been waiting for two hours…..PS98 shone, rocked and delivered their message of evangelization, praising and proclaiming God’s words in music. The dancing among the audience created a dust storm and yet they asked for more! Ian’s opening songs, the dance numbers by the Vietnamese youth, as well as Fr. Noel’s raps were all received warmly by the crowd from 10 pm to midnight. What a glorious night!


4) Saturday night ~ Cuatros Vientos
Eleven of us started out early this morning to celebrate Mass with our Vancouver Archdiocese pilgrims at Espiritu Santo Church. We were ready for our Vigil night with our tarps, sleeping bags, foamies, sunscreen and lots of water. We decided to take a short cut and get there as quickly as possible, judging by the hundreds of thousands already heading for this air base in the early afternoon. We had to fight for a spot among the Italians (a not-too-friendly crowd) since D4 was full by 3 pm. My nursing instincts waved red flags: shortage of water in the mid-day hot sun, possibility of mass chaos, unsanitary toilet conditions. Finally the sun went down and we stayed put; we’re saved by the picnic bags of food and water for the night. Pope Benedict arrived and tried to address the million young people who had answered his call, but thunderstorms interfered with great orchestration. I heard him start with “Mes queridos peregrinos!” and then the sound system faded. The wind picked up tarps and garbage, covering us with mud and the water we so longed for. BE NOT AFRAID! Our PS98 group, huddling under tarps but our packs secure inside garbage bags, were not afraid. An overwhelming bonding of spirit and togetherness in the midst of disaster—assuming responsibility for each other—and the calm of the night settled us into our damp sleeping bags. A few times I opened my eyes to a clear sky, the moon and Jupiter watching over us. Bryan woke up wondering, “Where am I?” Thaddee was sitting up at 5 am trying to get warm…Jay slept like a babe in his baby blue sleeping bag…Sean learned a few lessons on sacrifice…Ryan taught Ian more rain songs…Kim, Coral and Stacia grew up a notch…Regina wouldn’t change anything to rewrite this script. Our Vigil experience at Cuatros Vientos was meant to be remembered as a test of faith and to be treasured as a gift of special grace.