Greetings From Texas!

After one Tim Horton's breakfast sandwich, a cup of airplane tea, and four hours of travel, the pilgrims of Immaculate Conception Parish Delta have arrived in Fort Worth Texas! St. Bernadette, Our Lady of Sorrows, as well as St.Patrick Parish WYD groups have also arrived safely.

These parishes not only share the pride of being Canadian but also the bond of being Catholic! Pilgrims of Vancouver can be seen sporting their red Archdiocese "Canada '13" jerseys or like St. Pats or IC Delta, their parish t-shirts! Truly this pilgrimage is bringing many Catholics together as one, holy, apostolic Church!

Some highlights of the day would definitely be being randomly selected to undergo a bag check at the American Customs, Father Saju being asked by the American Officer the stages in becoming a pope (Father was held for quite a long time, so we thought that they would not allow him to pass), mailing my "cow kisses from Texas" postcard to my parents, and finding out that in Texas there are two food sizes: a normal size and TEXAS size...(and they also have a Texas accent too!).  NOW for a gruelling ten hour plane ride to Sao Paulo! See you in Sao Paulo! :)

Signing off,
Stephanie Nguyen and the IC Delta WYD Pilgrims!

Holy Cross parish pilgrims departing YVR airport for WYD Rio 2013!

The smiling faces of Holy Cross parish pilgrims bound for World Youth Day Rio!

99 Vancouver pilgrims bound for WYD Rio 2013!

The Archdiocese of Vancouver will have 99 pilgrims from 19 parishes (grouped into 9 parish groups) journey to the 2013 World Youth Day in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.  This number includes many young adults making their first WYD pilgrimage and will also include 5 priests and few seminarians.

Over the last two years, many of the pilgrims have been planning, fundraising and praying to prepare themselves for this great journey.  A big thanks goes out to their WYD group leaders who have been working very hard to get their groups ready.

A few pilgrims have left Vancouver already, while the majority of them will be leaving on or around July 15 to make their way to Missionary Week, the pre-WYD program, formerly known as "Days in the Diocese."  Following Missionary Week, the pilgrims will journey to Rio for the main events of World Youth Day from July 23 to 28.

The Vancouver pilgrims are counted among the 1,100 Canadians registered for this WYD.  Many of them will meet at the Canadian gathering to be held at the Welcome Centre at Vivo Rio on Thursday, July 25.

Here are the parish groups with the number of pilgrims attending:

Blessed Sacrament, Vancouver - 16 pilgrims and 1 priest

Holy Cross, Burnaby - 7 pilgrims

Holy Family Parish, Sechelt - 4 pilgrims

Immaculate Conception, Delta - 15 pilgrims and 2 priests

Our Lady of Sorrows, Vancouver - 20 pilgrims and 1 priest

St. Bernadette, Surrey - 3 pilgrims

St. Joseph, Port Moody - 5 pilgrims

St. Patrick, Vancouver - 6 pilgrims

Star of the Sea, Surrey - 18 pilgrims and 1 priest

To stay update with the Vancouver pilgrims, follow this blog at www.vanwyd.blogspot.ca and/or follow the Twitter account @VanWYD

For more info on WYD Rio 2013, visit the official website here.

By Gerard Garcia

Office of Youth and Young Adult Ministry
Archdiocese of Vancouver