(Vatican Radio) Polish Cardinal Stanislaw Rylko, President of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, has sent a message looking ahead to the next World Youth Day which will take place in Krakow from July 26th to 31st 2016. Pope Francis is scheduled to attend the event that will be focused on the theme from the Beatitudes: ‘Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy’. Philippa Hitchen reports…
Listen:
Taking place in the context of the Jubilee Year of Mercy which begins on December 8th this year, the Krakow event follows on from the last World Youth Day in Rio de Janeiro where Pope Francis told young people to read the Beatitudes because, he said, it “will do you good”. In his message Cardinal Rylko notes that the Pope has made the theme of mercy a priority of his pontificate and that the Krakow meeting will mark an international Jubilee of Young People dedicated to this theme.
It’s the second time that World Youth Day has been held in Poland – the first such event took place in 1991 at the Marian shrine of Czestochowa with Pope John Paul II. The Polish pontiff will also be spiritually present at the 2016 event as young participants visit the tomb of St Faustina Kowalska at the Divine Mercy shrine, inaugurated by Pope John Paul during his last visit to his homeland in 2002. There, they will be able to take part in a programme of meditations and recitation of the Divine Mercy chapelet.
Numerous confessionals will also be set up and Pope Francis himself is likely to offer the sacrament of reconciliation to a number of young men and women attending the celebration. A symbolic Holy Door will also be built at the shrine, through which the Pope will process at the start of the prayer vigil and Eucharistic Adoration on Saturday July 30th. Following the final Mass on Sunday 31st, Pope Francis will give lighted lamps to five young couples from the five continents to symbolically send all the participants out as missionaries of God’s mercy throughout the world.
(from Vatican Radio)…
Less than 24 hours
after registration opened for next year’s World Youth Day (WYD), 45,000 people
had already signed up. The first to register was Pope Francis himself who had
previously announced that the theme of the meeting would revolve around mercy.
According to the website’s managers, thus far there are 250 “macrogroups” and
300 volunteers signed up. The countdown
to the event is already surrounded by great enthusiasm. In exactly one year —
from 26 to 31 July 2016 — young people will meet in Krakow for
the 31 st WYD. Twenty five years after its start, WYD will return to
Poland, the land of the Pontiff who created it. Even if Pope Wojtyła loved to
say that “it was the young people themselves who invented WYD”. In 1991 in
Częstochowa, a strong wind of faith was announced to the young people and from
them the faith blew beyond the iron curtain. The young Christians of eastern
and western Europe experienced the first large-scale encounter after the fall
of the Berlin Wall. Pope Wojtyła
returned to his homeland for WYD which saw the participation of more
than one million people. A true jubilee of young people will be celebrated on a
global level. Pope Francis recalled this at the Angelus and Cardinal Stanisław
Ryłko, President of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, also underlined it in
a message published on the dicastery’s website. The theme of WYD is “Blessed
are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” is part of the extraordinary
holy year which will begin on 8 December. WYD in Krakow will complete a three
part series of themes dedicated to the
Beatitudes. The theme in Rio in 2014 was “Blessed are the poor in
spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven”. This year’s theme for the 30 th
WYD on the diocesan level is “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see
God”….
(Vatican Radio) Before the recitation of the Marian Prayer before the faithful in St Peter’s Square, Pope Francis recalled Sunday’s Gospel about the multiplication of the loaves and the fishes. The Pope explained that “Jesus satisfies not only material hunger, but the most profound of hungers, the hunger for meaning in life, the hunger for God.”
He went on to say that “in the face of suffering, loneliness, poverty and difficulties of so many people, what can we do?”
Complaining, the Holy Father stressed, “does not solve anything, but we can offer what little we have. We certainly have a few hours of time, some talent, some expertise” … “Who among us”, the Pope underlined, “does not have his or her “five loaves and two fish”? If we are willing to put them in the hands of the Lord, we will bring a little more love into the world a bit ‘more love, peace, justice and joy. God is able to multiply our small gestures of solidarity and make us partakers of his gift. ”
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis on Sunday remembered the people of Syria caught up in the continuing conflict in the country. In particular, the Holy Father made an urgent and heartfelt appeal for the release of Italian Jesuit priest Father Paolo Dall’Oglio who was kidnapped in Syria almost two years ago.
He also remembered both the Greek and Syriac Orthodox archbishops of Aleppo, Boulos Yazigi and Gregorios Yohanna Ibrahim, who were kidnapped in Syria near the Turkish border in 2013. The Holy Father expressed the hope that with the commitment of international and local authorities these religious would be restored to freedom.
Pope Francis made the appeal following the Angelus prayer in his studio above St Peter’s Square where, with the clic of a button, he became the first person to register for World Youth Day to be held next year in in Krakow, Poland.
He opened registration for the event with two young people by his side, telling the faithful gathered in the square below that the day would be celebrated in the Year of Mercy, adding it would be, “in a sense, a jubilee of youth, called to reflect on the theme “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy”.
He then invited youth of the world to live this pilgrimage to Krakow, participating, he said, “in this moment of grace in their communities.”
Pope Francis also recalled the feast of Saint’s Joachim e Anne, the parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary and grandparents of Jesus, marked on July 26th. With that in mind the Pope had a special greeting for all grandparents thanking them for their precious presence in the family and for the new generation.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) “Confirm the faith with the closeness to the Lord that never abandons us” and in the belief of being able to contribute to their wisdom and loving gestures towards life and the human growth of their families.
That was the message addressed to all elderly Spaniards and to the organizers and participants of the XVI edition of the Grandparents Day which is being celebrated Sunday, July 26, throughout Spain.
In the message, sent from the Nunciature in Madrid, the Holy Father also reaffirms his support “to those who care for the elderly with love, contributing to the common good of society.”
The Day is promoted every year on the Feast of Saints Joachim and Anna – the grandparents of Jesus – by the Spanish Catholic “Edad Dorada-Mensajeros de la Paz” which is committed to supporting and promoting the elderly. The goal is to raise awareness in society about the respect due to older people who have given so much in their lives, to appreciate the great value of grandparents in every family and to draw attention to the needs of the elderly population. They are also the concepts outlined in the messages for the occasion by the archbishop of Madrid, Carlos Osoros, and Spanish military ordinary Bishop Juan del Río Martín.
Madrid is the main host of the event this year and a Mass will be celebrated in the Church of St. Anthony in the capital by Luis Gutiérrez Martín, bishop emeritus of Segovia. After Mass there will be the reading of the Holy Father’s message with his apostolic blessing.
(from Vatican Radio)…