From Fr Greg's Desk: Sunday 30th July, 2023

Hi everyone.
World Youth Day Pilgrimage Update
Our intrepid RGCP youth on pilgrimage to World Youth Day have spent the last week in Spain, after visiting significant iconic sites of the Church in Italy at Rome and Assisi. Their journey through Spain included the city of Avila, where such great saints as Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross carried out their ministry.

Fr. Steve tells me that one of the personal highlights of their time in Italy for him was praying before the crypt of the very young Blessed Carlos Acuti in Assisi (Italy), who is an inspirational 'almost saint' of our time. He also enjoyed seeing how the Cathedral of Avila (Spain) was built into the very walls of the City of Avila, which offered part protection for the city. Nice touch, Fr. Steve!!

Fr. Dan and Br. Antonio have been on a parallel pilgrimage, going through Italy with the Sydney

Catholic Youth and Sydney Catholic Schools pilgrimage. They will arrive in Lisbon this weekend. For Fr. Dan, one of the highlights of the trip has been visiting the home towns and final resting places of some of the most iconic saints of all time. He was privileged to concelebrate Masses with Bishop Umbers and others in St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican, and near the tombs of both St. Clare and St. Francis in Assisi, and the added opportunity of preaching a homily to some 300 Aussie pilgrims at the Basilica of St. Rita in Cascia. Pretty cool, Fr. Dan!

Thankfully, the weather was considerably kinder to them in Spain than in Italy, which was going through a nasty heatwave at the time of their visit there. But, then again, maybe the Good Lord wanted to build resilience in them before the final week of World Youth Day, and the overnight 'camp-out' of their huge meeting with the Pope??

The pilgrimage reaches its peak at their final meeting with the Pope at the Parque do Tejo near Lisbon (the river from which it gets its name is called the Tejo or Targus in English) just outside of Lisbon. They are expecting something like 2 million young people to gather there, which will be quite a remarkable experience for all of them.

The Tejo is the longest river flowing across Portugal. Like our intrepid Pilgrims, it too travels a great distance even before it reaches Portuguese territory. We look forward to hearing about their escapades when they get back in a few weeks’ time.

For those of you who wish to follow the events of World Youth Day Week in Lisbon (which begins next Tuesday 1st August) you can find out more on the official website at www.worldyouthday.com/News. We will send a 'blog' out to all those who have registered for our emails as soon as we know how you watch these events online. For now, you can catch news reports of the events as they unfold at the website mentioned above.

And that's about it for now! God bless,

Fr. Greg