Our correspondent in Lisbon, Francesca Merlo, describes the enjoyment that gripped the 1.5 million younger pilgrims who took half within the World Youth Day vigil celebration.
By Francesca Merlo – Lisbon, Portugal
A sizzling finish to day 5 in Lisbon, the most popular its been this World Youth Day, however on the Parque Tejo the pilgrims and volunteers did all the pieces they may to remain cool and hydrated.
The breeze helped, and the warmth protect blankets stored all the pieces cool, while makeshift tents and umbrellas stored the solar off the pilgrims’ pores and skin.
As time handed, the air will get cooler and the solar decrease. A gaggle of pilgrims from Jamaica share the story of their two-day journey and of their pleasure for what they describe as “an enormous sleepover”. It’s a massive sleepover. The pilgrims have include mattresses, sleeping luggage, pillows and heat garments, in hope that the temperatures will drop within the night time.
In an overcrowded press room journalists, too, share their tales: “I hate crowds, however there’s one thing totally different about this one,” a French journalist tells me. “It’s like a little bit village. Once I was strolling round, I ran into three totally different folks I do know, pilgrims, all from totally different nations.” He’s usually shy, however instantly grows fairly loquacious.
All of the sudden, all of the pilgrims leap up, the large screens exhibiting that the Pope is arriving. They seize their cameras and rush out.
The sound of excited pilgrims provides us a tough estimate of how far alongside the trail the Pope is, and very quickly, simply as rapidly as he attracts close to, he’s gone, till he reappears on stage, not lengthy after.
The group calms down, and because the sky across the white, wave-shaped stage darkens, the massive crucifix within the center lights up. Two Portuguese fighter jets fly over the gang to welcome the Pope, modern dancers in stunning blue attire float throughout the stage and the primary testimony begins.
We hear from 33-year-old Matos from Portugal, who risked his life when he nearly fell asleep driving after which determined to grow to be a priest.
Then the dancing begins once more, earlier than we hear the testimony of 18-year-old Marta from Mozambique. Her space within the north of the nation has been on the coronary heart of the violence of extremist teams. After her father died, she and her three sisters have been pressured to flee into the forest twice in six months, however “we by no means misplaced our religion”, she says.
Then, as pilgrims start to shed tears, the dancing picks up once more, having tailored the music to the temper, extra sombre, considerably unhappy, melancholic, harking back to a world by which they need these testimonies didn’t must be instructed.
The pilgrims are requested, through textual content on the screens, to put a hand on another person’s shoulder, and instantly 1.5 million persons are all linked.
Then, Pope Francis begins to talk, reminding pilgrims of their responsibility to one another. “The one time you must look down at somebody is when you’re serving to them rise up,” he mentioned, in in depth off-the-cuff remarks.
He spoke about being fixed and constant, of by no means giving up and of getting up after we fall. “There are not any classes for studying learn how to undergo life,” he says. We be taught by means of observe.
“Don’t be afraid”, he concludes, quoting one of many first phrases utilized by Pope St. John Paul II at the start of his preach.
It’s with these phrases that the pilgrims, after having adored Christ within the Eucharist, go into the night time. Phrases of consolation, and in one of the best of firm.
