Every day here is a new story. Right now there’s a line of pilgrims a city block long outside my hotel room window waiting for food from a local restaurant. Things can be tough when on pilgrimage, so the pilgrims have been given voucher cards that are good with any restaurant in the city that has a red ball sign on it, so we foreigners have one less thing to worry about. Naturally, just about every restaurant with a red ball sign has at least a 20 minute line. I'm not sure the businesses knew what they signed up for when they agreed to be a WYD designated restaurant.
Yesterday we went up Corcovado to visit the Christ the Redeemer Statue. It was a very cloudy day, and we were in fact in the middle of a cloud for most of the time we were on the mountain; but we still went and made the best of it. For brief moments, the clouds drifted away and we had a much clearer view of the statue and the city lying several hundred meters below. The clouds may have disappointed some of us, but for me they made the short-lived clear views of the statue and city all the more precious. Perhaps if we came on a clear day, we would have been overwhelmed by the view at first, then we would have stood there taking it all in, taking pictures at this and that angle, with this and that friend and foreigner; then once our excitement wore off, we would have left Corcovado believing we had taken in all the beauty that the wonder has to offer. But since we came on a cloudy day, for us the full splendor of the place is still shrouded in mystery.
Last night we were supposed to go to the opening Mass of World Youth Day celebrated by Archbishop Orani João Tempesta of Rio de Janeiro, but we got down from Corcovado too late. By the time we got to the site of the Mass, there was no room, so once again we decided to make the best of the situation. We came back to the hotel and had Mass on the rooftop at the same exact time of the opening Mass with Archbishop Tempesta ( the roof has a large sitting area). The celebrant was Father Joseph Espaillat, youth ministry director of the Archdiocese of New York, and he brought with him a small group of pilgrims from his archdiocese and Brooklyn Diocese. Also celebrating with our group of 23 pilgrims from New Jersey were pilgrims from the Diocese of Lafayette, Louisiana, who happen to be staying in Rio’s Presidente Hotel as well. We called it our own Mass of divine providence, because how else would we have had the chance to celebrate the Eucharist with other U.S. pilgrims in such an extraordinary, intimate setting, on such short notice? Much more has happened today, but I had a short window of time so I took it to catch up on the recent happenings here at World Youth Day. If the night isn’t too crazy, I will bring this blog up to speed with the most recent events, especially the USA gathering at the Vivo Rio that I must find my way to right now. Viva Cristo!
What comes to mind when I think Rio? There’s the Christ the
Redeemer statue, the laid back beaches hugged by mountains and high rises, and
the controversial shanty towns in the foothills. There’s the recent riots
against bus fares, the 6.3 million citizens, and Portuguese (which I told
myself months ago to learn, but still haven’t). Then there’s the FIFA World Cup next year and
the Summer Olympics of 2016.
With the exception of Mexico, I’ve never been to another
country where English wasn’t a common language. In fact, with the exception of Mexico, Canada
and Ireland, I’ve never been to another country, period. Ironically, with the
exception of Canada, I’ve never been to another country for anything other than
missionary purposes– unless you count that one time I crossed over to Nogales
just to get a real Mexican poncho, or the time I accidentally took the San
Diego rail line into Tijuana. The trip to Ireland was with my college rugby
team, but even then my team, the Franciscan University Barons, saw sports as an
opportunity to evangelize the teams we played and their fans.
Remembering that mission to evangelize adds to the adventure
of this journey to Rio. It is a strange way to be a missionary though, I must
admit. Usually you think of missionaries serving in hospitals, feeding the
poor, or building new homes for the homeless in ‘mission territory’ where there
really aren’t many other Christians. But we’ll be attending concerts, drama
skits and inspirational speeches with about 2 million other Catholics in a city
that is at least half Catholic and at least three quarters Christian. Yes, we
will be about 2 million strong, and we still won’t outnumber the local Catholic
population of Rio.
The media is expecting World Youth Day to boost the economy
of the city. That’s really the core element of missionary power here… our presence, the sheer magnitude, the
communal power, of so many young Catholics being there. Even if you are
Christian, it is possible to be re-evangelized by such an extraordinary witness.
And that’s what WYD really is: so out of the ordinary. Even the cultural
Catholic could be pleasantly surprised and inspired by this eccentric representation
of the Church. We see an aging congregation at Mass on Sunday, the lack of young faces
among the clergy, and we walk up to the locked churches all around the country,
and we think the Catholic Church’s future is dismal.
Then we see the missionaries of World Youth Day. Many of the
events in Rio from July 23 to 28 will be entertaining in nature because this is
a truly joyful generation of Christians. They bring not only hope but life. Many
Catholics are discouraged by the lack of religious vocations in my generation,
but let’s get to the real issue here. My generation has been disconnected from
the rich Catholic culture that our elders knew so well. We need to rebuild
first. We need to raise true Catholic families before we can get a good influx
of religious vocations, because the vocations will come from those
families-- and the families will come
from those inspired by John Paul the Great’s great idea, World Youth Day.
