Written by Ndukwe Theodore Nwabueze (CIWA Cohort, Nigeria)
The spirit of the World Youths Day(WYD) is high at the moment and has electrified the entire atmosphere in many parts of the world, and good enough, Africa is not left out. I hereby wish to take us through a brief history of the event as some may not have known who started it? When it was started? How often it is held among other information concerning the event. I therefore invite you to journey with me as I take you through this adventure.
The World Youth Day is a program of religious education and spiritual formation for the youths in the Roman Catholic Church. Yes, you heard that right- it began in the Roman Catholic Church and was a fire that was sparked by Pope John Paul II who was inspired to establish the World Youth Day in 1986 following the church’s Youth Jubilee in 1984, a special meeting between the pope and young Catholics held at the conclusion of the 1983–84 Year of Jubilee, and by the United Nations International Youth Year (1985).
The first World Youth Day was held on Palm Sunday in Rome, with a goal of assuring young Catholics of their capacity to perpetuate the church’s traditions, spirituality, and work within the world.
Since 1987 however, the World Youth Day has been celebrated annually on Palm Sunday in every diocese. But the event is celebrated internationally every few years where it becomes an international pilgrimage to a major world city. The event is often a weeklong program of spiritual activity that integrates catechism, public rituals—including a mass reenactment of the Stations of the Cross—and performing arts. The program is inaugurated by the completion of the “Journey of the Cross and Icon,” in which young pilgrims transport from Rome to the celebration site a wooden cross and an image of the Virgin Mary, both donated by the supreme pontiff, Pope John Paul II “to the youth of the world.” The celebration culminates in a Sunday mass led by the pope.
*The International World Youth Days have been held in such cities as Buenos Aires (1987), Manila (1995), Sydney (2008), and Kraków (2016).
Estimated attendance at the final mass has ranged from 500,000 to 5 million
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Now that you know, I wish you and all the youths of the world a very resounding happy international World Youth Day celebration!!!
