Closing World Youth Day … and waiting for the next

Pilgrims pray before the beginning of Mass.

The morning of the final day of World Youth Day 2011 in Madrid dawned fair. A few clouds at first, but the weather was otherwise perfect. It would warm up significantly, as it did every morning, but so would we.

After the night before, we were ready for this Mass. The night before, the emcee had said that the pope wanted to come through the crowd in his popemobile, to greet all of us. We were excited — another chance to see the pope at close range! So long as we could clear the avenues between sections (a challenge indeed!), the pope would come through.

It was tough. Those who had camped out on any piece of available space had to find a section to join; those of us in the sections had to clean up our spaces to allow more of the crowd to join us. The line for the toilets stretched into the avenue — and considering the state of the toilets after the heat and the rain and more than a million people had been through, the wait for such facilities was only a portion of the experience to offer up.

As well, the first announcement of the morning was that 26 children and one 83-year-old woman had gone missing during the night. Such chaos was going to be difficult to organize.

In addition to all of this, during the winds of the night before, many of the chapels had had to be dismantled. The Blessed Sacrament reserved in these places had had to be moved, and we were now told that there would be no Communion available for the crowds. It was a blow. On top of all of the sacrifices of the past day, we would not be able to join in physical communion with the Holy Father. One more thing to offer up.

But then, the joy. As Pope Benedict XVI came through the avenues, waving to the hundreds of thousands who had stayed the night, to the hundreds of thousands who had joined us this morning, it seemed no more than a small trifle to bury the troubles of the day. We were again together as a Church, celebrating our love for Christ and his vicar.

The Mass was incredible. To hear the Holy Father greet us, “Dominus Vobiscum” and to answer “Et cum spiritus tuo” and realize this was the response we gave not only today, to the pope, the vicar of Christ, but to every priest in every church around the world, was deeply impactful.

We sang, we prayed the “Pater Noster,” we listened as he spoke to us in his homily and in his address after the Mass. And during Communion, as we waited for the pope and the concelebrating clergy to receive, we prayed for the Church, that we could all be united in spiritual communion.

The experience was powerful. From the very beginning of World Youth Day to this last, the experience was humbling, encouraging, chaotic, peaceful, exciting, and much more. I can say firmly that my life has been changed by it, and from talking with a number of the others on this diocesan pilgrimage, the feeling is universal.

Will we do it again? Perhaps. The Holy Father announced, to the rapturous applause of Brazilians scattered about Quatro Vientos, that the next World Youth Day would take place in Rio de Janiero. It will be crowded, and hot, and undoubtedly chaotic, but it will deepen your faith. Will you be there?