Archive | June, 2011

Sh..sh…sh..the rumours have started…WYD in Rio next?

28 Jun

As I was flicking through my twitter account over the weekend I saw the following posting: ‘next WYD to be in Rio’. I quickly got into google and typed ‘WYD in Rio’ and you know what?,  it seems that already everyone knows about it – are we then just waiting for the papal seal? – I hope not I thought – to be completely honest, I hope Pope Benedict proves all these rumors wrong and confirms (cough)… my choice.

Following the thread of 13 WYD’s, it seems that indeed South America should be the next continent where young Catholics should gather together for this mega event. But Rio? Surely in ‘the continent of hope’ – as Paul VI and JP2 called it – there are at least 2 other cities where WYD could be comfortably held.

Let’s explore these possibilities from North to South.

The first city where WYD could be celebrated next is Mexico City. This is a city rich in culture, history and Catholicism. The Virgin of Guadalupe is the patron saint of the city, she has been venerated there since 1737 and she is not only loved in Mexico but also in the rest of Latin America. This country is home to the ancient indigenous Mayan culture,  the weather is perfect with an average of 12C- 23C all year round and Mexicans are very welcoming people. Direct flights from LHR would take approx. 11hr 25mins.

Next is Rio, which can be reach direct from London in 12hrs flight. Rio, or better said Christ (the redeemer) will welcome us with open arms in Corcovado hill. There should be no problem arriving in winter (southern hemisphere) as the minimum temperature is around 18C and a max of 26C. Having the carnival as precedent, Brazilians will surely put a worthy WYD full of samba with a great happy atmosphere. However Rio is also hosting the Word Cup in 2014 and Olympic games in 2016. With this in mind would it be not fair to host WYD somewhere else?

And here is where my preferred choice lies – sorry  to be biased :-)   Santiago de Chile: A city in the foothills of los Andes mountain range will offer the perfect backdrop for WYD. True it is a bit further away, 16hrs from London but not further than Sydney! It is an extremely modern city and it has been voted number 1 destination by the New York Times. The rest of the country offers the most varied landscapes from the Atacama desert in the North to the glaciers in the South. Chileans not only have a very welcoming heart but many young people are active in their faith and at the ‘end of the world’ will be eager to receive pilgrims from all over the world. Last year, Chile had to cope with one of the most difficult times in its history with the 8.8 earthquake and the trapped miners from San Jose, where they’ve shown the world how the Chilean spirit is united with God in adversity.

The first and the last time a Pope visited Chile was in 1987 by JP2, and just as the UK saw JP2 in 1982, Chile’s vast majority of Catholics are long overdue a visit. So I pray and hope Pope Benedict – please, please dear Pope, if you are reading my blog -  surprise us in Madrid by heading straight down in 2013 to the longest country in the world!

Communications Officer – doing the job!

26 Jun

Wow – well, what a start to being a communications officer for WYD!

After the training day, I started using Twitter a lot more and now have 20 followers, which is pretty good! I’ve been tweeting whatever I’ve been up to, so that everyone knows exactly what the East Anglian group is doing (and what I’ve having for dinner!).

Fast forward a week or so and I find out that my parents have been talking to a man who attends my church at our parish picnic. I was told to give him a ring and he would try and sort out a time slot for me to talk about WYD at some point in the near future on the local community radio station that he runs, which would have been great! However, when I rang him up, I was told to go to the station and we could sort everything out there, so this was what I did. I got there, to read a note on the door saying “Come upstairs”, complete with a smiley face! I then met DJ SebaDEE, who was, at the time, doing his own show of the top 40 count down, and he showed me around the station, into the studio (that probably would have been a bedroom when it was a house!), and he also let me stay there when he was on air, so I could see exactly what went into broadcasting a live show – really interesting! Anyway, Jeff eventually arrived and we went downstairs to talk ‘business’, as it were. I then found out that he wanted me as a volunteer for Zack FM and that he would let me do whatever I wanted – including a big time slot purely for WYD! How exciting is that??? I’m now waiting on an email to sort this out so that I can spread the word of WYD across Suffolk!

As if that wasn’t enough, I then emailed around the local BBC radio stations and newspapers. Now, as I’m a teenager, and a practising Catholic, I wasn’t expecting floods of emails or letters back offering me some time, as the two things seemed to be looked on as bad things, simply because of the bad publicity of both aspects. However, quite literally a few hours later, I had an email back from Rob Dunger, of BBC Radio Suffolk, who presents the early morning Sunday show, which concentrates on faith and religion. He said to me that he would love to have me on air to do a short interview! This was absolutely fantastic! I quickly emailed him back and said of course I will and we set a date and time from there.

Now, this morning (26/06/11), I was woken up at 6 o’clock by my mother, and 25 minutes later, we were on our way to Ipswich so that I could do this interview. We arrived around 7 15 and were greeted by the producer of the show and 20 minutes later, there I was in the studio, talking about WYD and what it means to me. Towards the end of the interview, Rob tells me to hang on and leans across and grabs what I thought was a notepad. It actually turned out to be a diary. Live on air, I was asked to go back 5 weeks later, on the 31st July, and be his special guest for the show from 7 to 7 30! Brilliant or what? The only thing is, I now have to come up with an original story about WYD, or the faith in general, that is still going to be relevant in 5 weeks time! Wish me luck!

I haven’t been in the role of Communications Officer for 3 weeks yet, but I’m already making my mark and allowing people all over the area (and the world, as you can listen on the internet from where you are) to hear about WYD and the good press about teenagers and Catholicism. These two, put together in the media in a good light, should, and hopefully will, take the country by storm and let everyone know exactly who we are and what we’re doing!

If you want to listen to the interview that I did this morning, you can find it here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/p00hf18j (look at around 1 hour 40 minutes)

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

Ruth :-)

(oh, and by the way, look at the photo just below this – I’m the one on the left hand side in the red hoodie!)

From the lens of youth

16 Jun

World Youth Day pilgrims

Last week I went for a communications officers’ training day for World Youth Day in Madrid, at the offices of the Catholic Bishops Conference of England and Wales.

I did not know what to expect, only that I had signed in for the job some months ago, when David Hill, who is the Youth Advisor for Portsmouth Diocese, had sent an email to all WYD participants. It was very compulsive – I thought – but after all, I have been waiting to go to a WYD for a long time that there was no reason to restrain myself and so I went all the way… and all the way it was after 4 hours sleep. It’s not that I had been partying in London all night the night before but we can say instead that my commute started at the end of my holiday in Spain, taking the last flight arriving into London Gatwick in the early hours of Tuesday morning.

After surviving the M25, standing on the train from Reading to Paddington and the Circle Line, I arrived for Mass, which was officiated by Father Christopher Jamison – this was a great way to shake off my jetlag and any ill feelings about the English weather. It was a great opportunity to meet each other and share points such as which dioceses of England and Wales we were representing, where we were staying in Spain as well as sharing past experiences such as the Pope’s Vigil in Hyde Park, WYD Sydney, etc.

Everyone was very friendly and I was struck by their warmth and readiness to talk about their commitment to the Church and their faith. I was particularly impressed by one of them who had been to Sydney, saying with much passion that WYD was so extraordinary an experience that he just had to go to Madrid.

In the afternoon, we had another very impressive talk given by the papal photographer who shared his tips on how to take good photographs in Madrid. He showed us the most moving and exceptional pictures of WYD Sydney, Cologne and Hyde Park, amongst others.

Towards the end of the day, I had come to understand that as a communications officer I would report World Youth day – and the riches of our wonderful Catholic faith – from my own eyes and my own experiences through my own words and photographs to the world. This is huge, especially in an event such as WYD, where our faith will be lived and celebrated by hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of young Catholics.

For all this to become a fruitful reality, the training day at Bishops House gave us both the opportunity to become communications officers and also the tools with much dedication and professionalism.

The training day was organised to the highest standards and the media accreditation that they are organising for us will be extremely useful to access the media centre in Madrid – this centre will be shared with the likes of Reuters and AFP – and where we will be writing/ editing/ publishing our work and photographs for all of you to see.

There is so much to look forward as a young Catholic in England and Wales; I really feel that the opportunities are there for all to get involved and embrace them.

Last year there was the Papal visit and this year there is WYD 2011 in Madrid. Stay connected and be part of it!

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PYD WYD MDR 2011

15 Jun

Below is a report from Dom de Boo on the latest of the residential weekends that the WYD pilgrims from the diocese of Northampton have spent together. (Seen above in Oxfordshire woodlands)

“Bizarrely, a well organised facebook campaign before PYD 3, meant that we arrived at Hill End in Oxfordshire on the Friday evening to seven cheesecakes representing the seven deadly sins, brought in by various different members of the group as a means of celebrating a collective love of cheesecake. Though odd, in many ways this rather strange campaign captures both the togetherness and blatant quirkiness that have become the trademarks of our PYD group. Throw into the pot a remix of Bruno Mars’ Billionaire, a selection of weird and wonderful drama games and a worship time spontaneously generated on instruments made out of literally whatever was going, and it becomes increasingly clear that no-one in our group quite knows what is going to happen next, not that anyone particularly cares.

Content wise, the weekend was once again packed with well chosen and well received guests and the visit of the Carmelites to introduce us to the Carmelite Spirituality underpinning Madrid 2011 was undoubtedly a highlight. Fionnuala Dunne and The Friars looked at St John of the Cross, St Teresa of Avila and how we can use social networking as a means of understanding prayer. The friars then led us in a reflective meditation which centred on using stillness as a way of connecting to God. On the Saturday evening, we were blessed to be able to celebrate Palm Sunday mass with the Bishop, who generously travelled down from Northampton to be a part of what was going on. Celebrating Mass on the Saturday night meant that we were able to enjoy the benefits of a Spanish lesson with Aisling, our nominated language expert, on the Sunday morning, not that we managed to sound any less English.

On top of all that, we still found time to worship, play frisbee, share some of our ups and downs since the last weekend and engage in a number of thought provoking prayer stations – no wonder I left feeling knackered on the Sunday. Still, as we get closer and closer to departure date, it is an absolute privilege to be sharing the experience with the group under the guidance of our fantastic leaders, Lizi and Pam.

Felicitations mi amigos!

 

For more on the preparations of the PYD group visit their blog here.

Michael,

Communications Officer for Northampton Youth Ministry Office

Pilgrim posts

14 Jun

Something to look forward to…

You’ll very shortly be hearing on this blog from pilgrims all across the UK as they count down towards World Youth Day, Madrid.  Hear about their preparations – spiritual and practical – individual and group – pilgrim tales – joys, hopes  and disappointments.

The countdown is on..

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