Two Utah groups plan trips to World Youth Day

Friday, Jun. 17, 2016

SALT LAKE CITY — The Neocatechumenate Way community from St. George Parish in St. George and members of the St. Catherine of Siena Newman Center in Salt Lake City each will undertake pilgrimages to Kraków, Poland for World Youth Day 2016.

World Youth Day is an international Catholic event focused on faith and youth; this year it will be celebrated July 25-31. 

WYD is held every three years; Pope Francis announced during the closing Mass of WYD 2013 in Rio de Janeiro that Poland would be the 2016 host. 

Czestochowa, Poland was the venue in 1991. This year’s event will offer a tribute to Saint Pope John Paul II, founder of the World Youth Day; Kraków was his home.

The pilgrimage process has already started for the youth in St. George’s Neocatechumenate Way community, said Rocio Roman, youth leader. 

“We began when we decided in our hearts to go and started fundraising; to see if we had support,” she said. “We sold tamales, poinsettias at Christmas and flowers on Mother’s Day. The kids have learned responsibility and to love each other.”

Ten youth, along with the catechist team and chaperones from the community, will attend WYD from July 25 to Aug. 5, said Roman. The Neocatechumenate Way community consists of about 30 men and women, both married and single. They meet on a weekly basis for a shared discussion on a word such as faith; then on a monthly basis for prayer, to share a meal and the Eucharist. 

The youth range in age from 10 to 22; many of them also attended WYD 2013. This year they plan to camp outside, possibly stay in hotels; “we don’t know for sure, this is a pilgrimage and we are going to see what happens,” said Roman. “We just want the youth to grow in their faith, and despite the circumstances, to allow God to talk to us and show us the way.”

For the group from St. Catherine  of Siena Newman Center, the WYD pilgrimage will include hiking a segment of the El Camino Polaco, a pilgrimage route that leads through Poland to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. After the camino and World Youth Day, the Newman Center group’s pilgrimage will end with a road trip through Italy following the path of St. Dominic to celebrate the 800th jubilee of the Dominican Order. 

About 20 members from the Newman Center will be joined by a group from the University of Arizona. Their journey will begin in Warsaw, and then they will visit the medieval town of Sandomierz. From there, as pilgrims, they will backpack 119.3 miles over the course of six days along the Polish section of the medieval Way of St. James.

“The Polish trails are not as well maintained as those along the Spanish camino; we will be walking about 20 miles a day,” said Julie Bellefeuile, Newman Center campus minister. “From there we will attend WYD. We will be tent camping, staying in hostels and staying with host families in Poland.”

The different sections of the trip will offer their own unique experiences for everyone, said Bellefeuile, who has walked the camino in Spain. 

“We will have time alone to think and slow down, then to contrast that with WYD and millions of enthusiastic Catholics gathered together. It will be awesome,” she said. “To top all that off with the jubilee of St. Dominic will be exciting. Throughout the pilgrimage there will be daily Mass, Liturgy of the Hours, along with mental challenges, blisters, sore knees and other struggles.”

The final phase will be a road trip through Italy following the path of St. Dominic, from Rome, where Pope Honorius III approved the Dominican Order 800 years ago, to Bologna, where St. Dominic is buried. Along the way the group will visit Assisi, Siena, Florence and Pisa. On Aug. 8, the solemnity of St. Dominic, they will celebrate Mass at his tomb.