Pilgrim Reflection: Meghan Kingsley

World Youth Day 2011 was one of the most inspiring, amazing, and most exciting moments of my life.  The journey, along with all the people who were a part of the pilgrimage, remain unforgettable.  I will never forget the enormous amount of excitement, faith, love and feeling of unity under the Catholic Church shared by everyone in Madrid. It was life changing!  Like many other pilgrims, I would do anything to go back!

Pilgrim Reflection: AJ Beckner

World Youth Day was the religious experience of a lifetime. Despite the heat, humidity and crowds, Madrid offered an amazing atmosphere of joy, peace, and God's love. Young faces from all around the world filled the streets with chanting, singing, and laughter. The way these people from all different cultures so easily came together over the Lord was truly awe inspiring. Much more plentiful than sightings of the Holy Father, were the faces of the future of the Church. World Youth Day is much more than a pilgrimage to see the pope for all of us. It is a pilgrimage to see each other. It is a get together with tens of thousands of our brothers and sisters in Christ.
At the events spread throughout the week, we stood together in the name of God, as we attended Catechesis with talks by many different Bishops and speakers, Christian rock concerts featuring groups from all over America and Europe, and prayer services attended by all. In the streets we met, conversed somewhat successfully, cheered, and traded trinkets with each other. Not a moment of quiet was left in the city during the whole week. From Saturday night into Sunday, the whole group camped out to await the Pope for Sunday mass. Together at the airfield we, almost two million strong, endured a mini hurricane which left everyone cooler and more disorganized than before. The next day we all celebrated final mass and returned to the streets of Madrid via the now jam packed metro trains. The conclusion of this crazy, holy, week left our group tired. We spent the next two days before our flight home quietly taking in the city as it is when there aren't so many foreigners on the streets. Then we said our goodbyes to the rest of the pilgrims still in the city until WYD Rio de Janeiro 2013.

Pilgrim Reflection: Eric Werneburg

Arguably the most memorable day of the World Youth Day pilgrimage was the Sunday on which we walked seven miles to meet the pope at the aerodrome and slept under the stars. Riding in extremely cramped train cars and walking until there were blisters on our feet finally paid off when we were able to put our tarp on the ground, relax with our fellow pilgrims, and meet two million other teens from all over the world. The torrential rain merely added to the experience when Pope Benedict XVI told us he would be praying for the rain to stop and, five minutes later, it did. To add icing on the cake, Nolan concluded the night by telling his famous "Man Without Hair" ghost story brought to us from New Paltz.

Pilgrim Blog - Tom Dougherty

Friday we went to the catechesis for the third time this week, and we heard a talk from Archbishop Dolan, the archbishop of New York. Later in the day we went to stations of the cross, where we sat in the street and watched the stations on a big screen. Although the catechesis and stations were great, the high point of the day had to be teaching a couple of Spanish girls the spoon game, and neither of them spoke English which made it difficult. Hopefully the game spreads throughout Spain now. Another long day followed with the vigil and overnight sleep outside at the airfield, but I'll let someone else blog about that.

A Few Pics from Thursday, August 19

Meeting some new friends from Argentina while we wait for Pope Benedict to pass by.

We got as close as we could to Il Papa when he drove by, blessing us in the "Popemobile"

With some new Iraqi friends.

After Life Teen's XLT event, gathering with other Life Teen parishes from all around the world for Eucharistic Adoration, we get a picture with Catholic recording artist Jackie Francois

Pilgrim Blog - Jamie Kimelstein

Yesterday we went to the great city of Avila and visited their beautiful churches such as St. Vincent's. The quiet peacefulness of the church reminded us why we were really here, for God. We then had an elegantly celebrated mass said by a priest of the Diocese, Father Rob. When we got home we went to a concert sung in Spanish, but we got a giant game of Pony started with about two or three other countries. It was truly a fun packed day!

Pilgrim Blog - Paul Clores

Yesterday we walked into the city to exchange our American money for Euros. After that, we had the plan to go to the Prada Museum. After we finally found it we decided the line was too long and that we would just go look for food! We walked around for about an hour.....a very long hour. We did, however, run into many new faces from different countries. We traded with them and we talked with them. We made it to McDonald's and we were in there for hours waiting for our food. Then we went to the Mass which was led by Cardinal Archbishop Antonio. Although it was all in Spanish, it was a beautiful Mass because it brought every country together in one ceremony. To finish off a fun day we went to Telepizza....nectar from the gods.