Saturday in Madrid

On Saturday, the World Youth Day began – the day begins on Saturday and ends with the concluding mass on Sunday. We woke up as usual, got ready and went to eat breakfast. The meal lasted longer than usual and then we went off to buy food for the day ahead.

After this, we returned home to pray. The morning prayer was a concluding prayer of thanksgiving for what we have experienced during this journey to Spain. At the end of this very moving prayer, we asked our brothers and sisters from Zambia and from Portugal, who are sharing the same accommodation during our stay in Madrid, to join us in praying together the "Our Father". We stood in a circle and each one recited the prayer in his or her own language and then we sang "Oseh shalom bimromav" (He who makes peace in His heights) and we danced in a circle. Of course, we took lots of photos.

After the prayer, we went our way in the direction of the meeting with the Pope. The train was packed to capacity. When we descended, we began to walk in the direction of the place where the meeting with the Pope was to take place. This took a long time but during the walk we sang, talked and laughed in great joy. Along the way, the residents of the area threw buckets of water on us pilgrims in order to cool us in the heat of the day.

When we arrived to the meeting place, we sat and ate lunch, expecting the arrival of the Pope. After ours of waiting, we received him. He began the prayers of the vigil. Despite the foreign language, the rain and other little incidents, the atmosphere was breathtaking. The peak moment was the time of adoration before the Blessed Sacrament, when more than a million people knelt (on wet ground) and spent some minutes paying deep respect to the Lord, present in the Bread of Life. After these moments of adoration, the Pope spoke to us for a few minutes. He said: "Thank you for your joy and resistance. Your strength is bigger than the rain… The Lord sends you lots of blessings with the rain.. in these moments of silence before the Blessed Sacrament, let us raise our minds and hearts to Jesus Christ, the Lord of our lives and of the future”. The Holy Father consecrated all Catholic youth to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and then took his leave, a precious and emotional moment. A while later, most of the youth present went off to sleep, awaiting tomorrow, the mass with the Holy Father.

See video clip here