�Months of crazy� prepare the way to Krakow

By Ana Rodriguez Soto - Florida Catholic newspaper

MIAMI | At San Isidro, they hosted game and movie nights through mid-July. They also washed cars and sold sno-cones to raise funds for their trip to World Youth Day.

“It’s been two-and-a-half months of crazy,” said Erick Frederick, one of four young adults from the Pompano Beach parish who will making the trip to Krakow, Poland.

Frederick, 20, and three others in his group are among 115 young people and adult chaperones traveling to Krakow on the official archdiocesan pilgrimage to WYD 2016. Archbishop Thomas Wenski will join the group in Poland, making this the first official archdiocesan pilgrimage to World Youth Day.

The San Isidro pilgrims’ participation was made possible by a scholarship from the Archdiocese of Miami that covered about 60 percent of the trip’s roughly $4,000 cost. The rest was contributed by the pilgrims themselves and their parishes.

The scholarship money came from the $1 million raised at the October 2013 gala to mark the archdiocese’s 55th anniversary.

Archbishop Wenski selected four parishes to receive the funds, leaving the choice of pilgrims to each pastor. The parishes selected were: San Isidro, St. Clement in Fort Lauderdale, the Basilica of St. Mary Star of the Sea in Key West and St. Mary Cathedral in Miami.

The frantic fundraising enabled San Isidro to send four people — not two — on the journey. Their goal was to raise $8,000, to offset the cost of extra food and incidentals.

“We figured if God opened the door for us, if we put in the work, he would provide,” said Eileen Pinzas, 28, who like all the others is involved in ministry at the church — from dance group to youth group to catechesis.

In return, their pastor, Father Miguel Gomez, “expects us to continue to be involved in the parish,” Frederick said. “He expects us to bring back the lessons that we’ve been taught.”

Investing in young people

“The easy story is how exciting it is for the kids. The real story is they’re representing their parish to the world and then bringing back to their parish the gifts from World Youth Day,” said Stephen Colella, director of the Secretariat of Parish Life in the archdiocese, which oversees the Office of Youth and Young Adult Ministry.

Colella, a pilgrim at six World Youth Days, said the scholarships are a way of “investing in these parishes so the pilgrimage doesn’t end when (the young adults) come home.” 

The two representatives from Key West will be expected to start a youth ministry at their parish when they return. The San Isidro group hopes to “set up a perpetual system so we can send people to the next World Youth Day,” Frederick said, perhaps as many as 10 to 15 each time.

‘City of saints’

Most of the archdiocesan pilgrims have been preparing for the trip for 18 months. As part of that preparation, they have been asked to read George Wiegel’s “City of Saints,” in which St. John Paul II’s official biographer refers to Krakow as “the city where the 20th Century happened.”

Krakow suffered through both the Nazi and communist occupations. It is also the birthplace of both St. Faustina Kowalska and the Polish pope who revealed her visions of Divine Mercy to the world — a counterpoint of hope, many believe, to the horrendous 20th century evils of two world wars, the Nazi holocaust and the communist gulags.

“If this is your first World Youth Day, you’ve picked a great one to go to,” said Chris Dube, director of Maine-based Dube Travel, a Catholic who has attended five World Youth Days. “You’re getting all of him (St. John Paul II) tied up in one package on the 30th anniversary (of World Youth Day), in his home town.”

Dube spoke in March at a meeting with the adult leaders of the archdiocesan pilgrimage group. His company is handling the arrangements for about 3,000 of the so-far 39,000 U.S. pilgrims to World Youth Day — reportedly the highest number ever registered for a World Youth Day not taking place in North America.

‘Hard goal to reach’

The largest parish representation among archdiocesan pilgrims is the 22-member group from St. Ann Mission in Homestead, whose members range from 17 to 48 years of age.

To help participants offset the cost of the trip, they started raising funds a year ago, selling tamales and holding garage sales every weekend while taking their performance of the story of Our Lady of Guadalupe on the road to other churches.

“Father Jesus (Bohorquez), he’s the one that was really motivating a lot of people,” said Pablo Rodriguez, the adult group leader for St. Ann. He was referring to the church’s pastor, who began a sabbatical July 1.

“Even though it seemed like a hard goal to reach, he was the one who believed it was achievable,” Rodriguez said, noting that many of the parish families are “barely getting by.”

The other large group going consists of 22 students and four teachers from St. Thomas Aquinas High School in Fort Lauderdale. Encuentros Juveniles will be represented by 15 young (and older) adults.

Other parish groups are: St. Matthew in Hallandale and Blessed Sacrament in Fort Lauderdale, sending nine each; Little Flower in Coral Gables, sending eight; St. Philip Neri in Miami Gardens, sending two adults and two teens; St. Mary Cathedral, sending three young adults; St. Clement, sending two; and St. Sebastian, sending two teens who will join with the St. Thomas Aquinas group.

Other young adults come from St. Mark in Southwest Ranches and St. Raymond in Miami, in addition to the four from San Isidro and two from St. Mary Star of the Sea.

Four priest chaplains also will accompany the group: Father Bryan Garcia, parochial vicar of St. Andrew in Coral Springs; Father Jean Sterling Laurent, spiritual advisor to Encuentros Juveniles; Father Silverio Rueda, a retired Colombian priest going with the St. Ann group; and Father Alejandro Lopez Cardinale of Renew International (Why Catholic), who is also president of La Red, the National Catholic Network of Pastoral Juvenil Hispana.

‘You’re going to be unsettled’

At the final group meeting for all the pilgrims, a day-long retreat June 25 at St. Martha Church in Miami, Rosemarie Banich assured them, “Nothing about this pilgrimage is random or coincidence.”

Banich, director of the Office of Youth and Young Adults, told them, “You’re going to be unsettled” by the language, the food, the tiresome rides on planes and buses, the all-night vigil at Campus Misericordiae (an open field on the outskirts of Krakow) and the 8-mile walk to get there.

But that’s a good thing, she stressed. “You really need to step away from the normalcy of your lives. Embrace that. That’s the moment when you will shed layers of attachment and in doing so be better able to respond to Jesus’ call.”

On July 17, the archdiocesan pilgrims and their families will gather at St. Mary Cathedral for a send-off Mass, where the will receive a blessing from Auxiliary Bishop Peter Baldacchino.

“Just think,” said Colella, “about what 115 people coming back with this experience can do, especially young people.”

 WYD Krakow 2016: Fast facts

• The 115 archdiocesan pilgrims to World Youth Day were to leave from Miami July 22 and return Aug. 3. They’re scheduled to celebrate Mass in Czestochowa, visit Auschwitz, then head to Krakow, where they’ll tour the Sanctuary of Divine Mercy before celebrating the opening Mass of World Youth Day July 26.

• After celebrating a vigil and Mass with Pope Francis the weekend of July 30-31, the Miami pilgrims will engage in a final reflection at the mountaintop retreat of Zakopane, where St. John Paul II loved to hike and take his students when he was a college professor.

• Archbishop Thomas Wenski is one of 13 U.S. bishops chosen to lead the English-language catechesis — three mornings of inspirational talks on the theme of World Youth Day that precede the young people’s weekend encounter with Pope Francis.

• The theme of World Youth Day 2016 is “Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy” (Mt 5:7).

• In addition to the official archdiocesan group, nearly 400 other South Florida Catholics will be traveling to World Youth Day on their own: That includes parish groups from St. Louis in Pinecrest, St. Maximilian Kolbe in Pembroke Pines and St. John XXIII in Miramar; about 200 members of the Neocatechumenal Way, who will be joining groups of 50 each from the Diocese of Orlando and the Turks & Caicos; about 100 traveling with the Servants of the Pierced Hearts of Jesus and Mary; and about 25 Spanish-speakers traveling with SEPI, the U.S. bishops’ Southeast Regional Office for Hispanics.

• Look for frequent reports on the archdiocesan pilgrims’ experiences in Poland on the archdiocesan website, www.miamiarch.org; and follow along on Facebook (ArchdioceseofMiami), Twitter and Instagram (@CatholicMiami). The pilgrims will be using the hashtag: #WYDMiami2016.