By Mia Wugol
UP to 260 youth from earthquake devastated Haiti will join over 2,000 foreign students at the Days in the Diocese (DID) event in the lead-up to World Youth Day in Madrid this August.
WYD organisers have guaranteed youth from poorer countries free registration. The diocese of Ciudad Real, for example, is hosting the Haitian youth.
They will join over 4,000 Australian youth who are expected to travel to Spain in August for WYD Madrid, amongst the over one million youths from around the world expected to attend.
The Australians (mostly aged 18-35 years) will be joined by two million other young Catholics from the Americas, Africa, Europe and the Asia-Pacific region at the event that is predicted to be 10 times larger than World Youth Day 2008 in Sydney.
A website, www.dedmadrid11.com, has been launched that has information on every site hosting DID in the lead-up to WYD Madrid.
At least 110 students from Perth have registered for WYD, though that number is expected to rise once Catholic ethnic groups and other communities are included.
Fifty of these come from the Vietnamese Catholic community, while 60 have registered from diocesan parishes.
Over 300,000 youth from 137 countries participate in DID, a programme started in 1997 to help youth prepare spiritually for the main events and to acclimatise visitors to the host country.
Opportunities to be a part of DID, however, are running out fast, as 12 of the 63 participating dioceses in Spain have already reached capacity.
Up to 2.1 million young people are expected to attend WYD Madrid from 11-15 August, 5,000 of whom will be from Australia.
As Spain has a rich Catholic cultural history, having been first evangelised by St James the Apostle, dioceses are hosting events that will immerse foreign WYD participants in the country’s deep religious roots.
The Basilica of Sagrada Familia in Barcelona will host such an event for youth from Catalonia with local young people. Pamplona will host youth from Sicily, with whom they are already sharing prayer meetings every Friday to prepare for WYD.
WYD organisers have also planned events that will be unique for WYD Madrid, including Watchmen of the Morning, a writing contest named after a term coined by the late Pope John Paul II when he met young people in his last visit to Spain in 2003.
The Cronica Blanca Foundation will reward journalistic work, to be published on 1 May, that reflects what WYD in Madrid is and means. Compositions can be presented in radio, audiovisial, press or internet formats. Awards will be announced on 16 August, the day WYD Madrid begins.
The popular Stations of the Cross – where the Passion of Christ from His betrayal in the Garden of Gethsemane to His Crucifixion is re-enacted through the streets of the host city – will also take on a new twist in Madrid.
A carving of the “Lying Christ” depicting Christ lying down by 16th century Spanish sculptor Gregoria Fernandez, donated by the Cathedral of Segovia, will be used for the 14th Station. Segovia is the 12th Spanish city to be represented in the Way of the Cross.