Melbourne young adult Abigail remembers being surrounded by millions at the vigil sleep out for World Youth Day 2023 in Lisbon, Portugal. \u2018[There] was a glorious silence among us during the adoration of the Blessed Sacrament,\u2019 she recalls. \u2018There is nothing greater … the Lord was really present.\u2019<\/p>\n
Abigail was describing her World Youth Day experience to the 600-plus crowd that gathered at St Patrick\u2019s Cathedral on Thursday 20 August for the launch of the Archdiocese\u2019s pilgrimage to next World Youth Day in Seoul, South Korea, which will take place from 3-8 August 2027.<\/p>\n
Thursday\u2019s launch event (\u2018SeoulFest\u2019) began with an hour of prayer with the Blessed Sacrament, led by Archbishop Peter A Comensoli. Festivities then spilled out onto the Cathedral grounds with a Korean food truck, music and a special badge-making station for would-be pilgrims.<\/p>\n
\u2018I went to WYD Lisbon with the Archdiocese and I wanted to check out what it\u2019ll be like for WYD Seoul\u2019, said Sophie from St Joseph\u2019s Parish in Chelsea. She said she hopes more young people will \u2018embrace the opportunity if you have the chance to go, and just try to get involved in as many activities as you can when you go there!\u2019<\/p>\n
The Archdiocese is offering three pilgrimage options to the 2027 World Youth Day\u2014via Japan, via the Diocese of Incheon for an experience of the local church (Days in the Diocese), and a pilgrimage direct to Seoul.<\/p>\n
[E]mbrace the opportunity if you have the chance to go, and just try to get involved in as many activities as you can when you go there!<\/p>\n
A special door prize was offered on the night with four lucky winners scoring $500 vouchers to go towards their pilgrimage of choice. Adding to the excitement were members of Melbourne\u2019s Korean Catholic community who taught the crowd some basic Korean phrases including \u2018annyeonghaseyo\u2019 (hello), \u2018gamsahamnida\u2019 (thank you), \u2018ne\u2019 (yes) and \u2018aniyo\u2019 (no).<\/p>\n
Jared from Our Lady\u2019s Parish in Craigieburn said it was \u2018so good\u2019 to see so many youth gathered \u2018all in the one spot\u2019 for SeoulFest, and that he is \u2018definitely\u2019 going to World Youth Day Seoul. \u2018I want to go on the Japanese pilgrimage because I love the story of the 100 Japanese martyrs, and I want to see more of the faith throughout other parts of Asia.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u2018There\u2019s going to be all sorts of great moments during these days ahead, including gathering with Pope Leo,\u2019 said Archbishop Comensoli. In addition to the Masses and catechesis offered at World Youth Day, the Archbishop pointed to some of the quieter moments on pilgrimage that can be just as powerful. \u2018Moments like reconciliation, healing … forgiveness. And quiet moments of prayer, gathering, and of finding new friends.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s going to be all sorts of great moments during these days ahead, including gathering with Pope Leo<\/p>\n
\u2018I am praying for all of you already and I will continue to do so. My prayer is that we might all be a part of that pilgrimage to World Youth Day. We\u2019ve got a destination: our destination is Jesus.\u2019<\/p>\n
World Youth Day 2027 will be the first to take place in Asia since the event was hosted in Manila, Philippines, where more than five million people joined Pope John Paul II at the final Mass. And despite being the first non-Christian majority country to host a World Youth Day, South Korea has a rich Catholic history, with thousands of Christian martyrs killed for the faith over the centuries. This includes St Andrew Kim Taegon, the first Korean Catholic priest.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Melbourne young adult Abigail remembers being surrounded by millions at the vigil sleep out for World Youth Day…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":78555,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[6866,6864,6865,6310,6868,6869,260,6867,6870,68],"class_list":["post-78554","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-melbourne","tag-archbishop","tag-archdiocese","tag-catholic","tag-child-safety","tag-community","tag-jesus","tag-melbourne","tag-parish","tag-sacraments","tag-victoria"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78554","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78554"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78554\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78554"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78554"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78554"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}