The Whole Wide World is On My Train

Day number two of our WYD activities was filled with praying and playing in the city of Madrid. We started our day with breakfast and Catechesis at St. Teresa’s Church.  Catechesis is a way for us to learn more about our Catholic faith through a mixture of witnesses, key note addresses, music, Adoration and Mass.  We met up with fellow English speaking pilgrims and we expected to receive our Catechesis presentation from a Bishop, however we were pleasantly surprised to have Catechesis with a friend from home, Cardinal Francis George from the Archdiocese of Chicago. The main message this morning was to build relationships and to take up our faith and grow within it.  Allowing ourselves to grow in our faith involves us putting in roots, and watering them to grow, we are working on “Being Rooted” like St. Peter tells us in the Bible.   

            Following Catechesis, we all adventured on the Metro along with hundreds of thousands of our closest friends.  We split into two groups for afternoon activities.  One group ate lunch and chose to attend a Soul Band Concert with a band from Australia, here we learned that a soul band in Australia plays praise and worship music. Following the concert in the heat, we decided ice cream would be a great way to cool ourselves down.  The other group ate some lunch with ice cream for dessert, and then headed to the English Camp which is run by the Knights of Columbus and the Sisters of Life. This was a great opportunity to bond with people who spoke our language, and even reunite with some friends from home.  Here, this group chose to go to Confession, sit in on a live taping of Life on the Rock, and we were chosen to attend a press conference about media and youth with a soon to be Cardinal.  After some more exploring in the English camp, we split in groups again for some evening activities.  We headed to the Metro stations or traveled on foot, to a night full of music and theater. One group headed to a concert in the English language called Contagious Faith, so now we are ready to come home and spread the word.  Here we sang, jumped, danced, and some even got up on stage.  On the way back to the hotel, we decided to have our own concert and sing for everyone we passed and walked with.  Another group headed to a concert in French which involved singing, dancing, jumping, and even some mimes.  We were able to trade with lots of people from many places to get some fun trinkets to bring home.  After this concert, we headed for churros and chocolate followed by dinner, yes you read that correct…DESSERT FIRST! J  A third group headed to the theater to learn about St. Therese and her life.  We are very excited for tomorrow because Pope Benedict will finally arrive in Madrid!  We are ready to greet him with exuberant joy and tons of energy.  So that means…we are signing off for tonight to rest up for the big day tomorrow!! Hasta Luego!