WYD – The Songs, the Joy, the Chaos and the Silence… Why we all flocked to Madrid this summer

Salt and Light TV's Fr. Thomas Rosica has an excellent round-up of WYD from his front-row seat:

Some are now doing their perfunctory post-mortems on the aspects that worked and especially on all the things that didn’t work out with the Madrid organization of this mega-event for the Catholic Church. On an organizational level, there is much to be desired. But that is not the full story… No matter what may be the topics of countless discussions around tapas, sangria and Spanish cerveza, seeds were sown last week in abundance. We must now pray fervently for the World Youth Day harvest.

For many of the young people who attend World Youth days, they come out of the tsunamis of so much wishful thinking that swept across the Western World telling them that God wasn’t essential to their life; that Jesus was just another nice guy in history; and that they could be spiritual and religious without belonging to the Church.

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World Youth Days offer the best of the Catholic Church to young people and to the world: sacraments (especially Eucharist and Reconciliation); the Word of God, piety, devotion, the saints, and the beauty of our Catholic faith. World Youth Days offer times when liturgy in all of its diversity and beauty becomes a true, participatory instrument of worship and adoration…

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World Youth Days prepare young adults to give a reason for the hope that is in them, helping them to be convinced of the Christian message so that they will be convincing instruments of the New Evangelization. World Youth Days form young men and women to be lovers of the Truth and lovers of the Church. World Youth Days invite young people to make thoughtful, life-changing decisions. They help us to see the world “upside down”, from the cross of Jesus, as Archbishop Timothy Dolan so powerfully stated in his stirring homily at the mass for the pilgrims from the United States of America last Saturday morning. At World Youth Days, young people come together to commit themselves, in the strength of their faith in Jesus Christ, to the great cause of peace and human solidarity.