Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Rome (Fides Service) - From 6 to 10 October Eucharistic Adoration Youth Groups from all over Europe, a fruit of the 15th Word Youth Day held in Rome in 2000, will be in Rome for the 1st European Meeting. At the end of that Youth Day, the Pope sent the young people on their way with this task: “Dear friends, when you go back home, set the Eucharist at the centre of your personal life and community life: love the Eucharist, adore the Eucharist and celebrate it...” . This command encouraged young people in various countries to form groups for adoration of Jesus present in the Blessed Sacrament and to encourage adoration and the meeting with give these many different groups an opportunity to share their experiences for mutual enrichment .
The many objectives of this 1st meeting: reflecting on the encyclical “Ecclesia de Eucharistia”; meet each other; reflect on the Eucharist as source and summit of mission; share experience of the life of youth in the Church; ways to spread love for the Eucharist in the Church; rediscover Adoration of the real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist and give new impulse to evangelisation; exchange experience and ways of animating prayer in front of the Blessed Sacrament.
The meeting will open with a talk by Bishop Mons. Renato Boccardo, former Vatican head of youth pastoral now Secretary of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, on the theme “WYD: a stimulus for taking up the Pope’s call to youth to adore and celebrate the Eucharist”. At the end of a concelebration Mass in the church of S. Agnese in piazza Navona presided by Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, perpetual adoration will start. The next four days will include catechesis, work groups, testimony and festivities. In the afternoon 9 October Cardinal Camillo Ruini, the Pope’s Vicar general for the diocese of Rome, will preside a concelebration of Mass in piazza del Popolo, during which he will give catechists of the diocese their annual mandate and lead a procession of the Blessed Sacrament through the streets of the city centre to Piazza Navona and S. Agnese church. The meeting will conclude on Sunday 10 October with a Mass in St John’s the cathedral of Rome, a procession to St Peter’s Square for the Angelus prayer with the Pope and a lunch at which special guests will be a group of the city’s many poor people. This 1st European meeting is set in the framework of “Mission of youth to youth”, promoted by the Diocese di Roma from 1-10 October in the city centre with the theme “Jesus at the city centre!”. (S.L.) (Agenzia Fides 1/10/2004; Righe 28 - Parole 373)
