Our People

Mass for Two Year World Youth Day Pre-Anniversary, Archdiocese of Perth

University of Notre Dame Fremantle

By Most Rev. Anthony Fisher OP
Auxiliary Bishop of Sydney
16/7/2006

Two years to go to the biggest youth event in the history of our nation. More than 150,000 young people from around the world will join a similar number of young Aussies for a week of catechesis and prayer, celebration and liturgy, festival and fun. By the end of that week numbers will have swollen to over half a million. But in the end it is not the numbers that matter. It is what it will do for some of our young people and for those who are touched in turn by them. Some will have a great time and that’s what they’ll remember. But for many it will be really life-changing. It is a dangerous thing to have that much fun with God and his Church! Who knows what he will do with you?!

WYD08 is a once in life-time opportunity for us here in Australia to connect young people with every corner and apostolate of our Church and to renew our Church and society in the process. Young people need Christ and his Church in their searching, and the Church, in turn, needs young people for her renewal. In his letter to us here in Australia, Ecclesia in Oceania (15), Pope John Paul II said:

Above all, the Fathers of the Synod wanted to touch the hearts of young people. Many young people are searching for truth and goodness, and their search can involve experimenting with the appeals and claims of the contemporary world, some of which are clearly destructive. This can create confusion in the young which leaves them at a loss to know what true values might be and where true happiness might be found. The great challenge and opportunity is to offer them the gifts of Jesus Christ in the Church, for these gifts alone will satisfy their yearning. But Christ must be presented in a way well adapted to the younger generation and the rapidly changing culture in which they live.

The gift of World Youth Day is a new opportunity to give our young people these gifts of Jesus Christ in the Church and to build with and for and through them a new future. In our second reading tonight St Paul sings his hopes for us in a canticle, a song, he has written to Jesus. It is a very beautiful one and I invite you to read it again during the week. It is at the very beginning of his letter to the Ephesians. He blesses God the Father for creating our world and for planning a future for us. He praises God the Father for sending us his Beloved Son, Jesus Christ, through whose blood we gain our freedom, forgiveness, wisdom, insight, adoption as God’s children. Through Jesus God reveals to us his mysterious but wonderful purposes for us. He reveals to us both who we are and what our lives mean. Even more awesome, Paul sings, God has given us the message of truth and the Gospel of salvation. God has claimed us as his own and sealed us with his Holy Spirit.

Which brings me to the theme chosen by Pope Benedict for the World Youth Day to be held in this “Great South Land of the Holy Spirit” – as the first explorers called it. It is from Our Lord’s last words before he ascended to the Father: “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses” (Acts 1:8). These words are, in a sense, Jesus’ last will and testament. They record his parting bequest to us: he will send us the Holy Spirit. And they tell us his parting hopes for us: that we will be witnesses to him. In Christifideles laici (46) John Paul II said that:

Young people are an extraordinary opportunity and challenge for the Church. The Church sees her path towards the future in them, beholding in young people a reflection of herself and her call to that blessed youthfulness which she constantly enjoys as a result of Christ’s Spirit. In this sense the Second Vatican Council defined youth as “the hope of the Church”... But youth must not be considered simply as an object of pastoral concern for the Church: in fact, they are and ought to be encouraged to be active on behalf of the Church as leading characters in evangelization and participants in the renewal of society… The Church has so much to talk about with youth, and youth have so much to share with the Church.

This weekend we mark the two-year pre-anniversary of WYD08 by beginning that conversation between youth and the Church. We are launching around Australia ActIv8, our programme of evangelisation, catechesis and prayer with our young people to help prepare and activate them for one of the greatest experiences of their lives. But the young are not just passive recipients of the Gospel of Adults. They are disciples and evangelists themselves. Think of Mary at the time of the Annunciation or John at the time of the Crucifixion. They were teenagers, but what a difference they made! Echoing the thoughts of our region’s bishops, John Paul noted in Ecclesia in Oceania (44) that he

wanted to assure the youth of the Church in Oceania that they are… a vital part of the Church today, and that Church leaders are keen to find ways to involve young people more fully in the Church’s life and mission. Young Catholics are called to follow Jesus: not just in the future as adults, but now as maturing disciples…The Synod Fathers were convinced of the need for youth-to-youth ministry…

After Mass tonight we will show you our latest DVD of why we wanted World Youth Day for Australia, what our plans are so far, how we see things panning out, and how you can be involved. God has already given you all that he is in giving you Jesus Christ. Now he wants to give you the power of his Holy Spirit as well. In return he doesn’t ask much: only that you give him your all! Then it will be your turn to be sent out like the Twelve Apostles in our Gospel tonight (Mk 6:7-13). Then it will be your turn to preach and to heal. For God’s grace is infectious. As Pope Benedict XVI said in his homily to the young people at the Final Mass or the World Youth Day in Cologne:

Anyone who has discovered Christ must lead others to him. A great joy cannot be kept to oneself… I know that you young people have great aspirations, that you want to pledge yourselves to build a better world. Let others see this, let the world see it, since this is exactly the witness that the world expects from the disciples of Jesus Christ. In this way, and through your love above all, the world will be able to discover the star that we follow as believers.

Get ready for the ride of your life! Let the Holy Spirit of God fill you with his power to become Christ’s witnesses to a new millennium. Be all that you can be and more. For as St Paul said to us tonight, God chose you, chose you before you were born, chose you before the world was made, “chose you in Christ to be holy and spotless and to live through love in his presence.”