Vancouver youth and 1,000 Canadians among half million in Rome for Jubilee of Youth

This story was updated July 30 to add additional details about the Jubilee of Youth.

Thirteen young people from the Archdiocese of Vancouver will join more than half a million others from 146 countries in Rome this week for the Jubilee of Youth, part of the Church’s Jubilee Year celebrations.

The Vancouver pilgrims include individuals and groups from Holy Rosary Cathedral, St. Patrick’s, and St. Andrew’s parishes in Vancouver, and St. Peter’s in New Westminster. They gathered July 11 at the John Paul II Pastoral Centre for Mass and a reflection session to prepare spiritually for the pilgrimage.

They will be among some 1,000 Canadian youth expected at the July 28–Aug. 3 events, which include a special Canadian gathering July 29 at Sant’Andrea della Valle Church. The two-hour celebration will feature a youth-led welcome, bilingual Scripture readings, faith-sharing, musical performances, and witness panels with youth and bishops. It will conclude with a commissioning prayer and symbolic sending forth.

Several Canadian bishops, along with priests, deacons, religious sisters and brothers, and lay leaders, will be present. The Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops has invited the faithful across the country to pray for the young pilgrims as they seek to deepen their relationship with Christ and offer a powerful witness to the Church’s life in Canada and around the world.

While 68 per cent of attendees will be from Europe, young people will be coming from four other continents and from war zones and areas of serious conflict, Archbishop Rino Fisichella, a pro-prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization, said July 23.

“Essentially, this moment of celebration and joy also aims to embrace all young people around the world, indicating that it will be a genuine moment of peace and peace-building in the world,” he said at a Vatican news conference.

“I am thinking in particular of the Christian young people of Ukraine, the Middle East, Syria, Gaza, and Iran,” said Lamberto Giannini, Rome’s prefect, who coordinates maintaining law and order in the city. The seven-day event during the Jubilee of Hope will be “in communion with all of them, because it is for them above all that hope is offered today, and not just any hope, but as we have been taught, the hope that does not disappoint,” he said.

The Vatican news conference featured representatives of the Italian national, regional, and local governments, as well as police and civil protection authorities. They provided many details about what is slated to be the largest of all the jubilee celebrations scheduled for the Holy Year, which has drawn nearly 17 million people so far, the archbishop said.

The high points will be walking through the Holy Door at St. Peter’s Basilica, and the Aug. 2 evening prayer vigil and Aug. 3 Mass with Pope Leo XIV in Rome’s Tor Vergata residential neighbourhood, which lies about eight miles southeast of the city centre.

The week will also feature about 70 cultural, artistic, and spiritual events—organized by multiple bishops’ conferences and Catholic groups and associations—throughout the city.

On Saturday, Aug. 2, the gates to the large area set up at Tor Vergata will open at 9 a.m. From 2 p.m. to 8 p.m., there will be on-stage entertainment with music and testimonies, hosted by Rudy Zerbi, Lorena Bianchetti and Paola Arriaza Avilés, Luigi Santarelli and Wallace Freitas, Victor Hernandez and Fabyola Inzunza. 

Guests taking to the stage include the world-renowned Italian singing trio Il Volo, Sergio Bernal, and Matt Maher; the Christian bands The Sun and Reale; Thiago Brado; Missionario Shalom; and the Hakuna Group Music choir, founded during World Youth Day in Rio de Janeiro in 2013. The Diocesan Choir of Rome, directed by Monsignor Marco Frisina, with approximately 450 members including the choir and orchestra, will sing at the Holy Father’s arrival and the Vigil.

Also on the agenda is the exposition of the relics of Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati and Blessed Carlo Acutis for veneration in advance of their canonization together by Pope Leo XIV in September.

Frassati’s incorrupt body will be available for public veneration beginning July 26 at the Basilica of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, located near the Pantheon. His tomb will be open to visitors daily from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. through the morning of Aug. 4.

Youth volunteers from the JP2 Project, a U.S.-based Catholic nonprofit, will be on hand to accompany pilgrims in prayer at the basilica, where several Masses are scheduled. Archbishop Anthony Fisher of Sydney will celebrate Mass there at 11 a.m. on Aug. 4.

A separate event, “Night of Adoration with Pier Giorgio Frassati,” will take place from 8:30 to 10 p.m. on July 31 and Aug. 1 at the Church of Piazza Farnese.

Organized by the JP2 Project, the evening adoration aims to foster reflection on Frassati’s spiritual legacy. His remains will be returned to his hometown of Turin, Italy, on Aug. 5.

A few blocks away, the Church of San Marcello al Corso will host the “Blessed Carlo Acutis Center.” Acutis, a 15-year-old computer coder who died of cancer in 2006, is known for his devotion to the Eucharist and his efforts to catalogue Eucharistic miracles.

A first-class relic of Acutis’ heart will be available for veneration at the church, where visitors may also submit prayer intentions to be brought to his tomb in Assisi. The centre opens at 10 a.m. on July 29 and closes at 9:30 p.m. on July 31. Daily Eucharistic adoration with the relic is scheduled from 3:30 to 5 p.m.

Evening events at the church on July 30 and 31 will include music, testimonies, and prayer. On July 29 at 11 a.m., young artist Johnny Vrba will present his 1,000-piece mosaic portrait of Acutis. An exhibit on Eucharistic miracles created by Acutis before his death will also be on display.

In addition to Acutis and Frassati, the jubilee will highlight other young people recognized for their sanctity.

On July 30, Jesus Youth International will host the Blessed Ivan Merz Center at the Basilica of Sant’Andrea della Valle, featuring relic veneration, confession, youth talks, and an evening of Eucharistic adoration.

Merz, a Croatian intellectual and former soldier who promoted Catholic youth movements, died in 1928 at the age of 31. Also on July 30, the Basilica di San Crisogono in Trastevere will host a talk at 11:20 a.m. on Merz’s life.

At the Centro San Lorenzo, a youth centre near St. Peter’s Basilica, pilgrims can learn about the Pier Giorgio Homeless Ministry and attend a gathering with the Servant Sisters of the Home of the Mother, the religious community of Sister Clare Crockett—a young Irish nun whose cause for canonization is underway.

That event, featuring prayer, adoration, and fellowship, will take place Wednesday afternoon, July 30.

The jubilee will also feature a self-guided “Young Saints Walk,” encouraging pilgrims to visit churches throughout Rome that house the relics of young saints.

Stops include St. Agnes, martyred at age 12; St. Aloysius Gonzaga, who died while caring for plague victims at 23; as well as St. Philip Neri and St. John Paul II, both remembered for their commitment to youth. The full walking route is available through the EWTN Travel app.

Pope Leo will arrive by helicopter for the prayer vigil at 8:30 p.m., and three young people—from the United States, Mexico, and Italy—will ask the pope questions in their respective languages. After camping out on the grounds of the venue, young people will celebrate Mass the next morning with the pope, who “always gives a mandate, that is, he sends the young people on a mission,” Archbishop Fisichella said.

The city has refurbished the giant open-air venue for the vigil and Mass, including three recommended routes participants will walk to get there. While bus, train, and subway services will all be enhanced, people will have to walk the last three miles on foot, he said.

Stations will be set up along the routes offering assistance and water, but pilgrims are being asked to ensure they have comfortable shoes, a hat, sunscreen, and a plastic water bottle for refills, and to label their items and not bring valuables.

With past experience as their guide, scores of embassies and consulates in Rome have been contacted to prepare them to help expedite services for their citizens, said Fabio Ciciliano, head of the country’s civil protection department.

Thousands of passports and ID cards were lost during World Youth Day in Rome in 2000. There will be 2,660 stations for drinking water, more than 2,700 chemical toilets, and many services for the disabled, including a special “quiet” area at the venue.

Four large mist cannons, which are normally used to control dust during demolitions and can shoot water as far as 100 yards, will be positioned throughout the venue to cool people. Dozens of mobile units with smaller cannons will also make the rounds, spraying mist to offer relief in the expected heat. Temperatures typical for this time of year are in the low 90s.

Registered pilgrims will be receiving one food package at Tor Vergata Aug. 2 after they go through security, providing dinner for that night and breakfast and lunch the next day. Gluten-free meals will also be available.

“We hope they’re not so hungry that they will eat the breakfast and lunch for dinner, too,” the archbishop said, suggesting attendees bring extra food with them. He encouraged participants to download the special pilgrims’ guide and the official app, Iubilaeum25.

The Dicastery for Communication released the Vatican Vox app, which will offer simultaneous translations in five languages at Vatican-sponsored jubilee events, and Vatican Radio will provide translations and commentary in eight languages. The city’s mayor, Roberto Gualtieri, encouraged people to connect with their AI assistant, Julia, who speaks 80 languages, on WhatsApp, Messenger, Telegram, and the web.

With Canadian Catholic News, Catholic News Service, and Catholic News Agency files

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