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August 3, 2008

800 young people rock Chicago at its first World Youth Day companion event

By Pam DeFiglio

CONTRIBUTOR

From Polish rappers to an experiment with duct tape to Bishop Paprocki singing a Linkin Park song, World Youth Day 2008 Chicago Style reverberated with the energy of young people.

About 800 people, mostly teens and twenty-somethings, gathered for the one-day event at St. Hyacinth Basilica on Chicago’s Northwest Side July 19.

Normally, the Archdiocese of Chicago encourages young people to travel to the city in which World Youth Day is being held. Since the long distance to Sydney made for an expensive plane ticket, however, the Archdiocese organized this event for young people who didn’t make it to Australia.

At the Chicago event, young people spent part of the afternoon in faith workshops, called catechetical sessions, and most of the evening in church. They also participated in a talent show, which featured a Polish rap group, a Mexican folkloric dance troupe, a singer from Ghana and many others. Faithbased performers, including singer Sal Solo and the band Ten Cities, also took the stage and got kids dancing.

Father Matt Eyerman also got kids moving during the English-language catechetical session he led. Eyerman, of St. Columbanus parish on Chicago’s South side, used energetic preaching and interactive exercises.

Saying that God tells us we can do amazing things, he asked 13-year-old Samantha Smyser from St. Aloysius Church to jump about 40 feet into the arms of a young man from Providence-St. Mel’s High School, who was to catch her. Smyser jumped, but only moved about two feet forward.

Sometimes, Eyerman explained, we need to ask for a little help from God, and sometimes that help comes in the form of friends.

He lined up about 20 volunteers, forming a direct path between Smyser and the young man who was to catch her. They all bent over from the waist, forming almost a solid surface with their backs. Eyerman and an adult volunteer held the hands of the very petite Smyser as she trotted across all their backs to the waiting arms of the young man, who caught her. The 200 or so kids in the room got the point and erupted with applause.

“I was sort of nervous,” Smyser said afterward. “But it was fun.”

Next, Eyerman asked his listeners to stand close together, and he ran around them, wrapping them in duct tape and crime scene tape, saying they were bound together by God’s love. The kids freed themselves, laughing, and Eyerman said a closing prayer.

In the Spanish-language catechetical session, participants watched a pantomime of the seven deadly sins, each represented by a different dancer, tempting a young woman. She fell victim to each sin, but eventually was rescued through the intervention of God.

“It showed God is always there for us, as opposed to other things like materialism,” said Maritsa Gonzalez, 21, of the youth group from St. Anthony of Padua Church in Cicero. “In the end, there is only God.”

Rogelio Alvarez, 21, of the same parish, had seen the pantomime before but got new insights this time.

“If you live life like the system wants you to live it, you’ll live in depression,” he said. “With God you go beyond the superficial. We can have serenity in our lives. We can have fun without alcohol and drugs in our lives.”

Father Stanislaw Jankowski took a more laid-back approach in the Polish-language catechetical session, and just talked to the young people.

“He kind of explained his view on faith, and how he became a priest,” said Sara Niedbala, 15, of Divine Mercy Polish Mission in Lombard.

“He was really outgoing and energetic,” added Agnieszka Glowik, 18, of Holy Trinity Polish Mission in Chicago.

A Ukrainian Catholic catechetical session was also held, and a Ukrainian choir led all the participants in singing a lovely Byzantine rite musical devotion called the Akathist hymn, a hymn of praise to the Mother of God.

At 7 p.m., five dancers from the Expressions of You ministry at St. Dorothy Church led a procession into church at the start of the liturgy. They were followed by young people carrying symbolic objects, such as a wooden cross signed by many of the youth. Bishop Joseph Perry served as principal celebrant, and the Mass was concelebrated by Bishops Thomas Paprocki and Francis Kane and Father Michael Osuch, pastor of St. Hyacinth. Ukrainian Catholic Bishop Richard Seminack also participated.

In the homily, Bishop Paprocki explained that, allowing for the fact Sydney’s time zone is 15 hours ahead of Chicago’s, the 7 p.m. liturgy in Chicago was occurring more or less simultaneously as Pope Benedict XVI’s World Youth Day Mass in Sydney.

Reflecting on the Gospel message about the weeds growing up among the wheat, Bishop Paprocki told the youth, “There is no shortage of God’s mercy to transform us from weeds to wheat — if only we ask.”

Bishop Paprocki also sang what he described as spiritual lyrics from Linkin Park’s song “What I’ve Done.” And he got the young people to sing along with him on a faith-laced song from the “Welcome Home” album by Brian Litrell, former lead singer of the Backstreet Boys. He finished to loud applause.

Later, Father Richard Hynes, director of the archdiocese’s Department of Evangelization, Catechesis and Worship, began to wrap up the liturgy by telling the young people, “God has a deep desire for you to make a difference in the world.

“If you can’t feel it, believe it,” he continued. “You are needed by God to make the world more holy, more transparent and more loving.”