Youth Day must be more than the Pope in Portugal
World Youth Day 2023 (WYDLisboa2023) will mark young Portuguese people, according to the executive secretary of the local organization, for whom the event “has to be much more” than the Pope’s days in Portugal.
“I think that two things will transform Portuguese youth: the path we take there, the way we get involved and try to get all young people involved in this preparation (…) contexts, whether they are from Lisbon or elsewhere. That in the end we feel that this is a very joint thing (…) and responsible for a great thing that happened in the country. And then, the week itself, I think it will be transformative to hear even those who have never loved the Journey until then”, says Duarte Ricciardi in an interview with Lusa.
For this 37-year-old manager, “the life has to be much more than those four or five days when the Pope is here and what he experienced that week”.
“Our goal is that on August 6th, the Journey will end, everyone who is in this territory, here in Lisbon, in Loures, in Almada, will feel the Journey very intensely, be proud of what has been done, that Something from the Portuguese to the world and not just from a committee that is an organizer or from the Patriarchate of Lisbon that is an organizer. May this be what transforms the youth”, he stresses.
Duarte Ricciardi, who twice has the epithet of “Catholic Woodstock” that is sometimes given good 2023, recognizes that, for him, as young days in which they participated “an important milestone”.
“I believe a lot in the project, I believe a lot in the Journey itself and in what it represents and I think that [o convite para o cargo de secretário executivo do Comité Organizador Local] It was a little bit of reconciling a person who is also within that, who identifies with the project, with a management capacity, to be able to give some professionalism to this coordination here”, he explains.
Organized by the Catholic Church, World Youth Day is, however, “a completely universal event, open to all, in which any young person, closer or farther from the church, or even a young person who is not even Catholic, who is from another religion, he is invited to participate”, recalls Duarte Ricciardi, specifying that it is an event that, during a week, “has a series of things that happen, not all of them are religious, a lot is [do âmbito] artistic, sportive and it is also a lot about meeting other young people and a lot about the joy that is generated in this meeting, about the opportunities of a week to have unforgettable moments”.
“Pope Francis himself is a universal figure, with many people who vary a lot later and identified, in the proximity of the Church”, he says, adding that he is sure “it will be a meeting completely open to everyone and also very much with interreligious dialogue and ecumenical. And that people feel good here regardless of religion.”
According to the leader of the teams that are putting together the logistics of the Day, “the Patriarchate of Lisbon has a team that works exactly on ecumenical and interreligious dialogue and this team is also working to find the moments to do this proactively, that is, , the Day as a whole is open to everyone”.
JLG // HB