Volunteers stand ready to distribute water to pilgrims as they arrive at the ANIA encampment. |
ANIA Pilgrims re-enact
the canoe travels of the North American Jesuit missionaries who worked among native peoples near Lake Huron. |
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BY FR. MIKE KOLB, SJ
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In a chapel at the Martyrs Shrine at Midland, Ontario, amid a prayerful drone and the soft glow of a hundred candles, I notice a young man kneeling, hands outstretched, his face radiant, almost beatific. “Golly,” I think, “you’d never see a
Marquette High kid do that.” Then I look again and realize that it is one of the young men from our group, Adam the kick-boxer.
Adam and I are among a group of 22 students and several staff from Marquette University High School in Milwaukee who made the journey to Midland as part of a two-week journey – the first at ANIA, a pilgrimage and spirit-filled gathering of about 750 young people, mostly students from Jesuit schools; the other at World Youth Day week in Toronto.
The image of Adam is one of two that remain with me most.
Planning the journey began early last fall. Chris Collins, SJ, Fr. Rob Kroll, SJ, and Mrs. Sue Sajdak spearheaded the planning. I figured I could do almost anything for a couple weeks and signed up as well.
The ANIA encampment resembled a very nice refugee camp: 80-person tents, a few cold showers, a medical station, and crates of food distributed from the back of a rental truck. And mosquitoes – millions of huge, insatiable Canadian mosquitoes. And
dusty dirt – tons of fine, clingy, dusty Canadian dirt. None of this, as you might guess, thrilled me particularly. Indeed, I grew downright whiny.
Members of the Wyandotte tribe join one of the daily liturgies celebrated during pilgrimage. |
Pilgrims, holding pictures
of the North American Jesuit martyrs, journey on six-mile walk to the site where the Jesuits were killed. |
Lots of time was spent just hanging around: talking among the older folks; soccer, volleyball and Frisbee for the tireless younger ones; concerts and plays in the evenings. We shared prayer and Mass daily and undertook a series of experiences that recalled the North American Martyrs. We paddled canoes across small lakes. We walked 12 kilometers to Saint-Ignace, site of the martyrdom of Fr. Jean de Brébeuf, SJ and Fr. Gabriel Lalemant, SJ. We visited Ste. Marie among the Hurons, a superb recreation of the 17th century Jesuit mission base.
Most touching for me was Ste.Marie. Brébeuf and Lalemant were laid to rest in the church there, covered only by a mound of dirt marked by smoky lamps and simple crosses of plaited reeds.
Touching, too, was the rebuilt Jesuit house and particularly the individual rooms – windowless and smaller than my bed at home. This, I realized, was the soft, cushy place where my long-dead brothers took ease from their work in the real wilderness of Huronia. No more whining about a week in a tent, I resolved.
The week actually passed quite quickly. For the kids, for us all, meeting and playing and sharing faith with folks from other Jesuit schools from around the world was a great experience. Even more, sharing a bit of the experience of those missionaries gave us pause for thought. “So, like, why did they do this? How could they do it?” one of the kids asked during our reflection. What we came up with, more or less, was that Brébeuf, Lalemant and the others had simply given themselves over to God, and so knew what they did was the most important, worthwhile thing they could possibly do – a challenge I brought home with me.
After Midland, Toronto was like the Ritz. Hoping for a bug-free gym, we were enraptured to be household guests of parishioners of St. Martin de Porres parish. My hosts, John and Ann Blair, provided me with the longest shower, tastiest pork chop, and longest sleep I’ve had in many years. Restored and relaxed, we charged into World Youth Day. Each day had a central event, such as opening Mass or Way of the Cross. But each left plenty of time for wandering and connecting with other pilgrims from around the globe at concerts, prayer sessions, talks, plays, discussion groups, most anything you could think of. All of this pointed toward the papal mass Sunday morning.
Fr. Warren Sazama, SJ, (left), Wisconsin Province vocation director, joins pilgrims for the trip to Downsview, Ontario, for the pope's World Youth Day Mass. Fr. Sazama made the ANIA/World Youth Day pilgrimage with a group of young men who have expressed interest in becoming Jesuits. Province Novice Director Fr. John Fitzgibbons, SJ, seated directly behind Fr. Sazama, made the trip with a group of novices from the Jesuit novitiate in St. Paul. |
Some people rode to the site. Others rode part of the way and hiked the final few miles. Our small group came up with a great idea no one would fess up to ownership of in five hours – we would hike the whole way from downtown, beginning Saturday morning, to the Mass site at Downsview Air Bas. That would be fun!! What looked like a few miles on the map turned out to be a plodding trek over 10 scorching miles.
If Midland was a well-run refugee camp, Downsview was more a poorly organized Woodstock for Catholics. Planners had provided
innumerable cardboard boxes for waste but perhaps had not planned to have them all used for blocking the sun. Trash piled up to the delight of the abundant field mice and frogs, against which one of our kids waged an ongoing, and I might add, just war armed only with a sneaker. Holy Father arrived at about 7 p.m., passing within 30 yards. He held what was more or less a long vespers service.
Second-year novices (from left) Mike Mosley, nSJ and Matt Moser, nSJ take cover from the rain as they wait for the start of the World Youth Day Papal Mass with Trevor Scott. Now a first-year novice, Scott entered the novitiate about a month later. |
At the rear of a crowd of a half million or so, we all stretched and strained to see the papal tiny white blur a half mile or so away. What we saw most was the throng of people and a sea of flags stretching toward the stage so far away. Thinking of the universal church is one thing; seeing an immense yet tiny portion of it assembled before me was breath-taking.
Holy Father left. The just war against the rodents and amphibians continued.
Wandering around that evening was surreal. Huge, illuminated helium balloons lighted the vast field where hundreds of thousands of young people talked, played soccer on the landing strips, and spent Spirit-filled hours learning about one another. By 3 a.m. Sunday, the morning of the papal Mass, things had quieted down. Almost everyone slept beneath the open canopy of sky. At 3:30 it drizzled a bit. At 5:30, the heavens opened.
I have probably seen harder rains; I’m sure I had never before stood outside for an hour through one. Canadian dirt turned to thick, Canadian mud. Frogs began swimming. Mice began swimming. We ate a kind of Spanish rice for breakfast. More garbage
piled up. A great wind arose, blowing balloons and garbage and boxes toward Nova Scotia. The rains ceased. Holy Father returned. Mass started. The sun broke through. Not necessarily in that order.
After the Mass we returned to the parish and left the next day for Milwaukee. |
They were among approximately 800,000 pilgrims who attended the liturgy at Downsview Air Base in Toronto. Pope John Paul II, visible to many only on the large video screen, called their watery wait “a natural Baptism.” |
Two weeks. Did they change any of us
profoundly? Perhaps. At the very least, a lot of
great young kids got to explore their inner selves
and see the pope.
I believe, however, we all experienced more than that. Indeed, we experienced the presence of God. And not so much in the thousand bishops, or the incense or the drying sun or, dare I say, the pope – merely because he was the pope.
For me, for all of us amid the garbage, muck and mass of humanity, God was present in the old warrior Wojtila – displayed limping, slurring, listing on a giant TV screen – just being there and keeping his promise in joy and in suffering service.
This is the other image that stays with me most. |
Reflections of a summer journey
ANIA and World Youth Days were an extremely amazing experience because I felt a rare and wonderful feeling of friendship with dozens of youth from around the globe. I met people from Nova Scotia, Canada to Hungary to Quito, Ecuador to Jamaica to South Africa. The variety of people and cultures was a true blessing. The number of countries represented at World Youth
Days is unparalleled anywhere, and it was a huge comfort for all of us to see the universal Church gathered in one place under one God to join together and celebrate our faith. The serenity and peace that descended upon me was amazing. Just seeing the youth of the world gathered together made me feel a total sense of calm. For that week the world was bound together for no goal other than peace. I got to know people from around the world, and I also got to see the pope. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and I am very glad to have been part of it.
— Brady McCarragher, Marquette High
While many images and moments of World Youth Day remain with me, I was particularly moved by the pope's frail yet powerful presence, and the way so many young people responded to this old Polish successor to Peter. I choked back tears watching the pope painfully descend from the plane to the tarmac. Millard Fuller, founder of Habitat for Humanity, said it best in
his inspiring address to the pilgrims: the Pope has every right to say “I've put in my time for Christ; now it's time
to take it easy,” but instead he continues to witness to Christ around the globe. As I observed the pope, I thought of Yoda in the latest Stars Wars film: slowed by age, walking with a cane, but very wise and powerful in the fight against the Dark Side. In a society where we hide the elderly, sick and disabled from public view, the Pope's willingness to appear before millions, bent and frail, witnesses to the truth of St. Paul's words: “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness” (2 Cor.12:9).
— Fr. Rob Kroll, SJ
The sense of unity I felt as our pilgrimage took us to World Youth Day in Toronto rejuvenated me and made me yearn for the sense of community that is difficult to achieve in an economically segregated city like Milwaukee. With so many of the world’s cultures represented, it dawned on me that it is far too easy to get swept up in petty bickering and a “need” for supremacy. It is much more important to look at what the world’s real needs are: unity, friendship, love, praise, laughter,
and everything else that makes a person feel whole. As the lead singer of the band Crispin remarked, “If anyone ever asks you if there is a crisis in the Church, you tell him about World Youth Day. You describe to them everything that you have seen and felt here….” Since World Youth Day I have felt more in touch with what binds everything together. God is everywhere and in everyone. Moreover, it is how we express God that is truly important. Reflecting God in whatever way I can is my
new purpose.
— Martin Cherwin, Marrquette High
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