As preparations get under way for World Youth Day, organisers in Rio have launched a new smartdevice App, and announced that a “week of missions” will precede WYD.
At the request of Cardinal Stanislaw Rylko, president of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, and to help young people prepare to participate in World Youth Day, a “week of missions” will be held in Brazil from July 17-20, 2013.
The “Week of Missions” replaces what had become the “Days in the Dioceses” programme and its purpose is to give young people the chance to participate in spiritual activities, works of solidarity and missionary and cultural events.
According to WYD organiser, Raphael Fritz, the programme will give World Youth Day pilgrims a more authentic experience of what life is like locally.
Fr Jefferson Goncalves, director of the pre-World Youth Day activities hopes the “Week of Missions” will be a “legacy to future World Youth Days,” and lead young people into missionary discipleship.
Also in preparation for WYD, the traditional World Youth Day Cross and an icon of Mary has been travelling around Brazil since September 18, 2011, and to mark the event, organisers have announced a free smartdevice App called “Follow the Cross”, or “Siga a Cruz” in Portuguese.
Available for iPhones, iPods, iPads and Android phones “Siga a Cruz,” allows users to track the WYD pilgrim cross and icon of Mary as it makes its way around Brazil.
The App also allows users to interact with friends on Twitter and Facebook.
The WYD cross and icon of Mary will visit each diocese in the vast and highly Catholic Brazil as well as dioceses in the surrounding countries of Argentina, Uruguay, Chile and Paraguay.
Sources
- Vatican Radio
- CNA
- WYD Rio 2013
- Image: WYD Central