C I O F S LIST

15th World Youth Day - Youth Jubilee

The context

The theological framework

The context

1. World Youth Days (WYD), from the first to the most recent "-- Rome (1984), Buenos Aires (1987), Santiago de Compostela (1989), Czestochowa (1991), Denver (1993), Manila (1995) Paris (1997) "-- have proved to be providential events, occasions of grace for countless young people, privileged times for rediscovering and professing faith in Christ, for strengthening communion with the Church, and feeling called to become involved in the new evangeliza tion of the world. These Days have been missionary and pastoral events of primary impor tance, stimulating in the Particular Churches renewal of youth ministry, with far reaching ecclesial, spiritual and cultural objectives and contents.
Now this gift of God is placed by the Holy Father at the heart of the Great Jubilee which celebrates the two thousandth anniversary of the incarnation of Christ, so that the young generations, to whom belong "the future of the world and of the Church" may encoun ter in a new way Christ who awaits them thus "make their own contribution to his presence in the next century" ( Tertio Millennio adveniente 58).

The Rome WYD in 2000 intends to be an experience of faith, understood and lived in the spirit and with the significance of the Jubilee, in order to be the Jubilee of the "Young Church".

The word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us" ( Jn 1,14)

The theological framework

2. The theological basis and central inspiration of the WYD is taken from the theme chosen by the Holy Father: "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us" ( Jn 1,14).
This statement found in the fourth Gospel, and indeed the whole prologue of the same Gospel in which it is situated, describe the salvation which comes from God, absolutely necessary, inconceivably gratuitous and generously given. The incarnation of the Word marks the beginning of the redemption of humanity and of the universe, which is completed in the Paschal mystery of death and resurrection and with the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Reading our faith we grasp the divine economy or plan of salvation as it mysteriously unfolds:

• Jesus Christ, Word of the Father, made Man, is God's greatest gift to humanity: "God so loved the world as to give his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not be lost but may have eternal life ( Jn 3,16).
  
• Christ is at the same time man's most authentic response to God, since he is the Son obedient to the will of the Father, from his incarnation to the total giving of self on the cross: "You prepared a body for me then I said: God here I am. I am coming to obey your will ( Heb 10,5-7).
  
• Christ does not keep the Father's love and mission for himself, he shares it with all those who believe in Him. On Easter evening he says to his disciples: "As the Father sent me, so am I sending you"; and he gives them his Spirit for a new life, free of sin and evil (cf. Jn 20,21- 22).

So a wondrous circle of missionary communion, animated by the Holy Spirit involves and moves the history of humanity: the Father gives the Son to the world (cf Rom 8,32); the Son responds to the Father giving himself completely to Him for us (cf Jn 19,30); the disciples, sent by Jesus, carry the Gospel to all peoples, knowing He is with them, to the ends of the earth. (cf Mt 28, 19-20).

3. The Church recognizes herself in this dynamic of "gift-response" and she lives it under many aspects.

• She expresses it visibly and in public in the journey of faith and Christian life (for example with the catechumenate), markedly through the consignment and conscious acceptance of the Symbol of faith; she celebrates it every Sunday, the day of the Lord, and weekly Easter day.
  
• She places it as the foundation of her missionary vocation, to involve all men and women in the joy of the gift and the responsibility of the response: "You received without charge, give without charge" ( Mt 10,8).
  
• She lives it in the constant exercise of forgiveness, welcomed and offered to all. In the awareness that the concrete possibility of sin consists in a wrong response "-- rejection or infidelity "-- by man to the great gifts received from God, the Church knows that every believer in Christ is exposed to sin because of human fragility: "He was in the world and the world did not know him. He came to his own domain and his own people did not accept him" ( Jn 1,10-11).

4. Closely connected to the general theme and a consequence of it, is the primary idea and core of the whole Day: recognizing and living faith as a gift-response to God in Jesus Christ, the word made flesh.

It finds in the consignment ( "traditio ") and re-consignment ( "redditio ") of the Symbol (Creed ) one of the highest and most expressive forms both of the Church's public profession and of her witness to the world. The different stages of the Day which culminate in the Vigil on Saturday evening and the solemn closing celebration of the Eucharist will be inspired by this purely biblical, historical and ecclesial "icon".