Pope offers roadmap to prepare for World Youth Day 2008

(July 16, 2007) Pope Benedict XVI offered the young people of the world a spiritual roadmap to prepare themselves for next year’s World Youth Day, WYD, encouraging them to meditate on the love awakened by the Holy Spirit. The Pope told this on Sunday before praying the midday Angelus from Mirabello Castle, a spot close to Lorenzago di Cadore in the Dolomite hills in northeast Italy where he is vacationing till July 27. Love "is the 'heart' of Christian life; in fact, only the love awakened in us by the Holy Spirit renders us witnesses to Christ," the Holy Father said. He said he wanted to re-propose this important spiritual truth in the message for the 23rd World Youth Day, next year, which will be made known next Friday, July 20. The theme of the July 15-20, 2008 WYD is taken from the Acts of the Apostles: 'You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses.'
Before reciting the Angelus the Pope reflected on his vacation, expressing gratitude, first to God, for being able to enjoy the mountains; then to those who welcomed him to Lorenzago di Cadore. Visibly relaxed, the Holy Father noted the "enchanting panorama" that surrounded him, where his predecessor Pope John Paul II also vacationed several times. The desire to praise God for the marvel of creation easily transforms itself into prayer, he said. He later commented on Sunday’s Gospel parable of the Good Samaritan, through which, he said, Jesus shows "that each one of us must be the neighbour of each person we meet." Himself the Good Samaritan par excellence, the Pope said, Jesus, who was God, did not hesitate to lower himself to the point of becoming man and giving his life for us. "Love, therefore, is the ‘heart’ of Christian life; in fact, only the love awakened in us by the Holy Spirit renders us witnesses to Christ."