Indian Catholics attending World Youth Day in Madrid enjoy a majority feeling

(August 20, 2011) "We're only two percent of the population in India said 32-year-old Vivek Machado to CNA but you only really realize the size of our religion, the Catholic religion, which is the biggest religion in the world, when you come here and meet so many people from across the world." Machado is in Madrid this week with a group of 200 youngsters from the city of Mumbai in western India. CNA met them as they made their way to a catechesis session at a church in central Madrid. In total, there are approximately 1,000 Indian pilgrims in the Spanish capital this week."It's great. We've been to a lot of places," said 24-year-old Sandia Furtado from Mumbai. "We don't usually get the chance to meet with young Catholics from all over the world so this is the time and this is the place -- and we're making the best of this week," she said.The roots of the Christian faith in India are also ancient. It's a widely-held belief that Christianity arrived on the subcontinent in the first century with St. Thomas the Apostle."It's really overwhelming, it's really amazing, it feels awesome," said 17-year-old Sabrina Young, a schoolgirl from Mumbai, who is attending her first World Youth Day.