Lebanese youth await participation in Vatican’s Way of the Cross

(March 13, 2013) When a committee of Catholic youth in Lebanon set out to compose the meditations for the Way of the Cross, they had no idea that a new pope would preside over the Good Friday service at Rome’s Colosseum. By custom, the pope invites a cardinal, or an ecclesial community to prepare the meditations. This year is the first that young people of a particular country were asked to participate. Pope Benedict XVI invited the youth of Lebanou to participate through Maronite Patriarch Bechara Rai, who was named a cardinal in November.
The meditations were submitted to the Vatican Feb. 10, a day before Pope Benedict announced he would resign. “Now on Good Friday, the Lebanese Catholic youth will be like a bridge between Pope Benedict XVI and his successor because it will be one of the first official ceremonies of the new pope after he is elected,” said Fr. Toufic Bou Hadir, who directs the Maronite patriarchate’s youth programs. About one third of Lebanon’s 4 million citizens are Christian.