Rio, July 27, 2013: Pope Francis, returned to Copacabana beach on Friday evening
to preside at at the Via Crucis or "Way of the Cross".The commemoration forms a vital
part of the World Youth Day events and tens of thousands of people turned out to watch
and greet Pope Francis. Our Correspondent in Rio Seàn Patrick Lovett followed the
event and sends this report.
For me it was the music that made it emotional
– and not simply spectacular (which, of course, it was). The Via Crucis has become
both a central and much anticipated event in the WYD celebrations and an artistic
tour de force in its own right.
My personal favourite is the one I saw in
Sydney in 2008. It was an itinerant Way of the Cross that involved the entire city
, with the 14 Stations animating the bay and harbour area (on land and water) and
culminating on the steps of the iconic Sydney Opera House. My least favourite is the
one I remember seeing in Denver in 1993. The role of Jesus was played by a girl…
Here
in Rio, Jesus was interpreted by different actors and in a contemporary style. The
overall effect was meant to provoke an artistic dialogue between traditional popular
religious symbolism and the needs, concerns and expectations of youth. Each of the
Stations that punctuated the long stretch of Copacabana beach, drew attention to different
existential questions posed by young people today: from love and loneliness to motherhood
and mission, from suffering and student-life to disability and death. The 10th Station
(“Jesus is stripped of his garments”) was dedicated to social networks and the need
to focus on the centrality of the human person without losing oneself in the labyrinth
of the web.
The World Youth Day Cross was the true protagonist of the evening
– carried by 30 young people, representing the different stops the Cross has made
on its way from Rome to Rio, and accompanied by 200 others waving the flags of the
countries present here at WYD in Brazil. However visually impressive, the overall
presentation never lost its religious and liturgical solemnity: incense-bearing altar-servers
and a white-garbed guard of honour provided a constant reminder that what was really
happening had more to do with spiritual experience than with external theatricality.
And
what more appropriate place to be living such an experience than right here in Rio,
Brazil – the country that was originally named “The Land of the Holy Cross”?