The secret is out: everyone knows that the next World Youth Day will be held in Lisbon, Portugal, in 2022. The announcement was made at the end of the closing WYD Mass which His Holiness Pope Francis celebrated in Panama City’s Metro Park on Sunday morning before 700,000 people. With Mary, keep saying “yes” to the dream that God has sown in you”, he told them. But the Pontiff’s concluding message to the hundreds of thousands of World Youth Day participants and pilgrims from all over the world can be summarized in one word: “Now”.
As reported by Vatican news, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing”. Taking his cue from the Gospel of Luke, the Pontiff interpreted that “today” as “now”. “Jesus”, he began, “reveals the now of God”. “In Jesus, the promised future begins and becomes life”. Unfortunately, continued the Pontiff, “we do not always believe that God can be that concrete and commonplace, that close and real”. Because “a close and everyday God, a friend and brother, demands that we be concerned with our surroundings”. “God is real because love is real”, he said.
At the conclusion of Mass, His Holiness Pope Francis thanked all those who have contributed to making this “World Youth Day dream come true” in Panama. But his last words were for the young people themselves: “We are on a journey”, he reminded them. “Keep walking, keep living the faith and sharing it”. And do not forget, said His Holiness Pope Francis, that “you are not the tomorrow, you are not the ‘meantime’, you are the Now of God”.
