Willing spirits Despite exhaustion, young Maine Catholics hear pope’s word, even if they can’t see him

It looked more like a rock concert, but some of the 350 pilgrims from Maine sat quietly Saturday night, clustered on ground covers and in collapsible chairs, the flames of their white candles flickering in the warm breeze.

Others collapsed on sleeping bags.

It was a service of worship Saturday night as Pope John Paul II conducted a candlelight vigil for an estimated 400,000 Catholics from around the world who gathered at a former military base in Canada’s largest city.

A few Mainers, led by the Rev. Robert Vaillancourt, spiritual director for the trip, moved closer to a big screen television and listened to English translations of French, Spanish, Italian and other languages used in the service. They gathered on the still-hot asphalt in front of the video monitor so they would not miss a moment of the pope’s appearance.

Most of the teen-agers, however, simply roamed from group to group, encampment to encampment, chatting, knotting rosaries, resting or massaging one another’s aching feet and shoulder muscles.

They figured they’d earned it.

The young Catholics from Maine who had journeyed to World Youth Day 2002 expressed little of the excitement or enthusiasm at seeing their spiritual leader Saturday that they had at the welcoming ceremony Thursday. They were too exhausted after their eight-mile hike through the city to Downsview Park on a hot, muggy afternoon.

They also were too far away to even make out a speck of white and identify it as the pope.

Although passes to the event were color-coded, and representatives from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland had been assigned to the coveted purple section – closest to the stage – early arrivals who did not have purple passes staked out territory and held it. By the time the Maine group arrived about 3 p.m., there simply wasn’t enough room for all 250 in “Father Bob’s group” to be in the same section.

So they fell back past the yellow to the blue section and set up camp in a grassy field on the 664-acre complex. It was plenty roomy, and they could hear everything through huge speakers.

Without moving, they couldn’t even see a big-screen television, let alone the stage.

They could hear the purple section pilgrims, but they didn’t join the chanting for “John Paul Two. John Paul Two.”

“It feels like we’re listening to it on the radio,” said Erica Maltz, 16, of Hampden. “It’s like we’re just here to be here. But just being with the pope is really awesome, really cool. It’s all been worth it to see the joy on his face like the other day and know how he’s done so much for everybody.”

While most of the young people seemed to be connecting more with their physical than their spiritual sides Saturday night, many said that by completing the grueling walk, they felt a real sense of accomplishment and a deeper understanding of their faith.

“The walk was very exhausting and tiring,” said Joshua St. Louis, 17, of Bradley, who attends St. Ann’s Catholic Church in his hometown. “I ended up with blisters on my feet. But it was rewarding at the same time because we were doing it all together – just a huge amount of us. Even though I was tired, and when we got here I just dropped, it was energizing at the same time.”

Nikki Young, 16, of Gouldsboro was almost a casualty of the heat. Her backpack, which included her sleeping bag, was heavy, she said, and when she got to the end of the walk, she felt dizzy. As one of the chaperones from St. Joseph Catholic Church in Ellsworth helped her off with it, she almost collapsed. After drinking some water, eating some fruit and resting with wet cloths on her wrists and neck, she was fine.

But she had learned the essential lesson of a pilgrimage. “I could understand how Jesus must have felt carrying the cross all the way and falling three times,” she said as the incense psalm was sung on the faraway stage. “It was like I connected with him and I could feel how much of a burden it must have been. I can imagine what he went through now.”

Not everyone was able to complete the walk, according to Jean Bigelow, director of youth ministry for the Portland diocese. Two adults and one youth were taken to hospital tents at the site and treated for heat-related conditions, she said, but rejoined the group about 7 p.m. One other female adult who seemed to be having heat-related problems on the walk was briefly unaccounted for, said Bigelow.

Jean B. Richard of Jay wasn’t sure he would be able to finish the walk when he started out about 10 a.m. Saturday. At 71, he was the oldest Maine pilgrim attending World Youth Day with 17 others from St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church in Jay.

He said his group let him set his own pace and they followed his lead. Everyone on the trip called him “pepere,” the French word for grandfather, which is embroidered on his bright red backpack.

Although the pope was delivering his homily, the walk was still uppermost in most of their minds at 9 p.m. Many of them spoke of the friendly “natives” who hosed down pilgrims as the path led them through residential Toronto neighborhoods. Drivers honked their horns, bus drivers stuck their sun-tanned arms out their windows to wave and Torontoans lined bridges shouting encouragement to them as they passed underneath. It was not what they had expected from big-city dwellers.

For the most part, Maine’s Catholic youth were just as well-behaved, according to Bigelow. Only one youth from a church in the Bangor area was not allowed to go on the walk because she had not followed the rules the previous week, Bigelow said. She was sent home.

While the adults struggled to recover, young Catholics began contemplating the next World Youth Day 2004 in Cologne, Germany. Some organized parish fund-raisers as they knotted more rosaries. Others imagined what it might be like to do World Youth Day in a country where English is not the national language.

The Maine pilgrims were expected to return home Monday night.