Not yet a member? Sign Up | Login
Key Personnel
Archbishop:
Archbishop Jose S. Palma
Chairman:
Rev. Msgr. Arthur R. Navales, PC
Vice-chairman:
Rev. Fr. Kit Sestoso
Youth Leader:
Krishna Jacalan
Address:
2nd Floor, Cardinal Rosales
Pastoral Center (Patria de Cebu),
P. Burgos St., Cebu City 6000
5th Archdiocesan Youth Congress

Official Theme Song

Downloads
Featured Video

The official stand of the Caholic Church; choosing life and rejecting the RH Bill.
Prayer of the Youth
on the occasion of the CBCP Year of the Youth

Almighty Father, God of life and love,
through time and ages, You love us.
You trust and choose us
to participate in Your saving work.

Bless us, Your young people,
with Your grace.
Give us the gift of living life to the full
by encountering Your Son
in a personal way
and sustaining a relationship with Him,
by learning what life truly is
from His words and works,
from His filial relationship with You,
And by living in true and fruitful
communion with You
and with one another.

Empower us through Your Holy Spirit
to stand firm in the faith.
May we bring our fellow young people
closer to You so that together,
we become agents of change
and builders of a society of justice and
solidarity, love and peace.

Enable all of us:
Your young people,
together with those ministering to us
in the Church, in families and in society,
to make a decisive response
to our universal vocation;
to live fully and fruitfully
by doing everything in love
as we follow Jesus Christ
along the path of genuine trust in You.

In communion with the rest of the Church,
we pray that this CBCP Year of the Youth
become a kairos time
for the youth ministry of Your Church
and a new springtime for us,
Filipino youth: a special period
of growing in Your grace
through our living in youthful holiness
and through our effort to reach out
as a Church to those waiting for Your love.

Together with our Blessed Mother,
our model in giving oneself
entirely to Your will,
we lift this prayer to You
in Jesus Christ, Your Son,
our Friend, Brother and Lord,
in the Power of the Holy Spirit,
now and forever. Amen.
Local WYD

History
of
World Youth Day

 

In 1984, Pope John Paul II announced 1985 as a Jubilee year for the Catholic Church. At the same time, while the United Nations (U.N.) nominated 1985 as an International Year for young people, the Holy Father, in the an effort to recognize the growing youth of the Church, he invited the young people from around the world to travel to Rome to celebrate with him the Holy Year of Redemption and the Palm Sunday, and the International Year of the Youth.

Pope John Paul said, All young people should feel followed by the Church: that is why all the Church, in union with the Successor of Peter, feels more and more that it is committed, on a world scale, in favor of young people, of their worries, their questions, their openness and their hopes, in order to match their expectations, by communicating the certainty who is Christ, the Truth who is Christ, love who is Christ. And in this privileged attention that the Church nurtures in their regard, young people need to find proof that they count a lot because they are worth a lot. Their lives are precious for the Church. (December 20, 1985)

The Holy Father believes that the youth who learns transcendental values that promote responsibility and maturity, centered in Christ, can make a difference in this historical moment in time not simply because of what they can do in the future, but for all that they can do today. Because being young - as the Pope teaches - is in itself a fundamental grace of the Spirit, the guarantee of the future and the source of hope.

At this time, Pope John Paul II gave to these young people the Cross of the Holy Year as a remembrance of their redemption.

Their answer was enthusiastic and surpassed all expectations.

The Holy Father’s invitation then went beyond the U.N. observance of the Year of Youth and became an invitation for a yearly celebration for catechesis, fellowship, worship, and renewal. He declared that day to be the first World Youth Day, and that the youth should go back to their home towns and communities and celebrate their new-found fellowship and continue the tradition for each year to follow. Thus, the celebrations of World Youth Day were initiated.

From that year forward, World Youth Days are celebrated on two levels. Since the initial WYD in Rome, Italy, World Youth Day is held every year in the local Churches on Palm Sunday, or on another opportune date. However, every two or three years, it is held in an extraordinary form in a selected city somewhere in the world chosen by the Pope on the invitation of the national Episcopal Conferences: it is a sort of “pilgrimage” around the world.

Although this international gathering is called World Youth Day, it is understood that young adults, those in their late teens, twenties, and thirties are also included. The translation of “World Youth Day” in most other languages clearly includes “young adults.” The age requirement or WYD 2000 is 16 to 30's.

 
«Back to Main Page