PAS on Pilgrimage

Personal Advocacy Service, an archdiocesan agency that works towards the inclusion of people with intellectual disabilities into the life of their local church communities, stepped out recently into a brave venture by arranging its own group of ‘pilgrims’ to attend World Youth Day in Sydney.

Nineteen young ‘pilgrim’ people with intellectual and other disabilities, each accompanied by their own ‘companion’, were part of a group of 42 who set out ‘to see the Pope.’ Despite the 29-hour delay in departure time that was reported in The West Australian, this group showed extraordinary patience and maintained their enthusiasm for taking part in all that they could during their time in Sydney.

We watched Nick Palmer, one of our young ‘pilgrims’, take part in the Presentation of Gifts at the Opening Mass celebrated by Cardinal Pell at Barrangaroo. To find ourselves sitting amongst 150,000 people, all gathered to celebrate our faith together, with flags waving from over 160 countries around the world, was a remarkable experience.

Just as remarkable was the experience of friendship, fun and faith being shared together on the streets of a great city such as Sydney over these few days.

While some of our ‘pilgrims’ were limited in verbal capacity, language barriers simply did not matter, as people greeted each other, smiled, shook hands and exchanged badges. In spite of obvious limitations with wheelchairs and other disabilities, our ‘pilgrims’ were overwhelmed by the acceptance offered to them by so many strangers, who simply saw them as people.

What were the highlights? For a couple of ‘pilgrims’ such as Melanie and Amanda, it was an opportunity to see Guy Sebastian and join in singing the WYD song with him and 400,000 others at the final Mass at Randwick.

For Danny and Peter, it was ‘seeing the Pope’.

For Nicole, Maria-Lisa and Stephanie, it was meeting their former teacher, Mike Penhaligon, who was there with his own group of pilgrims from Corpus Christi College, and getting a hug.

For Kiro, the highlight was simply ‘the people’. Not just the huge crowds gathered each day in Sydney, but the experience of being part of our own special community, sharing time and space together at our campsite at Wanawong, on the southern edge of Sydney.

For Greg, one of our pilgrims’ ‘companions’, ‘The best part for our friends was being able to soak in the atmosphere and the spirit of friendliness that was just there amongst the crowds.’

Coming together like this showed that we are all part of an on-going story that has been celebrated for 2,000 years, and that ‘together we are strong.’

Our 18 months of preparation for this venture now seemed well worthwhile.

Amanda’s question lingers: ‘Why can’t people be like this all the time?’