CONWAY — Stormy Prewitt and Allison Young didn’t know what to expect attending their first World Youth Day, but they were pretty sure things weren’t supposed to start in an airport terminal.
On an eight-hour layover in Houston, the two longtime friends and products of St. Joseph Church and School in Conway found themselves among fellow pilgrims from Guam. Invited to join in the Mass the group was celebrating in the gate area, they accepted, not realizing they were with a group of Neocatechumenate, a species of Catholic known for, in Pope Benedict’s words, “apostolic zeal.”
What followed — equal parts liturgy, tent revival and flash mob — stopped passers-by in their tracks and drove home the first of many reminders they weren’t in Arkansas anymore.
“Going in, I had the mindset, ‘Whatever happens, happens,’” said Young, 19, a junior at the University of Central Arkansas. “And what happened was a mind-blowing experience.”
After months of fundraising and planning, the Arkansas contingency — which also included Father James Melnick of Dardanelle; Cynthia Solis, Fatima Gomez, Gabriela Solis and Estephania Oliva of Danville; Ruby Alvarez, Tessie Guillory and Zach Long of Little Rock; Austin Padgett of Greenbrier; and Holly Hambuchen and Emily Rideout of Conway — was on their way.
Virtually everything they experienced challenged their powers of comprehension, and not just because none of them spoke Portuguese. Landing in Sao Paulo, Brazil, July 18 for “mission week,” they expected to be bused to the local parish and spend the next several days in service work. Turns out the locals had other plans for the honored guests.
“When we got through security it’s like we’re celebrities,” said Prewitt, 19. “Our hosts are there and they’re clapping and cheering to welcome us. It was really cool.”
Their “service” became guided tours of Sao Paulo’s attractions. They visited churches and museums dedicated to Catholic relics, climbed mountains, rode ziplines and tried to wrap their minds around a city so immense its population was three times that of their home state. When the pilgrims boarded a bus for the six-hour ride to Rio de Janeiro July 22, parishioners saw them off with hugs and tears.
“They were crying so much and thanking us for what we had done for them,” Young said. “We really hadn’t done anything, but in that moment, I felt how much God loved us through them.”
One hard thing to process was the scale upon which everything played out during the week in Rio. In the days following the close of the event, officials reported that about half a million pilgrims registered for World Youth Day, but many more actually showed up. For a group accustomed to being in the religious minority, seeing Catholics everywhere they turned was astounding.
“Every store or restaurant we’d go into, we’d see a crucifix on the wall,” Young said. “It made you so comfortable. We just felt loved wherever we went.”
In addition to feeling intensely the presence of God during the event, the pilgrims had their brush with human greatness as well. Young and Prewitt proudly reported two near-encounters with Pope Francis — during opening ceremony and Stations of the Cross where the pope passed by not 20 feet away — each one accompanied by a tidal wave of humanity surging forward to catch a glimpse.
Both women said the catechesis and Masses they experienced throughout the week were helpful in processing the religious spectacle they saw during the other planned activities. In order that pilgrims could fully participate, churches were assigned a certain language, thus the Arkansas delegation celebrated Mass alongside English-speaking Catholics from around the world.
Even when things didn’t go according to plan, they experienced small miracles that turned what would have otherwise been frustrating into moments of grace.
“One day we were supposed to go to a church, but we got so lost we just went into another one,” Young said. “Not only were there people there we knew, but it was being celebrated by priests from Nebraska, which is where a lot of my family is from. That’s when I realized that even with everything that had gone ‘wrong,’ God meant for us to be right there.”
As the exhausted, underfed and rain-soaked pilgrims returned home, they struggled with the enormity of what they had experienced. Back in Arkansas, they’ve begun to talk about ways to put the fire of faith they now felt into action; their marching orders having been delivered during closing Mass July 28.
“Pope Francis’ message was “Go, serve, don’t be afraid,” said Prewitt, a junior at the University of Central Arkansas. “He said, ‘The Church is counting on you. Jesus is counting on you. The pope is counting on you.’
“The bond we all have is something no one will ever really understand, but it’s a bond that will stay. Now that we have come back we need to step out and don’t have any fear, just go make disciples.”
