Adios Madrid

OK, the astute readers amongst you will realize that there should be another entry between this one and the first Madrid entry. I will get to it, but, lack of Internet access and the immediacy of the experience from the last two days demands my attention. The missing Madrid entry will be creatively titled, 'Madrid, the missing entry'. Watch this space.

And so to the Vigil, sleep over and Papal Mass.

I have tried to maintain a positive outlook on things in the spirit of pilgrimage. This has been a little easier because the young people with whom I'm traveling are gold. They are positive, strong in their faith and embracing every experience, no matter how poorly organised. However, the sleep-over last night was a debacle and this was exacerbated by the weather.

The temperature hit 40 yesterday. Did I mention it is hot over here? The heat is constant and energy sapping, with the only respite being early morning and evening. The evening culture in Spain and the siesta is to allow people to cope with the weather.

Anyway, the sleep over festivities officially commenced at 4:30pm, so we sent an advance force to secure our area so that we might stagger the arrival of the other pilgrims. There are over 300 pilgrims from the Parramatta Diocese and we didn't want them all to fry in the afternoon sun. So about 30 or 40 of us brave souls set out in the blistering heat. I have applied more sun screen this week than I have in the last 10 years. We arrived at our ticketed area, F4 after a trip on the metro and a walk of around 2kms, plus the 1km walk from the entry gate to our area. It was hot, already crowded and the area was dusty but we set our boundaries and settled into guarding our zone and keeping out those who wanted to usurp our land. This became more difficult as the afternoon wore on. The temperature climbed, tempers frayed and the love and peace and friendly chanting was forgotten, but only for a moment.

We lost some skirmishes and conceded ground to the Brazilians, the French and eventually to some Croatians and even people from the Sydney Diocese. After 2 hours or so the call came through, the next group was coming through the gate. 30 minutes later they had still not arrived, so I phoned. They were within sight of us in the unticketed area, despite the fact that they had tickets. The gates were closed! The gates were closed and were not going to be reopened and people with tickets were locked into an area with almost no facilities and water was scarce. Did I mention it was 40 degrees?

How could this happen? Well, they had underestimated the number of pilgrims that could fit into each area because we were in the last section and we had plenty of people who had tickets for areas closer to the front. Secondly, it appeared that no-one was checking tickets on the way in. It was a free for all.

And despite all of this, the young people maintained their sense of humour and rationalized the difficulties because this was a special moment, the Pope would be here soon.

There was too little water. The lines for the water were not controlled and it was survival of the fittest. And as for the toilets ... No, you don't really want to know.

Then the cloud cover came. Hallelujah, relief at last. But the rest of our party would not be joining us. They were locked into the non ticketed area. We gave some more space to pilgrims who were fortunate enough to make it through the gate. The spirit of camaraderie returned and so did the chants, this time for the Pope.

The cloud cover got heavier, water arrived, hallelujah again, the fire trucks drove around spraying the crowd ... blessed relief. The chanting continued. The sky got darker and the Pope arrived for the Vigil.

The Vigil began. The wind picked up, the lightning and thunder began and then the rain. People huddled under umbrellas and sleeping bags, whatever they had. The storm, although reasonably short lived, maybe 15 minutes was terrifying. The wind actually destroyed some of the communion tents. All I could think of was the hundreds of thousands of people in front of us. What would happen if the panicked? It was a very dangerous situation. Eventually most of our group decided to get out and return to the safety of the Uni.

We tried to get through the closest exit point, but it had been closed and was cut off by riot police, so we trudged the kilometre back to the other entrance. What did we find? An open gate, no security and pilgrims still streaming in, many without tickets. This was happening while thousands of pilgrims with tickets were corralled in an other area. Words fail me, not often, but this time! Unbelievable doesn't quite capture the moment.

It hadn't rained in Madrid in August for 8 years until last night. Were we surprised? Not really, too many other things had gone wrong for us to expect things to go smoothly. If not for the good humour of the crowd there could have been a catastrophic end to the evening.

We gathered for breakfast the next morning and swapped tales of the previous night. It turned out that of our 300 pilgrims, about 30 had decided to brave the conditions and stay for the Papal Mass in the morning.

At breakfast I was able to announce to our group that Bishop Fisher had heard of our plight and had arranged to say Mass for us at 3pm. The Bishop opened our Mass by telling us that he would use the book from the Papal Mass and even read us the Pope's homily, but in English. Awesome.

The Mass was a wonderful celebration of all that we have experienced this week, the highs and the lows. And of course, the young people of the Parramatta Diocese embraced the situation with their usual positive, spirit filled enthusiasm. Bishop Fisher challenged us to return home changed people, ready to embrace evangelisation and make saints of all the Catholics in the Diocese. Well, that was the starting point. The chanting returned, go Bishop, go Bishop ... The Bishop paused for photos, blessed Rosary beads, chatted with pilgrims and declared that he would join them at the football (soccer) match that night.

At that moment all the negatives of the week seemed insignificant. Bishop Fisher saved the day and received a standing ovation from his pilgrims. Go Bishop, go Bishop, go go go ....