St. Pope John Paul II and World Youth Day

Established by St John Paul II in his papacy, the first official World Youth Day was in 1986 in Rome, Italy The inspiration for its institution began two years earlier, at the close of the Holy Year of Redemption in 1984 JPII invited an International Jubilee of youth to celebrate Palm Sunday in St Peter’s Square, and over 300,000 youth responded

The following year (1985) was also the UN’s International Year of the Youth, and JPII again invited young people to Rome and the Vatican. He also wrote the apostolic letter Dilecti Amici, meaning “Dear Friends,” addressing it to the “youth of the world.”

Since man is the fundamental and at the same time the daily way of the Church, it is easy to understand why the Church attributes special importance to the period of youth as a key stage in the life of every human being. You young people are the ones who embody this youth: you are the youth of the nations and societies, the youth of every family and of all humanity; you are also the youth of the Church. We are all looking to you, for all of us, thanks to you, in a certain sense continually become young again So your youth is not just your own property, your personal property or the property of a generation: it belongs to the whole of that space that every man traverses in his life’s journey, and at the same time it is a special possession belonging to everyone. It is a possession of humanity itself.

A few months after writing Dielecti Amici, JPII announced the institution of World Youth Day on December 20, 1985, for the upcoming Palm Sunday in 1986 He selected Palm Sunday as it was the day “the children of Jerusalem” met Jesus upon his entrance to Jerusalem after 40 days in the desert.

Since then, there have been 15 International World Youth Day celebrations spanning the globe and drawing in millions of young Catholics from all over WYD is celebrated every two or three years, though there is always a smaller celebration in Rome in the “off” years