EUROPE/RUSSIA - Towards the Holy Year: young Catholics from the Archdiocese of the Mother of God in Moscow met in Kaliningrad

by Chiara Dommarco

Kaliningrad (Agenzia Fides) - "Hope is not just the expectation of something longed for and far away: it is a foretaste in which we can already find what we want," said Father Denis Malov (CMF) to the participants present at the youth meeting of the Archdiocese of the Mother of God in Moscow (Eparchial'naja Vstreča Molodëži), which took place from July 31 to August 4 in Kaliningrad, a Russian exclave between Poland, Lithuania and the Baltic Sea. The event was attended by about a hundred young people and young adults, mostly between the ages of 14 and 30, including seven faithful of the Russian Orthodox Church and three catechumens. During these intense days they were accompanied not only by several priests, but also by the auxiliary bishop of the archdiocese, Nikolai Dubinin. The participants, who came from 23 cities in the territory of the Catholic archdiocese, were guests of the Catholics of Kaliningrad either in their families or in the parish reception facilities.
The event entitled "Rejoice in hope" (Romans 12:12), like the letter that Pope Francis sent to the youth of the world for the XXXVIII World Youth Day (WYD), which will be celebrated in the particular Churches on November 26, 2023, was in continuity with the World Youth Day in Lisbon, for which young people from all over the world had come to the Portuguese capital (1-6 August 2023).
The event in Kaliningrad, conceived as an intermediate stage between WYD 2023 and the Holy Year 2025, took place one year after the Russian Catholic Youth Meeting, held in St. Petersburg two weeks after WYD in Lisbon (see Fides, 6/7/2023), and precedes the Holy Year of Youth 2025, also under the theme of hope.
For the first time, two days of training were organized prior to the event for the volunteers, who met on July 29 and 30 to study in depth the various aspects of the service to the community that was to begin on July 31: accompanying the liturgy, organizing the music, the cleaning of the places that would host them. One of the most creative initiatives of the volunteers was the development of a Russian version of the anthem of the 2025 Holy Year. The very rich and varied program included, in addition to the daily mass, several meetings in the city, which took place in the two Catholic parishes "St. Adalbert" and the "Holy Family", as well as trips to the Kaliningrad region. July 31 was dedicated to getting to know each other and the history of the city - not only religious - with a treasure hunt and a visit to the cathedral, near which Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) is buried. On the second day, the young people made a small pilgrimage to the cross erected on the spot where St. Adalbert, Bishop of Prague and saint of the undivided Church, was martyred in 997.
Afterwards, the participants discussed the theme of hope, took part in various group sports activities and went to the beach to enjoy the view of the Baltic Sea. The next day was dedicated to the use of social media to proclaim the Gospel, with two seminars on the topic and the presentation of the coming Holy Year, which ended with a Eucharistic adoration accompanied by the Taizé prayer in different languages. On Saturday there was a second treasure hunt entitled "Pilgrims of Hope" and an evening of songs and music. To conclude, on Sunday the young people were given the task of being "messengers of hope" in which each one lives their daily life, in anticipation of the next appointments in view of the 2025 Holy Year.
The Ecclesiastical Province of the Catholic Church in Russia consists of the Archdiocese of the Mother of God in Moscow and its three suffragan dioceses: the Diocese of St. Clement in Saratov, the Diocese of St. Joseph in Irkutsk and the Diocese of the Transfiguration in Novosibirsk. Since Catholics in the Russian Federation represent less than 1% of the total population, communities are usually small and scattered over a wide area, so the presence of a priest is sometimes quite rare during the year. (Agenzia Fides, 5/8/2024)

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