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WYD-POLISH Jul-10-2008 (500 words) xxxi
WYD Polish pilgrims get a taste of Australian hospitality in Sydney
By Dan McAloon
Catholic News Service
SYDNEY, Australia (CNS) -- On the eve of World Youth Day here, 48 Polish pilgrims are getting a real taste of Australian hospitality.
Among the first of 2,000 Poles to arrive for World Youth Day, the group from Szczecin, Poland, has been enjoying the sights and sounds of Sydney. First on the agenda was a July 8 get-acquainted cruise around Sydney Harbor courtesy of their hosts from the Diocese of Parramatta, Australia.
The spirits of the visitors from Szczecin were high, even after enduring a 30-hour trip halfway around the world. Having left summer in Poland, the group found Sydney's winter weather to be remarkably mild.
Sixteen-year-old Matthew, who didn't provide his last name, said providence had played a role in his being in Sydney.
"I was praying to come but it didn't seem possible until a friend of my family, a woman in Spain who was intending to come to World Youth Day, (became) pregnant and decided against the air travel. She very generously offered her airline ticket to me. I'm still amazed that I am actually here," he said.
For Mariana Ihnanatowicz, 17, the pilgrimage to World Youth Day is part of what she described as a life-changing experience that has returned her to the Catholic faith, even in the face of a family tragedy.
Ihnanatowicz spoke of the closeness that had developed among the pilgrims as they prepared for World Youth Day and how the pilgrims helped her as she struggled with her father's death from a stroke in 2007.
"These are people who inspire me with faith," she told Catholic News Service. For her, being part of World Youth Day "is a way to win back something I badly needed in my life."
Although she was a regular churchgoer as a child, she said she found her faith beginning to waiver as a teenager. Then came her father's stroke. He was 53.
"As he lay sick in the hospital I begged God to make him get better," said Ihnanatowicz, the eldest of five children in her family. "When he died I was numb. In this moment I felt I lost my faith. I was so angry because I felt that God hadn't listened to me in the most important moment in my life."
Ihnanatowicz said that despite her grief she had found acceptance within the pilgrim group.
"When my father died I was caught up in my life and making demands of God," she said. "Being part of the pilgrim group I have since learned that God really does listen to me if I give something of myself to him. If I talk to God, he gives me the strength I need in my life."
Ihnanatowicz said she is excited to be a pilgrim at World Youth Day.
"This is part of my personal faith pilgrimage. My ears are open to God's message in my life," she said.
END
Copyright (c) 2008 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
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