Towards Panama WYD 2019

By Our Own Correspondent

EAO, 7 November 2018 -- The 28th World Youth Day will be held in Panama (Central America) on January 22-27 with the presence of Pope Francis and thousands of youth from all continents. Also the 10th successor of Don Bosco and many Salesians are preparing for this global appointment.

The theme - spiritual journey - is motivated by the Word of God: "I am the servant of the Lord..." (Luke 1,35) and you can reach the official website of the 2019 WYD at: https://panama2019.pa/en/home. Due to distance, probably not many Salesians and young people from EAO will be able to take parte personally in the WYD. Some local versions based on the theme and spiritual journey will be produced in local versions.

So far, from our EAO region a few provinces (AUL, CIN, GIA , KOR, PGS) are preparing their small SYM group to reach Panama World Youth Day. As usual, during the 5 days of the WYD, the Salesian World Youth Day is being prepared, led by the SDB central sector for Youth Ministry (rcursi@sdb.org). The link to register for the Salesian event (the link to the webpage of the Feast of the Salesian Youth Movement on January 23 (PM time) during the WYD in Panama: https://www.salesianoscentroamerica.org/MJS2019panama/

Among the variety of initiatives leading to this new Catholic Youth global event, is the online game 'Follow JC, Go!" This new gaming app is based on the famous 'Pokemon Go' series. By contrast with the latter it invites the gamer to search for the saints and biblical figures. This app was recently launched in Spanish, but in the next few weeks it will be available English, Portuguese and Italian. The app project was created by the 'Fundacion Ramon Pane', a Catholic evangelical group.

Players of "Follow JC, Go!" interact with the saints or Scripture figures. In order to 'catch' them they must correctly answer a question about their life.

More than 40 designers, IT engineers, theologians, Bible scholars and Church historians have been working on the app since August 2016 covering about 32,000 working hours. Apart from the 'catechesis or faith' related questions, Follow JC, Go! also includes biblical videos. When the players pass near a hospital in real life, the app will also suggest to stop and pray for the sick or to do some work of mercy.

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