World Youth Day: Religious Interaction at a Catholic Festival [1 ed.] 9783666554551, 9783525554555

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Jane Skjoldli

World Youth Day Religious Interaction at a Catholic Festival

Critical Studies in Religion/ Religionswissenschaft (CSRRW)

Edited by Oliver Freiberger, Bettina Schmidt, Michael Stausberg Volume 14

Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht

Jane Skjoldli

World Youth Day Religious Interaction at a Catholic Festival

Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht

Dr. Jane Skjoldli obtained her PhD at the University of Bergen in 2018 and is now working as Associate Professor at the University of Stavanger, Norway.

Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek: The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data available online: https://dnb.de. © 2021 by Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Theaterstraße 13, 37073 Göttingen, Germany, an imprint of the Brill-Group (Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands; Brill USA Inc., Boston MA, USA; Brill Asia Pte Ltd, Singapore; Brill Deutschland GmbH, Paderborn, Germany¸ Brill Österreich GmbH, Vienna, Austria) Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Hotei, Brill Schöningh, Brill Fink, Brill mentis, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Böhlau, Verlag Antike and V&R unipress. Cover design: SchwabScantechnik, Göttingen Typesetting: 3w+p, Rimpar Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Verlage | www.vandenhoeck-ruprecht-verlage.com ISSN 2197-2230 ISBN 978-3-666-55455-1

To my parents Johanne and Normann

Acknowledgements

Let me begin by thanking my colleagues at the Department of Archaeology, History, Culture Studies and Religion at the University of Bergen: Your openness to new ideas, your critical engagement with research, and your collegial support have been part of what makes the study of religion at the University of Bergen such a vibrant and rewarding place to be. Thank you for your encouragement and guidance, Michael Stausberg, Ingvild S. Gilhus, Lisbeth Mikaelsson, Richard J. Natvig, Dag Øistein Endsjø, Einar Thomassen, Sissel Undheim, Marianne Bøe, Håkan Rydving, Marie von der Lippe, Sumanya Velamur, Charlotta Österberg, Margrethe Løøv, Håkon Naasen Tandberg, Knut A. Jacobsen, Knut Aukland, Knut Melvær, Alexandros Tsakos, István Keul, Pål Steiner, Janemil Kolstø. Thank you for sharing your ideas, criticism, and feedback, for supporting me through many years, for being there when I needed a pair of critical eyes, and for being such inspiring scholars. Michael Stausberg, my main supervisor, thank you for your faith in me, for your patience, and your sense of humor. My co-supervisor, Thomas A. Tweed, thank you for your steadfast support and teaching me to follow my intuition. You have both been amazingly patient and constructive, pushed me to do my best, and readily provided me with criticism and guidance issues big and small. Your professional encouragement has meant a lot to me through the rollercoaster ride that is the PhD program. I am also very grateful to those who contributed with feedback at my dissertation seminar on June 22, 2017, where Paul Post and Thomas A. Tweed deserve special mentions for crossing wide and narrow seas to be there. A special token of appreciation goes to my more geographically distant colleagues and dear friends Cecilie Endresen, Jessica Moberg, Tao Thykier Makeeff, and Cole Sadler—and to my former boss at the University Museum of Bergen Eli Kristine Økland Hausken. I also wish to thank my defense opponents Anne Stensvold and Kristy Nabhan-Warren for their inspiring feedback, and the research communities that welcomed me as a guest researcher in 2015: The Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism at the University of Notre Dame, and the study of religion at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. At the Cushwa Center, Kathleen S. Cummings, Catherine Osborne, Shane Ulbrich, Heather Grennan Gray, Francesca Cadeddu, and to Professor Halina Grzymała-Moszczyn´ska at the Jagiellonian University: Thank you for your invaluable help, input, and generous

8

Acknowledgements

hospitality. To my respondents: If only I could name you! This book would have been very different without your generous openness, your trust, and your curiosity. Thank you for sharing your views and experiences, and for including me in them. People like you make fieldwork an adventure. To all my friends and family, and my parents in particular: Thank you for believing in me and challenging me, for teaching me the value of hard work, determination, for instilling in me a curiosity about the world, for showing me the worth of imagination and exploration. Thank you for letting me indulge in other realms, whether fictional, religious, or virtual, and for (heroically) trying to teach me moderation in engaging them. Thank you for your unceasing support, your encouragement and, most of all, for your love. Zelda, my dear cat, the limits of interspecies communication dictates that you will never know how you have brightened my life since our first meeting at the animal shelter on October 22, 2016 (Saint John Paul II’s feast day). Your favorite snacks will have to suffice. Addendum, 2021: At the time this book reaches the printing stage, four years will have passed since I first wrote the above section. In the meantime, the book has become, I hope, an improved version of the doctoral dissertation I submitted in August 2017 and defended in May 2018 at the University of Bergen. Since then, I have had the pleasure and privilege of learning from my colleagues at the University of Oslo during my time as Senior Lecturer there, and more recently from my new colleagues at the University of Stavanger. Zelda has received many snacks, as well as a poodle bonus sister named Vilje. Vilje moved in along with her human mom, Kine—my partner and gyðja— who has encouraged me and pushed me to finally get this book out there. Kine, you are the star of my life. May we live long and prosper. I love you.

List of abbreviations

AAD AGW APC APW CCL1917 CCL1983 CCC1908 CCC1992 CMJPIIB CDF DCRA HCC JP2 JP2C NABRE NCCB PCL RUA UJPIIB UNDA USCC USCCB WYD

Archdiocese of Denver Archives – World Youth Day Collection Archives of Gazeta Wyborcza (Archiwum Gazeta Wyborcza) The National Archive in Cze˛stochowa (Archiwum Pan´stwowe w Cze˛stochowie) The National Archive in Warszawa (Archiwum Pan´stwowe w Warszawie) Code of Canon Law, 1917 Code of Canon Law, 1983 Catechism of Saint Pope Pius X, 1908 Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1992 Center of John Paul II’s Ideas Library (Centrum Mys´li Jana Pawła II Biblioteka) Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith The Denver Catholic Register Archives History Colorado Center John Paul II (popular abbreviation) John Paul II Center (Archdiocese of Denver) New American Bible (Revised Edition) National Conference of Catholic Bishops (United States) Pontifical Council for the Laity Regis University Archives University of John Paul II Library in Kraków (Uniwersytet Jana Pawła II Biblioteka) University of Notre Dame Archives United States Catholic Conference United States Conference of Catholic Bishops World Youth Day

Contents

Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

7

List of abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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1. What is World Youth Day? . . . . . . . . . 1.1 The biggest papal gathering on record? . 1.2 When did World Youth Days begin? . . 1.3 Previous research . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.4 Contextualizing this study . . . . . . . . 1.4.1 Pilgrimage studies . . . . . . . . . 1.4.2 Digital game studies . . . . . . . . 1.5 Summary and outline of chapters . . . .

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17 17 21 28 36 37 41 48

2. Religious interaction: What gaming can teach us about religion 2.1 “Lucy looks into a Wardrobe” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2 Running out of Hosts at World Youth Day . . . . . . . . . 2.2.1 Realms of lived reality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3 Religion as interaction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3.1 Superhuman persons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3.2 Interaction and presence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3.3 Transrealm interaction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.4 Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.4.1 Religious interfaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.4.2 Interfacial elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.4.3 What about media? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.4.4 The interfacial mind . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.4.5 Governing the interface: Magisterial and other normativities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.5 Immersion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.5.1 Immersion, flow, presence, and vulnerability . . . . . 2.6 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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51 51 52 54 57 58 60 63 68 68 70 71 74

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77 79 82 85

3. World Youth Day Origins: From Youth Gathering to Pilgrimage, 1984–1991 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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3.1 From youth gathering to pilgrimage . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.1 World Youth Day emerges . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.2 Naming World Youth Day a pilgrimage . . . . . 3.1.3 World Youth Day as a pilgrimage . . . . . . . . . 3.2 Acknowledged influences in the official narrative . . . 3.2.1 John Paul II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.2 Catholic “World Days” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.3 The United Nations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.4 The revivification of pilgrimage trails . . . . . . 3.2.5 The new evangelization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.6 Christocentrism and mariocentrism . . . . . . . 3.2.7 The emergent official narrative . . . . . . . . . . 3.3 Other possible influences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.3.1 Contextualizing World Youth Day . . . . . . . . 3.3.2 The communist World Youth Festival . . . . . . 3.3.3 Polish precursors to the World Youth Day Cross 3.3.4 Charismatic Christian “crusades” . . . . . . . . . 3.4 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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88 88 96 104 107 107 110 112 113 114 118 120 120 120 121 124 130 133

4. Changing Pilgrimage: World Youth Day 1993, Denver . . . . . . 4.1 Denver: From metropolitan city to pilgrimage site . . . . . . 4.1.1 How World Youth Day in Denver became a pilgrimage . 4.1.2 Preparing for pilgrimage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.3 Life and pilgrimage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.4 Event design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.5 Papal presence and participation . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.6 The World Youth Day community . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.7 World Youth Day saints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.8 Our Lady of the New Advent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1.9 The Way of the Cross and the female Jesus controversy . 4.2 How Denver defined World Youth Day . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2.1 Remaking pilgrimage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2.2 Legacy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.3 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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135 138 138 146 151 156 163 167 168 169 173 176 176 177 181

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183 185 185 185 192

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5. “Bringing the mind to Heaven”: Religious interaction at World Youth Day 2016 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1 Interfacial elements at World Youth Day 2016 . . . . . . . . 5.1.1 Identifying interfacial elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.2 The Eucharist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.3 Confession . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.4 The World Youth Day community and the universal Catholic Church . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.5 Pope Francis—an interfacial element? . . . . . . . . .

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5.1.6 Places, Poland, and Pope John Paul II . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.7 The Divine Mercy image(s) and the relics of Saint Faustina . 5.2 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

202 209 215

6. Pilgrimage and immersion: Nuances of pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage at World Youth Day 2016 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1 Asking about pilgrimage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2 Transrealm interaction as a criterion for pilgrimage . . . . . . . 6.2.1 Self-describing as pilgrim(s) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2.2 Describing pilgrimage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2.3 Pilgrims, non-pilgrims, and the “pilgrim scale” . . . . . . . 6.2.4 Pilgrimage as immersion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.3 Expanding possibilities for (inter)action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.3.1 “Offer it up”: Pain as part of play . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.3.2 God as fellow pilgrim: Superhuman persons initiate interaction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

249 252

Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Appendix: Method and methodology . . . . . 1. A mixed-methods approach . . . . . . . 1.1 The evolution of a research design 1.2 Historical research . . . . . . . . . 1.3 Fieldwork . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.4 Respondents . . . . . . . . . . . . 2. Research ethics . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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261 261 262 262 264 265 265

List of references and archival material . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Archival material . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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There were many chinks or chasms between worlds in old times, but they have grown rarer. This was one of the last: I do not say the last. And so they fell, or rose, or blundered, or dropped right through, and found themselves in this world. C. S. Lewis, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian.

To think that once I could not see beyond the veil of our reality, to see those who dwell behind. Silicon Knights and Nintendo, Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem.

20 years ago today a world that I had lived in alone was suddenly open to others. It’s been wonderful. Thank you. J. K. Rowling, Twitter, June 26, 2017.

We have our victim in heaven, our priest in heaven, our sacrifice in heaven… When you see the Lord sacrificed and lying as an oblation, and the priest standing by the sacrifice and praying, and all things reddened with that precious blood, do you think that you are still among men and standing on earth? Saint John Chrysostom (quoted in Nichols, 1991: 50)

1. What is World Youth Day?

1.1 The biggest papal gathering on record? How many people attended the largest papal gathering on record? Where was it, when was it, and what was the occasion? According to church historian Eamon Duffy and political analyst George Weigel, the answers would be—in turn: roughly 5 million people; Manila, the Philippines; World Youth Day 1995 and the Papal Mass on January 15, the feast day of Saint Paul the Hermit, celebrated by—now Saint—Pope John Paul II (e. g. Duffy, 2014: 375; Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 750). Another papal event at Manila saw that change in 2015, but WYD 1995 held its ground for two decades (Pullella and Francisco, 2015). What, then, is World Youth Day? When and how did it begin? Did it stay much the same, or did it evolve? How has World Youth Day affected Catholicism at large? These are the questions I aim to answer with this book, and while the book in its entirety is the answer I propose, a short description of the phenomenon will help readers situate themselves. Let us begin at the top, then: What is World Youth Day? World Youth Day (WYD) is the name of a series gatherings for Catholic youth and young adults held by the Catholic Church. From this point on, the picture gets complicated. WYD takes two main forms. The first is a globally distributed but locally enacted small-scale variety, celebrated annually on Palm Sunday in many dioceses around the world. The second form is of a globally concentrated variety, held every two to three years in a specified location. This latter type gathers hundreds of thousands to millions of participants in one place, making them centralized transnational events. Moreover, the pope is always present to lead a few ceremonies. It is the ambition of the hierarchically topmost WYD organizers at the Vatican (previously the “Pontifical Council for the Laity,” redubbed and reorganized in 2016 into the “Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life”) that all WYDs—distributed and centralized—involve the Catholic Church in its universal entirety. To answer that demand, viewing parties enabled by digital technology connect people around the world to the Vatican’s Palm Sunday celebrations by live streaming. Similarly, diocesan viewing parties are organized during the large-scale centralized events for those unable to travel to attend in person. Barring a few exceptions, like the WYD of 1995 in Manila, mentioned at the beginning of this chapter, centralized events typically take place in July–August. The hundreds of

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What is World Youth Day?

thousands to millions of participants come from 160–185 countries worldwide (Jackowski et al., 2016: 136; Polish Press Agency and Catholic News Agency Poland, 2016). Centralized WYDs involve encounters between people from around the world, making the events transnational with global reach and relevance. Both varieties of WYDs connect Catholic youth and young adults from around the world, but it is the large-scale centralized events that draw media attention, and so it is these events that typically are referred to when WYD is mentioned. This tendency stretches into research on WYD, this book included. Unless otherwise specified, I use “WYD” to refer to the centralized transnational events. Speaking of WYD locations, main parts of the event take place in or in the vicinity of a city, and no city aside from Rome has hosted WYD more than once. The Eternal City has hosted four large-scale events and remains the center of small-scale WYDs. It is a poetic illustration of the negotiations of power between the administrative center at the Vatican and the Catholic Church’s many other centers—centers of tradition, of pilgrimage, of piety and power. Viewed as a single phenomenon, WYD has become a mobile shapeshifter clothed in the religious and cultural characteristics of each location, but with similar event designs, structures, and ambitions. Centralized WYDs draw on saints, stories, and symbols of special prominence to the host locations and communities. Changing host locations from city to city around the world ensures a freshness that may well be key to securing WYDs’ continued appeal. Design and duration are other ways in which WYDs have changed. In its first manifestations, centralized WYDs lasted two days—Palm Saturday and Palm Sunday—and Palm Sunday remains the normative time for diocesan celebrations, although there are exceptions (Rymarz, 2007: 387).1 Today, the centralized events continue for a full week, sporting several main gatherings and some smaller events like concerts and other artistic performances—all of which contribute to an elaborate event design. Despite its plasticity, the event design also has fixed features that carry over into each individual WYD. The most prominent of these is a regular set of rituals that include an Opening Mass, a Welcoming Ceremony for the pope (who always participates), language-specific catechesis sessions, the Way of the Cross, a communal Pilgrimage Walk followed by a night Vigil, and a Closing Mass. Most of these regular rituals have a fixed week schedule. For example, the Way of the Cross always takes place on Friday, the Pilgrimage Walk and Vigil on Saturday, and the Closing Mass on Sunday morning. This pattern of events largely replicates the ritual pattern in the last days of Holy Week in Rome. Papal participation constitutes another consistent component and connection to Holy Week. Just 1 In the United States, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) celebrate “National Youth Day” on the “Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, which is typically in late October” (USCCB, 2016).

The biggest papal gathering on record?

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as the pope leads the Way of the Cross on Good Friday, the Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday, and celebrates Mass on Easter Sunday in Rome, he also leads the Vigil and Closing Mass at WYD. Beyond that, papal ceremonial leadership is fluid. For example, Pope Francis led the Way of the Cross at WYD 2016, but John Paul II did not at WYD 1993. The WYD Closing Mass is open to the general public and does not require WYD participant credentials. This papal Mass thus tends to draw the largest number of people, as exemplified initially in this chapter by WYD 1995 in Manila.2 The subtitle of this book reveals that I consider WYD to be a festival. Analyzing the Olympic Games in the 1980s, ritual studies scholar John J. MacAloon identified four “genres of performance”: spectacle, festival, ritual, and games (MacAloon, 1984). Spectacle implies “large and dramatic public displays”; festival conveys “celebration and joyousness”; ritual is taken to indicate the invocation of “religious or sacred forces”; and games communicates a combination of playfulness and socio-political significance (Getz, 1989: 128, cf. MacAloon, 1984). WYD combines all four genres, but I have chosen to accentuate festival partly due to its celebratory atmosphere, and partly because it indicates a level of complexity that I think the reader will find useful to keep in mind. Despite many disruptions within its durable design, one of WYD’s most stable and conspicuous features is references to the events as pilgrimage and participants as pilgrims. Scholars of religion Alex Norman and Mark Johnson have noted that WYD differs from other, older Catholic pilgrimage traditions (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 371). In their view, the differences between WYD and other pilgrimages consist in WYD “lacking the historical authority of longer established pilgrimages” and “not taking place at a noted sacred site” (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 371). While Norman and Johnson’s observations ring true for some WYD locations like Denver, Sydney, or Toronto, the same can hardly be said for Rome, Buenos Aires, Santiago de Compostela, and Cze˛stochowa. These latter host cities boast old and vivid pilgrimage traditions. Unlike pilgrimages to those places, however, or to other major Catholic shrines like Lourdes, Fátima, or Guadalupe, WYD is only available for a very short time. WYD’s time-limited availability places it in a class of recurrent pilgrimage events with Jubilee Years, Holy Week, and other Catholic feasts and festivals. We might also note that WYD thus bears some resemblance to the Muslim Hajj and the Hindu Kumbh Mela on the one hand, and rock festivals and cultural fairs on the other. In fact, the inclusion of music events along with the sheer number of participants gathered under the open air earned WYD the nickname 2 By comparison, John Julius Norwich suggests that the Requiem Mass at John Paul II’s funeral in 2005 was “attended by well over four million people, almost certainly the largest single Christian pilgrimage in history” (Norwich, 2011: 466). John Paul II’s visit to Nowy Targ, Poland, in June 1979 is often ignored in this connection. According to the New York Post on June 8, 1979, over five million people gathered (UNDA1).

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What is World Youth Day?

“Catholic Woodstock” (DCRA4). Unlike the Hajj or Kumbh Mela, however, WYD revolves around practices that are enacted locally and are always available on the parish level, like the Way of the Cross, Confession, and Communion. What sets centralized WYDs apart from local enactments of these rituals is the media attention they attract due to the sheer number of participants gathered in one place, their multicultural and multinational diversity, and the administrative, logistical, and financial demands involved. The conundrum of WYD—promoted as a pilgrimage while diverging from some central connotations to pilgrimage as conceived conventionally—led me to select pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage as keywords for this study. Until now, no study has asked whether participants themselves agree to self-describe as pilgrims, or how they interpret the term pilgrimage in the context of WYD. Consequently, I chose these topics to limit the scope of my study. This had consequences for how I collected material during my stay at the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism at the University of Notre Dame in the spring of 2015, and in various archives in Poland from August to early December that same year. Pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage were also important for designing the interview guide for fieldwork at WYD 2016. This process is explored in the Appendix.3 Research on WYD by scholars of religion is scarce and historical and qualitative studies even more so. This is surprising because WYD is the one large-scale, thematic, youth-oriented, and recurring global mega-event undertaken by the world’s largest religious organization. If that is not enough to inspire interest, WYD is also the greatest singular event undertaken by that organization to accommodate, recruit, engage, and influence youth as a distinct social segment. I hope this short introductory description is sufficient to spark curiosity. It is time to present my study’s guiding research questions and the structure of this book. This first chapter starts with the three main contributions I aim to make with this book, leading to the question of when WYD began, a discussion of previous research on WYD followed by a section that presents research questions, contextualizes the book, and positions it in relation to the two fields of study I engage the most: pilgrimage studies and—less conventionally— digital game studies. First, however, let me present the book’s three main contributions: 1) A better understanding of the origins and early history of WYD and, by extension, a better understanding of Catholicism in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. This contribution pertains mainly to the history of Catholicism in this period. 3 Some readers may interpret placing the discussion of research methods and methodology in the Appendix as a sign of irreverence. That is not my intention. Instead, the decision resulted from a wish to treat the section with the reverence and dedication due to the topic while retaining the flow of the argument that would otherwise have been obstructed.

When did World Youth Days begin?

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2) A new approach to studying pilgrimage by showing that another framework, here inspired by digital game studies, can enrich and extend the considerable insights already obtained in that field. This is done by providing some new language for interpreting the source material, especially the personal experiences of travelers, what that entails for them, and their judgments about themselves and other participants. 3) Exploring what theoretical perspectives from digital game studies, especially conversations about interaction, interface, and immersion, not only to Catholic pilgrimage and rituals, but also of phenomena in other religious traditions, such as Hindu darshan, visionary dreams in Muslim spirituality, and embodied manifestations of the Holy Spirit among Charismatic Christians. The central question that guides these contributions is: What is World Youth Day? I have already used the terms event and festival interchangeably with WYD, which reveals the primary outlook: Whatever else they are, WYDs are complex, celebratory public events—mass gatherings organized by the Catholic Church in cooperation with the festivals’ host cities. In order to explore the central question of what WYDs are, asking when they began is a fitting first step.

1.2 When did World Youth Days begin? It would be misleading to say scholars disagree on when the first WYD took place, for the matter is not discussed but rather unceremoniously asserted in most studies’ introductory sections. Even so, they tend to refer to three different years: 1984, 1985, or 1986. The 1986 event was the first to be officially named “World Youth Day,” but the documents of WYD 1986 display continuity with gatherings in 1984 and 1985. 1985 is the year most scholars name the first year WYD was celebrated, probably because John Paul II officially instituted the gatherings as an annual celebration on December 20 that year (Perreault, 2005: 305; Pfadenhauer, 2010: 383, 392; Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). December 20 was half a year after the WYD of 1985, however, and scholars also refer to a large-scale meeting between the pope and a transnational group of young people in 1984—in the same place and at the same time of year (Cleary, 2011: 19; Faggioli, 2014 [2008]: Chapter 9, section 1, para. 2, Kindle edition; Rymarz, 2007: 387; Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 493). 1984 is the first year on the list of WYDs found on the Vatican’s official website (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014; Vatican.va, 2016). The history of WYD’s material culture also suggests we place its beginning in 1984. On Easter Sunday that year, John Paul II oversaw the presentation of a large wooden cross to a multinational group of young Catholics gathered in Saint Peter’s Square

22

What is World Youth Day?

(Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). One week earlier, however, during the Palm Weekend, the Youth Jubilee (also called the Festival of Hope) was held in connection with the conclusion of the Holy Year of the Redemption (1983– 1984). Throughout subsequent transnational gatherings, the “WYD Cross,” and an icon that often accompanies it, have been and continue to be central material objects at the main events. Within the festival’s timeframe, one could even make the case that the main events are those where the WYD Cross is on display. There are good reasons for selecting any one of the three years as the first WYD, although 1984 and 1985 might best be dubbed “proto-WYDs” because the gatherings had not yet been named. In light of these observations, it makes sense in retrospect to conceptualize the festivals of 1984, 1985, as well as WYD 1986 as sequences in a formative period. As time went on, the event design was continuously elaborated, as we will see in Chapters 3 and 4. From Table 1.1, it is possible to discern certain trends in the three pontificates during which WYD has been celebrated. In John Paul II’s pontificate, event intervals were biennial with the exceptions of the three-year pauses between 1997 in Paris and 2000 in Rome, and between 2002 in Toronto and 2005 in Cologne.4 Out of the ten centralized WYDs John Paul II attended, four of them coincided with the Assumption of Mary (August 15). Themes focused on the incarnation, evangelization, various aspects of believers’ identities as well as their relationships with the persons of the Trinity and Mary. Benedict XVI’s pontificate saw a decrease in frequency of transnational events to triennial intervals. Timing remained in summer but was otherwise less consistent, and themes focused on various aspects of believers’ relationships to Jesus and one another. So far, the WYDs of Francis’ pontificate have maintained a triennial interval, and varying celebration dates in summer. Themes have focused on evangelization, the beatitudes from the Sermon on the Mount, and the Annunciation. A consistent feature in all three pontificates are WYD themes, which have been quotes or paraphrased excerpts from the New Testament. The number of WYDs presided over by each pope is one important difference between the three pontificates. Including the proto-festivals of 1984 and 1985, 21 WYDs were celebrated under John Paul II—ten of them centralized. By comparison, Benedict XVI presided over eight in total, three of which were centralized, while Francis had by 2020 presided over seven in total, three of which were centralized. The difference in numbers is easily explained by the extraordinary longevity of John Paul II’s pontificate—26 and a half years. The events have since continued and been replicated with minor changes. Most of them were afforded by what had become an established event 4 It should be noted that WYD 2013 in Rio de Janeiro was to a large extent already planned when Francis was elected pope. The same goes for WYD 2005 in Cologne, which was Benedict XVI’s first WYD.

1985 Rome

1986 Rome

1987 Buenos Aires

1988 - (Rome)

1989 Santiago de Compostela

1990 - (Rome)

1991 Cze˛stochowa Transnational WYD VI

JP2

JP2

JP2

JP2

JP2

JP2

JP2

WYD I

WYD III

Diocesan

WYD V

Transnational WYD IV

Diocesan

Transnational WYD II

Diocesan

Transnational Proto-WYD

Transnational Proto-WYD

1984 Rome

JP2

Status

Level

Pope Year Host city

Occasion

Palm Sunday

Palm Weekend

Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday

August 10– Assumption of 15 Mary

April 8

August 15– Assumption of 20 Mary

March 27

April 11–12 Palm Weekend

March 23

March 30– 31

April 11–15, Youth Jubilee, 22 Palm Weekend, Easter Sunday

Date(s)

Table 1.1: Full overview of World Youth Days (Adapted from Vatican.va, 2016).

You have received a spirit of sonship” (Rom 8:15)

“I am the vine, you are the branches” (Jn 15:5)

“I am the Way, the Truth and the Life” (Jn 14:6)

“Do whatever he tells you” (Jn 2:5)

“We ourselves have known and put our faith in God’s love towards ourselves” (1Jn 4:16)

“Always be prepared to make a defence to anyone who calls you to account for the hope that is in you” (1Pt 3:15)

No theme. Apostolic Letter Dilecti Amici is released.

No theme. Presentation of WYD Cross.

Theme

When did World Youth Days begin?

23

Diocesan

1992 - (Rome)

1993 Denver

1994 - (Rome)

1995 Manila

1996 - (Rome)

1997 Paris

1998 - (Rome)

1999 - (Rome)

JP2

JP2

JP2

JP2

JP2

JP2

JP2

JP2

WYD VII

Status

WYD IX

WYD XI

Diocesan

Diocesan WYD XIV

WYD XIII

Transnational WYD XII

Diocesan

Transnational WYD X

Diocesan

Transnational WYD VIII

Level

Pope Year Host city

(Continued)

Palm Sunday

Occasion

Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday

March 28

April 5

Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday

August 19– Various saints’ 24 feast days

March 31

January 10– Various saints’ 15 feast days

March 27

August 10– Assumption of 15 Mary

April 12

Date(s)

“The Father loves you” (cf. Jn 16:27)

“The Holy Spirit will teach you all things” (cf Jn 14:26)

“Teacher, where are you staying? Come and see” (cf. Jn 1:38–39)

“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (Jn 6:68)

“As the Father sent me, so am I sending you” (Jn 20: 21; same as previous year)

“As the Father sent me, so am I sending you” (Jn 20: 21)

“I came that they might have life, and have it to the full” (Jn 10:10)

“Go into all the world and preach the Gospel” (Mk 16:15)

Theme

24 What is World Youth Day?

2002 Toronto

2003 - (Rome)

2004 - (Rome)

2005 Cologne

2006 - (Rome)

2007 - (Rome)

JP2

JP2

JP2

B16

B16

B16

WYD XIX

WYD XVIII

Diocesan

Diocesan WYD XXII

WYD XXI

Transnational WYD XX

Diocesan

Diocesan

Transnational WYD XVII

WYD XVI

2001 - (Rome)

JP2

Diocesan

Transnational WYD XV

2000 Rome

JP2

Status

Level

Pope Year Host city

(Continued) Occasion

Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday

Various saints’ feast days

Palm Sunday

April 8

April 9

Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday

August 16– Various saints’ 21 feast days

April 4

April 13

July 23–28

April 8

August 15– Assumption of 20 Mary

Date(s)

”Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another” (Jn 13, 34)

”Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path” (Ps 119, 105)

”We have come to worship Him” (Mt 2,2)

”We wish to see Jesus” (Jn 12,21)

”Behold, your mother!” (Jn 19,27)

”You are the salt of the earth … you are the light of the world” (Mt 5: 13,14)

“If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me” (Lk 9:23)

“The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (Jn 1:14)

Theme

When did World Youth Days begin?

25

2010 - (Rome)

2011 Madrid

2012 - (Rome)

2013 Rio de Janeiro

2014 - (Rome)

2015 - (Rome)

B16

B16

B16

F

F

F

WYD XXV

Diocesan

Diocesan

WYD XXVII April 1

WYD XXX

WYD XXIX

Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday

Various saints’ feast days

Occasion

March 29

April 13

Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday

Various saints’ feast days

Palm Sunday

August 16– Various saints’ 21 feast days

March 28

April 5

July 15–20

Date(s)

Transnational WYD XXVIII July 22–29

Diocesan

Transnational WYD XXVI

Diocesan

WYD XXIV

2009 - (Rome)

B16

Diocesan

Transnational WYD XXIII

2008 Sydney

B16

Status

Level

Pope Year Host city

(Continued)

”Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Mt 5:8)

”Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Mt 5:3)

”Go and make disciples of all nations!” (cf. Mt 28:19)

“Rejoice in the Lord always!” (cf. Phil 4:4)

”Planted and built up in Jesus Christ, firm in the faith” (cf Col 2:7)

”Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”(Mk 10:17)

”We have set our hope on the living God” (1 Tm 4:10)

”You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses” (Acts 1, 8)

Theme

26 What is World Youth Day?

2018 - (Rome)

2019 Panama City Transnational WYD XXXIV January 22– Various saints’ 27 feast days

F

Diocesan

April 9

WYD XXXIII March 25

WYD XXXII

F

Diocesan

2017 - (Rome) Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday

Various saints’ feast days

F

July 25–31

Transnational WYD XXXI

Occasion

2016 Kraków

Date(s)

F

Status

Level

Pope Year Host city

(Continued)

“I am the servant of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word” (Lk 1:38)

“Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God” (Lk 1:30)

“The Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is His name” (Lk 1:49)

”Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Mt 5:7).

Theme

When did World Youth Days begin?

27

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What is World Youth Day?

design: new host cities, new themes and songs, new patron saints of youth (John Paul II himself among them). The table above provides an overview and historical outline, but does little more than hint at the structural changes taking place on deeper levels: Paying attention to centralized WYDs’ duration, location, and placement on the liturgical calendar lets us discern that centralized events grew in duration, and have so far been held in a total of fourteen different host cities in twelve countries. Festivals have also moved from the beginning of Holy Week to other dates on the liturgical calendar. WYD is now a Catholic tradition in its own right—one whose history stretches across three decades—a full generation— and has been integrated into the papal as well as global Catholic calendar. WYD exemplifies religious change in three ways: First, it has added a new temporal, calendaric ritual “rhythm” to Catholicism (Weigel, 2010: 244). Next, it attempts to accommodate, recruit, engage, and influence young generations of Catholics. Third, WYD itself has changed and, finally, the changes to WYD have further altered an important Catholic tradition: pilgrimage.

1.3 Previous research Research literature on WYD, including the present work, focuses exclusively on transnational events, leaving diocesan WYDs in the dark. Most studies also concern events contemporaneous to the research projects taking place, especially those of 2005 and later. This leaves most of WYD’s history in the relative obscurity. This study aims to remedy that shortcoming by combining a synchronic approach with a diachronic one. Scholars trained in a variety of disciplines have studied WYDs. Those disciplines include medicine, sociology, the study of religion, and various forms of theology and religious education. Epidemiologists have studied influenza outbreaks at WYD 2008 in Sydney (Blyth et al., 2010; Foo et al., 2009; Gautret, 2014; van Hal et al., 2009), and others have examined public health management during “mass gatherings” with WYD as one among several cases (Fizzell and Armstrong, 2008; Smith et al., 2008; Tyner et al., 2012). Studies in medicine bear kinship to event studies in their emphasis on the management at the social macro level of WYD, and inform us of the health hazards that come with participating at WYD and similar mass gatherings, like the Muslim Hajj (Al-Tawfiq et al., 2016). Turning to the humanities and social sciences, anthropologist Danièle Hervieu-Léger pioneered research on WYD with her study of French participants at WYD 1991 in Cze˛stochowa (Hervieu-Léger, 1994). Although it contains some inaccuracies, her study is often the earliest cited in later contributions (e. g. Norman and Johnson 2011: 371; Perreault, 2005: 312; Rymarz, 2007: 34). Hervieu-Léger contextualizes WYD as part of the “New

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Evangelisation of Europe,” which she interprets as a response from the Catholic Church to a threat of “dislocation of the collective memory” (HervieuLéger, 1994: 127). Since continual change is a defining characteristic of Hervieu-Léger’s concept of modernity, the “New Evangelization” and WYD by extension are anti-modern phenomena; continual change dislocates collective memory, thereby eroding the “very basis of their [religious institutions’] survival” (1994: 127). One weakness of Hervieu-Léger’s study is her lack of attention to WYD’s changing elements, which would be more compatible with her interpretation of modernity. Another inaccuracy is her interpretation of the new evangelization as focused on Europe, which foregoes its influences from Latin-American Catholicism, as well as its global outlook. The final remark in her article pertains to Catholic youth giving “primacy to immediate individual and community experience and the subjective expression of this experience, over and above any form of institutional authority governing the relationship of each believer with the line of believers” (1994: 137–138). This insightful observation, too, seems to defy her description of WYD as antimodern and plays on a theme we will revisit several times in this book, especially in Chapter 6. Another example is scholar of religion Jean-Philippe Perreault’s article on mass media reception and representation of WYD 2002 in Toronto. He considers WYD “a veritable laboratory for observers of modern religiosity and contemporary Catholicism” (Perreault, 2005: 305, my translation). I agree, and would add that the diachronic development of WYD is a window into the ambitions of the governing body of the Catholic Church as a global institution, and some of the means by which its members try to realize them. Perreault, who wrote over a decade and five WYDs after Hervieu-Le´ger, reveals two trends in how WYD 2002 was interpreted: “Some have seen a real return of young people to Catholicism, while others have discerned a skillful propaganda exercise of the Catholic Church” (Perreault, 2005: 306, my translation). Like any public event, he argues, WYD does not exist in a vacuum but “acquires its identity and is constituted in the public space.” Quoting sociologist André Akoun, he asserts that “the mass media are not ‘mere instruments that convey information, but they contribute to the making of this world that will be called’ the real world” (Perreault, 2005: 306, cf. Akoun, 1997: 87, my translation). He considers WYD to be an “inscription […] in the public space” that “results [from] the interaction” between three actors: the youth, the Catholic Church, and the media (Perreault, 2005: 306, my translation). He concludes that the audience and the readership constitute a fourth participant: “physically absent but present in the game of media framing” (Perreault, 2005: 317, my translation). Other sociological studies have also largely been connected to event studies and media studies, and some have been comprehensive. One example is sociologist Winfried Gebhardt and colleagues’ Megaparty Glaubensfest (Gebhardt et al., 2007). Studying WYD 2005 in Cologne, they concluded that

30

What is World Youth Day?

WYD at its core fulfills all the criteria of an “event” (Gebhardt et al., 2007: 207). They also identify the purpose of WYD to be the “(Catholic) re-evangelization of youth” (Gebhardt et al., 2007: 208). Gebhardt and his colleagues conclude that WYD, like other events, “had a clearly identifiable thematic focus,” used “a variety of national, but also high and popular cultural traditions and their symbolic expressive means,” “aimed at ‘totality’ to enable a ‘total experience’ that […] appealed to all the senses,” endowed “it with meaning,” and “aimed at creating a comprehensive sense of community” (Gebhardt et al., 2007: 209, my translation). Several of the contributors to Megaparty Glaubensfest, Andreas Hepp, Veronika Krönert, and Michaela Pfadenhauer, went on to publish articles on WYD from mediatization and eventization perspectives. Hepp and Krönert approached WYD as an example of mediatization and individualization of religion. They conceived of WYD 2005 in Cologne as an example of contemporary religions being “themselves staged in media events” (Hepp and Krönert, 2010: 270, italics in original). Such events, they claim, “have a hybrid character” (Hepp and Krönert, 2010: 270). WYD and other hybrid media events transform “on the one hand religious festiveness into media coverage, but on the other hand [take] forms of popular consumer culture into the field of religion” (Hepp and Krönert, 2010: 270). They found a contrast between highly controlled religious celebrations and youth celebrating uncontrolled in the streets and being represented in this way by the media, and that said contrast was held together by a focus on the Pope, acting not only as a representative but as a ‘brand symbol’ of Catholicism (Hepp and Krönert, 2010: 271–272). At WYD 2016 in Kraków, ritual(ized) contexts and liturgical enactments at main events could be described as “highly controlled.” “Uncontrolled” celebrations “in the streets” could arguably designate the spontaneous ritualization WYD participants from different countries engaged in when they encountered one another. Walking in the streets was also ritualized as a whole by forming mini-parades, singing, and loud recitation of rhymes and slogans. Such mini-parades were often headed or at least marked by a flag or banner, signifying the group’s nationality and sometimes regional origin and affiliation to Catholic organizations. Upon encountering other groups in the streets, people from one group would high-five people from the other as they passed one another, shouting greetings in their own language or in the language of the group they encountered. Many groups were also headed by leaders, often priests or members of religious orders. Some nuance is called for, however. At WYD 2016, “control” at main events was not absolute, as the introduction to Chapter 2 will show. Nor were spontaneous celebrations in the streets without directio. Pfadenhauer analyzed WYD 2005 from a marketing perspective, arguing that “WYD can be unequivocally reconstructed as a Catholic Church marketing event” (Pfadenhauer, 2010: 382). She interprets the product marketed as “the Catholic faith, uniquely personified by the Pope,” and

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“presented by an elite organizing team in an atmosphere of fun and mystery that especially appeals to young people” (Pfadenhauer, 2010: 382). To Pfadenhauer, the creation of WYD—a “new hybrid event form”—demonstrates the Catholic Church’s capacity for “responding in an innovative way to the challenge posed by pluralization” (Pfadenhauer, 2010: 382). Pfadenhauer’s analysis is informed by an implicit “religious market” model that calls to mind Rodney Stark and William Sims Bainbridge’s “rational choice” approach to the pluralized religious market (Stark and Bainbridge, 1996). Compared to Hervieu-Léger’s interpretation of WYD as a response to secularization, Pfadenhauer’s work reflects a shift in conversations among scholars of religion. If Hervieu-Léger’s study represents a view where secularization theory holds sway, Pfadenhauer’s study represents attempts to explain the apparent staying power of religion that led many scholars to adapt or discard the secularization thesis. Pfadenhauer considers WYD’s success to be “documented quantitatively by attendance figures and qualitatively by the publicity and media coverage it receives” (Pfadenhauer, 2010: 392), but attendance figures and publicity alone do not satisfy the ambitions of WYD organizers. As a manifestation of the new evangelization, WYD is also intended to recruit young people to the priesthood, inspire them to get married and raise children as Catholics, engage them in church activities on the parish and diocesan levels, and to (re)gain moral and political influence for the clerical hierarchy. Pfadenhauer considers the “secret of this success” to be the result of a diverse event program, creating “a relatively novel event form that combines – and gives equal status to – elements of modernistic events typical of today’s youth culture and elements of traditional ceremonies such as liturgical rites” (Pfadenhauer, 2010: 392). Here too, we see a divergence in interpretation between Hervieu-Léger who considered WYD to be anti-modern, and Pfadenhauer, who describes the festival as modernistic. What they all have in common, is a seemingly tacit conviction that WYD is a novel phenomenon. As we will see in Chapter 3, however, WYD is not as novel as it may appear, and to state that the events give equal status to non-ceremonial and ceremonial events is to conceal the importance of ritual that WYDs are designed to instill in participants. Hepp and Krönert, and Pfadenhauer all testify to the importance of the pope in the emergent narrative of WYD as represented in the media. The present book also pays attention to papal agency in the construction of WYD as a pilgrimage. Focusing on the pope invites comparison with other papal events, such as papal visits to various countries. Sociologist Agnieszka Zduniak took this into account when she classified WYDs as religious media events along with John Paul II’s papal visits to countries around the globe, his death and funeral, and the papal conclave (Zduniak, 2015). Zduniak makes an important point: As a papal event, WYD cannot be divorced from the wider eventization and mediatization of the papacy and Catholicism, or even event culture more

32

What is World Youth Day?

broadly—the roots of which can be found in several historical contexts, as I argue in Chapter 3. Still, it would be a mistake to overlook WYD as an attempt by the ecclesial hierarchy to appeal to young people, and the festivals’ impact upon them. Religious education scholar Richard Rymarz has made considerable contributions on that topic. In 2007, he published an article on the impact of WYD 2005 in Cologne on Australian participants under the age of 18 (Rymarz, 2007). 98.6 percent of his respondents reported that attending WYD had “strengthened my faith,” while 55.6 percent reported an increase in involvement on the parish level, and 53.2 percent reported an increase in “involvement in faithbased activities at school” (Rymarz, 2007: 390). However, only 14.3 percent and 15.9 reported having joined a parish group or faith-based group at school respectively.5 Another group of researchers, Australian sociologists Michael Mason, Andrew Singleton, and Ruth Webber, published a series of articles and conference papers from The Pilgrim’s Progress 2008 Research Project, which focused on WYD 2008 in Sydney. In their quantitative study, they classified participants according to four groups: “Devoted,” “Involved,” “Open,” and “Social,” indicating declining levels of “commitment.” They also sorted participants into three age groups (15–18, 19–24, 25–35), and found the highest commitment levels in the oldest group (57 percent Devoted, 5 percent Social), and the lowest levels in the youngest group (25 percent Devoted, 23 percent Social). Commitment levels were most equally distributed among the youngest (25 percent Devoted, 26 percent Involved and Open, 23 percent Social). The mid-range age group showed a marked increase in numbers of Devoted participants (42 percent), and a significant decrease in Social participants (10 percent). Only in the oldest age group did the percentage of Devoted and Involved participants together exceed 70 percent in total (Mason, 2008b: 2).6 5 In a 2008 article, Rymarz examined “the attraction and impact of WYD for a particular sub group […] type A pilgrims, characterized as a relatively select group who have traveled a considerable distance to attend” (Rymarz, 2008: 1). Rymarz acknowledges that “WYD has become a social phenomenon for a number of reasons, but perhaps most obviously for the numbers who participate in it.” He also recognizes that “WYD can be seen through a variety of prisms,” and suggests that “[o]ne way of approaching WYD on a conceptual level is to see it as somewhat of a paradox.” His previous research also suggests the participation of “a variety of types of WYD pilgrims” (Rymarz, 2008: 1–3). 6 Adding nationality to the mix (Australia, New Zealand, United States, Canada, Philippines, United Kingdom and Ireland, and Other), Mason, Singleton, and Webber found cultural differences in commitment. The highest levels of commitment were found among 15–18 year olds traveling from the Philippines (89.5 percent Devoted and Involved together), with the next in line being participants from the United States (75.8 percent Devoted and Involved together). They found the lowest levels of commitment among participants from Australia—the host country (38.4 percent), and the United Kingdom and Ireland combined (42.1 percent) (Mason, 2008b: 3). Among 19–25 year olds, the scores evened out with 89.5 percent of Filipinos classified as highly committed, 80.7 percent of Americans, 61 percent of Australians, and 55.2 percent from the United Kingdom and Ireland. Among those aged 25–35, however, all countries had over 70 percent of highly committed

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Among the Pilgrim’s Progress 2008 researchers, Mason’s WYD-related publications are the most numerous. Most recently, he contributed to the anthology A Sociology of Prayer with the article “For Youth, Prayer is Relationship” (Mason, 2015)—an article Chapter 2 will look take a closer look at. At the Annual Meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion in 2008, Webber presented the last in a series of three papers proceeding from the results of the Pilgrims’ Progress 2008. The paper asked whether WYD 2008 in Sydney could be described as “Sacred Rock concert or a fun day out,” and was concerned with the social ethics of pilgrims—“the extent to whether civic orientation and spirituality are related, and…whether there have been any changes in the way returned Pilgrims relate to other people and the wider community” (Webber, 2008: 1). Webber juxtaposed her research team’s findings to those of Winfried Gebhardt in Megaparty Glaubensfest, that “in Cologne from day one, but especially during the closing ceremony, the Cologne WYD was a blend of classical Catholic doctrinal and liturgical elements with themes from profane pop-culture” (Webber, 2008: 2). Webber and her research team, however, “did not witness anything that could be called ‘profane pop culture [sic]’… The concerts were youth oriented and lively with well recognised youth performers on the stage, but they were not ‘profane’” (Webber, 2008: 2). Judging from my own fieldwork experience, I would note that the scale of the event and the number of participants involved makes it entirely possible for two groups of researchers to study the same WYD and make different observations. Besides, scholars of religion will be quick to note that Webber’s disagreement may rest on disparities in what is considered “profane” rather than behavioral differences observed. To Webber, what distinguished WYD 2008 from a rock concert was that it “seemed to be remarkably free from the kind of behaviour associated with the large gatherings at previous WYDs as described by Gebhardt (2007)” (Webber, 2008: 3). Webber attributed the apparent difference to WYD 2008 attracting a smaller number of people, but also to the expense related to travel, which she took to indicate high levels of commitment, “and a low proportion of Socials who were going primarily to have a fun time” (Webber, 2008: 4). Contrasting the Pilgrims’ Progress 2008’s results with those of Gebhardt et al., Webber disputes their idea that the pope at WYD is seen as a “sacred rock star and as a sort of pop-star celebrity” (Webber, 2008: 4). “It simply was not the case in Sydney WYD,” she claims, quoting a fellow researcher: “[T]he Pope was regarded by Pilgrims as a significant religious leader who commanded their participants, with the highest scores once again coming from the Philippines and the United States (Mason, 2008b: 3). It is unfortunate that their surveys jumble all other countries together, as it serves to conceal the respective commitment levels of participants from Latin American countries and European countries beside the United Kingdom and Ireland. The survey thus ends up with a decidedly anglocentric perspective. Researchers working with other languages have found that WYD 2013 in Rio de Janeiro was a lucrative economic investment, with an impact of R$ 1.9 billion (Monteiro and Marques, 2015: 71).

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respect rather than mass hysteria: ‘Maybe you could call the WYD08 as a celebrity visit in the person of the Pope but there was a respectful adulation and not a noisy greeting for a movie star or hysteria’” (Webber, 2008: 4). Instead, Webber suggests that the pope was “a focus for WYD,” a topic for conversation, “figurehead of the church,” and “protector and ‘guide’” (Webber, 2008: 4–5). One important difference between Megaparty Glaubensfest and Pilgrims’ Progress 2008 were the interests and levels of (in)dependence between the two projects. Megaparty was an independent research project that involved researchers from several public German universities, while Pilgrims’ Progress was carried out by a smaller group of researchers, two out of three of whom were employed by the Australian Catholic University, which also was the project’s source of funding along with Monash University, the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, and World Youth Day Sydney 2008 (Mason et al., 2009: 4). This means that the Australian project gained funding for the purpose of enhancing organizers’ understanding of WYD participation, reception, and impact. WYD 2005, on the other hand, took place in Benedict XVI’s homeland, which may have had a stronger national appeal. As such, the two studies were not only of two different events, carried out by research teams with differing interests, but may also display differences in types of insider- and outsidership, how they may view and interpret religious events differently. However, as scholar of religion and ritual studies Ronald Grimes has stated: From the inside, the dogma is that outsiders can’t possibly understand. From the outside, the prejudice is that insiders don’t really understand what they are doing. Each is half a truth. Each posture, that of insider and that of outsider, has its virtues and vices, and neither has a monopoly on the truth (Grimes, 2014: 6).

We might add that the insider/outsider dichotomy is inherently problematic because boundaries of insidership and outsidership are negotiated along different parameters: A hypothetical self-identified Catholic from the United States may be an insider to American Catholicism, but an outsider to Catholicism as practiced in other countries. She may even be considered an outsider to all American dioceses and parishes except her own. She might leave Catholicism and enter Protestantism or even Christianity altogether; is she still an insider to Catholicism? To Christianity? As a researcher conducting fieldwork at WYD 2016, I might be considered an insider to that specific event, but I am a universalist Ásatrú—a feminist and anti-racist, Norse-inspired neopagan lesbian—and I remain an outsider to Catholicism. My point is that the conventional insider/outsider dichotomy creates new problems even as it solves others. Insidership/outsidership, therefore, is relative to the parameters we set up and may reveal more of the researchers’ perspectives than they describe the groups they are intended to classify. That is not to say that the distinction is unhelpful; it can be useful for generating and upholding humility, curiosity, and care even as we dissect our source material according to the categories we construct, criticize, and negotiate. I have tried to identify my own

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preconceptions, and to stay critically aware and reflexive of such interfering noise in the process of my own analysis (see Appendix). One aspiration I have with this book is to heed the material and linguistic “turns” in the humanities and social sciences (e. g. Meyer, 2011: 60; von Stuckrad, 2013: 10). Catering to the linguistic turn means focusing on the use of specific words, in this case pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage, and accommodating the material turn means paying attention to how people enact religion bodily, how they interpret their own enactments and those of others, and how they interact with the observable environment. My goal is to complement the emerging mosaic of research on WYD which, with a few exceptions, is dominated by event studies and quantitative studies by sociologists. While those studies clearly constitute considerable contributions, the field of pilgrimage studies has been more or less ignored. This is odd, considering the observed prevalence of pilgrimage and pilgrim(s) in reference to the event and its participants. Norman and Johnson even call the use of these terms “ubiquitous” (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 371, 378). “Ubiquitous” is an exaggeration, but they are prevalent in WYD promotion, mediatization, and management, as well as among scholars (Cleary, 2011; Cleary, 2013a; Cleary, 2013b; Hervieu-Léger, 1994; Mason, 2008a; Mason, 2008b; Mason, 2009; Mason, 2010b; Mason, 2010a; Mason, 2014; Mason et al., 2009; Mason et al., 2008; Mason, 2015; Monteiro and Marques, 2015; Norman and Johnson, 2011; Webber, 2008; Rymarz, 2007; Rymarz, 2008; Webber, 2012). Even though some scholars have noted the pervasive presence of pilgrim and pilgrimage, current research on WYD tends to skirt around the topic or take their application for granted (e. g. Mason, 2010b; Pfadenhauer, 2010; Post and van der Beek, 2016: 37–38). An exception is Norman and Johnson, who “do not set out with the assumption that WYD is best classed as a pilgrimage” (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 372). They conclude that WYD is a “pilgrimage event” rather than a “religious pilgrimage,” and that it “demands to be viewed through the lens of pilgrimage study” because “sociological data […] strongly indicate that the event can be understood as a pilgrimage in relation to the way participants experience it” (2011: 380). Although I disagree with Norman and Johnson on some counts, I agree with their conclusion: pilgrimage studies has something important to offer our understanding of WYD. As an example of pilgrimage, Paul Post and Suzanne van der Beek take online participation at WYD 2013 in Rio de Janeiro to be a form of “cyberpilgrimage,” which rests on the assumption that participants who make physical journeys to the festival count as “pilgrims” in the first place. Unfortunately, they do not adress the underlying question of the relevance of pilgrimage studies.7 They admit that 7 Post and van der Beek assert that WYD 2013 in Rio de Janeiro “included, for the first time, those that participated through television, radio, and social media” (Post and van der Beek, 2016: 37). But in fact, WYDs have been broadcast live online at least since Sydney in 2008, and by radio and television for much longer.

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“[n]either the organizers nor the participants referred to [following WYD 2013 online] as a ‘cyberpilgrimage,’” and appear uninterested in what online WYD participants were calling themselves and what that might mean (Post and van der Beek, 2016: 40). In sum, the application of pilgrimage to WYD and pilgrims to its participants is propagated by WYD organizers and the scholars that study the events, albeit in different ways. In my view, the interesting question is not whether or not WYD is best classed as a pilgrimage according to scholarly definitions; it is easy to see that WYD can be said to diverge from many other forms of pilgrimage—even, or perhaps especially, within Catholicism. The interesting questions are what its use implies within the WYD context, what it does to the intra-Catholic concept of pilgrimage and, finally, what (if anything) that implies for pilgrimage as a category for academic analysis. To find out, we need to set aside any assumptions about what pilgrimage is, ask what it means to WYD participants, and what its role is in the evolution of WYD’s event design. My main questions, governed by the central question “What is World Youth Day?” are: What are the origins and early history of WYD and what is the place of pilgrimage in that development? What does pilgrimage mean for WYD participants today? In order to answer these questions from diachronic and synchronic perspectives, it is necessary to draw on both historical and ethnographic source material so as to cover WYD’s synchronic and diachronic dimensions. That means a mixed-methods approach was needed, which is outlined in the Appendix.

1.4 Contextualizing this study From the previous section, media studies and event studies emerge as the fields that have seen the most contributions to research on WYD. Scholars of religion have a number of possible approaches to WYD available to them—event studies, pilgrimage studies, media studies, ritual studies, mission studies, gender studies, organization studies, and material culture to name a few. Media studies and material culture are incorporated into my theoretical framework presented and developed in Chapter 2 and are less useful for positioning this book than pilgrimage studies and digital game studies. My treatment of these two fields is neither meant to be exhaustive, nor an attempt to do them justice. Instead, I have selected a few examples in order to frame the contributions of this book as they are the two main research contexts within which I would place them.

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1.4.1 Pilgrimage studies Pilgrimage studies denotes a global, multilingual, and interdisciplinary field of study that, in the past two decades, has been “used to describe the expanding Anglophone research on contemporary pilgrimage” with empirical and theoretical dimensions that intertwine and affect one another (Albera and Eade, 2015: 1). According to Dionigi Albera and John Eade, the development of this field has been dominated by two main currents: “deeply embedded national structures of knowledge production” on the one hand, and on the other, “an increasingly globalised economy of academic publication dominated by Anglophone universities and publishing houses” (Albera and Eade, 2015: 1). As this book is written in English, the research involved primarily adds to the sphere of anglophone hegemony, though not exclusively as it has also resulted in the publication of an article in Norwegian (Skjoldli, 2017). Nevertheless, the study has a strong focus on the United States, visible both in Chapter 4 on WYD 1993 in Denver, Colorado, and in the sample of respondents featuring in Chapters 5 and 6—all of whom traveled from the United States. Although I have also used material in Polish, Spanish, and Italian, this is not unproblematic; WYD is a multilingual, multiethnic, and multicultural festival, and so I do not claim to speak to the totality of WYD as a phenomenon. Nevertheless, maintaining a focus on the United States at WYD is valuable because it can help us understand young Catholics in a country where Catholicism is a large minority (24.3 percent) and yet ranked fourth on the list of countries worldwide with the highest number of Catholic residents in 2010, surpassed only by Brazil, Mexico, and the Philippines (75.6 million; Pew Research Center, 2011). According to church historian Massimo Faggioli, “American Catholicism is taking an unprecedented leading role for the Church worldwide” (Faggioli, 2014: Prologue, para. 3, Kindle edition). While we should be careful not to exaggerate its importance, understanding Catholicism on the global arena requires comprehension of American Catholicism in a global context. The present book contributes toward that end. Other trends have made their mark on pilgrimage studies as well. Albera and Eade note that the “Turnerian model”—that is, theoretical developments and empirical studies that build upon Edith and Victor Turner’s work, especially Image and Pilgrimage—“could be seen as ‘representative of a particular discourse about pilgrimage rather than as an empirical description of it’” (Albera and Eade, 2015: 6; Eade and Sallnow, 1991: 5 quote in quote). Recent decades, however, have seen increasing diversification in pilgrimage studies, with established paradigms being criticized and global perspectives being accommodated (Albera and Eade, 2015: 7–9). WYD has a global reach, both in terms of potential host cities and participant nationalities, so studying American participants at WYD helps us understand American Catholics in intercultural social encounters in the context of pilgrimage.

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Pilgrimage studies bears close kinship to ritual studies—a relationship Hillary Kaell ascribes to Turner and Turner (Kaell, 2016a: 398). Conceived as “an extended ‘ritual-like’ experience that contains more cohesive rituals within” (Kaell, 2016a: 398; cf. Bell, 2009 [1997]: 102), WYD fits the description if we consider it a festival or ritual mega-event comprised of a series of ritual events. Research on pilgrimage is also often embedded in scholarly conversations on ritual and ritualization that invites the use of concepts common to ritual studies (whether broadly or narrowly conceived) like flow, communitas, and liminality—or, in Turner and Turner’s terms, “liminoid” or “quasi-liminal” (Turner and Turner, 1995 [1978]: Chapter 1, section 5, para. 1, Kindle edition). Mason included these concepts briefly in a preliminary report, pointing out that WYD can be approached as a community event (Mason, 2008a: 11–13). In Chapter 6, we will see examples of how the new framework of religious interaction can shed light on some of the WYD community’s affordances that these terms so far do not fully capture. As a term, pilgrimage has been used to refer to a complex and varied range of human activities, often with differing criteria for classification. Consequently, we should not be surprised by the lack of a “universally accepted definition” (Stoddard, 1997: 42). Robert H. Stoddard discusses three examples of pilgrimage definitions: Definition #1: A journey to a sacred place as an act of religious devotion. Definition #2: Pilgrimage involves three factors: a holy place; attraction of individuals or crowds to this place; a specific aim, i. e., to obtain some spiritual or material benefit. Definition #3: The term pilgrimage is used in at least three senses: (1) There is first the ‘interior pilgrimage,’ or ‘journey of the soul’ in a lifetime of growth from spiritual infancy to maturity. (2) There is, second, the literal pilgrimage to some sacred place as a paradigm of the intent of religion itself. This literal journey may be called ‘exterior mysticism’ […] (3) Finally, every trek to one’s local sanctuary is a pilgrimage in miniature insofar as it acts out on a small scale some transition or growth and experience of the sacred and new community which pilgrimage in general offers (Stoddard, 1997: 42–43).8

Edith Turner’s conceptualization of pilgrimage in The Encyclopedia of Religion considers the term appropriate only for journeys that go “beyond the local temple, church, or shrine” to “some distant holy place renowned for miracles and the revivification of faith (Turner, 2005 [1987]: 7145). Turner’s formula 8 Stoddard, writing in 1997, took the first definition from The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Current English (1982), the second from A Dictionary of Comparative Religion (1970), and the third from a combination of Turner and Turner’s Image and Pilgrimage and Abingdon Dictionary of Living Religions (1981). Ultimately, dictionaries only reflect the lexical contents of words included as imagined and given by their editors.

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conforms to Stoddard’s Definitions #1 and #2, as well as factor (2) of #Definition 3 and, while perhaps conventional, it is also narrow. Adding to this already complex picture, we find The HarperCollins Dictionary of Religion, edited by Jonathan Z. Smith, classifying “three general approaches to or theories of pilgrimage” (Smith, 1995b). The first, called “typological” approaches, “are highly individualistic; thus, no single typological classification has been settled on as the most adequate approach. In fact, all such approaches usually break down after careful scrutiny and use” (Smith, 1995b: 846). Stoddard’s article exemplifies such a deconstruction process. The second, pilgrimage as a rite of passage “emphasizes pilgrimage as the liminal phase of a ritual, as expressing community versus structure, equality versus inequality” (Smith, 1995b: 846). The third approach is functionalist and “asserts that the best approach to explaining pilgrimage is to demonstrate that it satisfies some need” (Smith, 1995b: 846). Smith splits the functionalistic approach into three models: one demonstrates that “the essential need fulfilled is that for social integration” (Smith, 1995b: 847). Another “places the emphasis on the need for the reinforcement of existing patterns of behavior and social relations” (Smith, 1995b: 847). A third model “is more individualistic: it emphasizes that the basic need fulfilled by […] pilgrimage is the development and maintenance of values and ideals in individuals that are essential for the welfare of the individual and society (Smith, 1995b: 847). Smith underscores that the models are frequently combined rather than seen as mutually exclusive (Smith, 1995b: 847). The dictionary adds a definition of its own: a “round-trip journey undertaken by a person or persons who consider their destination sacred. Pilgrimage is a subcategory within the larger category of religious journey” (Smith, 1995a: 841). Such a definition aligns with Stoddard’s Definition #1, the second factor of his Definition #2, and potentially both factors (2) and (3) of his Definition #3. It is also compatible with Michael Stausberg’s concept of religious tourism, of which pilgrimage is one type among many (Stausberg, 2011: 14). Smith makes three points that will be important here: The first is that “pilgrimage is open-ended; it is a locus of negotiation between the known and unknown, the familiar and the unfamiliar, and the individual and the collective” (Smith, 1995a: 841). The same can be said of WYD. It is open-ended in the sense that participants do not necessarily fully know what to expect, particularly first-timers whose participation involves travel to a new country. In such unknown and unfamiliar environments, rituals like the Way of the Cross, the Mass, and the Vigil provide culturally and topographically knownwithin-the-unknown, and familiar-within-the-unfamiliar. Travel groups, too, may represent friendly communities in the larger, experientially unfamiliar but conceptually familiar context of the “universal Catholic Church.” Smith’s second point is that pilgrimage “has more elasticity in this negotiation than other religious rituals, simply because resolving issues in a permanent way is

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not a characteristic of pilgrimage” (Smith, 1995a: 841). Chapters 3 and 4 especially will show how WYD also exemplifies elasticity. Smith’s third point is that “a place may be sacred is not a ‘given’; a place must be constituted as such by believers. At least initially, many places of pilgrimage are not uncontroversially labeled as ‘sacred’; who considers a place as sacred and why determine over time the level of controversy surrounding a place of pilgrimage” (Smith, 1995a: 841–842). This element can also describe WYD, which we will see an example of in Chapter 4. In pilgrimage studies proper, scholar of religion Ian Reader used the term pilgrimage “in a broad generic sense, treating it as a virtually universal phenomenon, found in most (if not all) cultures and religious contexts” (Reader, 2014: 19). The term has also been applied to a wide range of activities enabled by more or less recent technological developments, such as veterans who ride motorcycles to Washington, D.C. to visit the Vietnam Veterans Memorial (Dubisch, 2004) and cases of “cyberpilgrimage” that take place in virtual realms (Hill-Smith, 2009). The latter development can be seen as the result of the computer technological counterpart to travel enabled and undertaken by advances in transportation technology (Stausberg, 2011: 3). What seems to be recurring as a conventional notion, is that destinations are of central importance to pilgrimage. However, notions of place and space can be more complex than they first appear. I wish to draw particular attention to virtual pilgrimage, which for Connie Hill-Smith encompasses her concept of cyberpilgrimage. Cyberpilgrimage, she writes, “might be best viewed as a form of virtual pilgrimage, itself a form of pilgrimage” (Hill-Smith, 2009: 6, italics added). The term virtual pilgrimage, she argues, also includes “non-web-based pilgrimage forms, such as using virtual reality headsets or watching videos, as with Pope Jean Paul II’s [sic] non-Internet-based pilgrimage to Ur in February 2000” (Hill-Smith, 2009: 6). Looking into the example Hill-Smith provides can shed some light on the theoretical discussions ahead. During his general audience on February 16, 2000 John Paul II disclosed that he would have liked to visit Ur in person, but since that had not been possible during his last visit to the region, he said: I would like at least spiritually to make a similar pilgrimage. Therefore, next Wednesday at a special celebration in the Paul VI Hall, together we will relive the key events of Abraham’s experience (John Paul II, 2000 g: No. 4, all italics in original).

This was more than a virtual pilgrimage undertaken by the pope; it was a communal journey to a space and time enabled by electronic media that would otherwise have been inaccessible. While the pope described it as a spiritual pilgrimage, it was also an experience of a state-of-the-art rendition of that otherwise inaccessible space and time as imagined and constructed by software developers. Those virtual renditions of a mytho-historical past in inaccessible time and space did not mediate that past so much as provide a means for making a translocative and transtemporal journey in the mind or, as John Paul

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II put it, “spiritual” journey. The pope’s choice of adjective is important, because it reveals a convergence between the mundane virtual and the lofty spiritual in the pope’s view, which challenges any assumptions that the two are inherently opposed. I leave this discussion on a cliffhanger for now because Chapter 2 develops a framework that helps us understand more about pilgrimage in the WYD context. With such diverse interpretations of pilgrimage among religion and pilgrimage scholars, there is no inherent reason to assume greater coherence among practitioners, which is not to say that scholars and practitioners are mutually exclusive. As I show in Chapter 6, the criteria for being a pilgrim also differed between my respondents at WYD 2016, even though all respondents quoted said they considered themselves pilgrims when asked. Apart from being a relevant and well-established field of study with a variety of theories, definitions, and approaches that far exceeds the examples given above, pilgrimage studies is helpful for highlighting nuances in how WYD is understood as a pilgrimage. Because pilgrimage studies can help make differences visible, is it also useful for showing change over time. However, I am also interested in similarity and continuity, which I have found come clearer into view from another perspective. For this purpose, I have developed a theoretical framework based on digital game studies that connects to material culture. The relevance of digital game studies lies in the combination of terms and concepts it offers.

1.4.2 Digital game studies Digital game studies is a young and rapidly expanding field of study that takes as its object of research “the largest, fastest growing, and most popular form of mediated entertainment—the video/computer game” (Brookey and Gunkel, 2017). Compared to pilgrimage studies, the intersection between this field and the study of religion probably needs a longer introduction.9 While cultural studies broadly construed included research on religion and digital games in the early 2000s (Radde-Antweiler et al., 2014: 2), the establishment of the journal Online: Heidelberg Journal of Religions on the Internet in 2005 provided research on religion and digital games with a dedicated publishing platform. Such a young field is bound to be bustling with pioneers, and Kerstin Radde-Antweiler is one of them. She and her Digital game studies sometimes overlap with the wider field of game studies, which people perform religion in digital contexts (Radde-Antweiler, 2008; Radde-Antweiler et al., 2014). Together with Michael Waltmathe and Xenia Zeiler, she established the journal Gamevironments in 2014, which expanded the publishing niche on 9 Joseph P. Laycocks colleagues have examined in for example, sought to explain negative religious attitudes to role-playing and digital games, such 43 ways.

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religion and digital games. From Online’s establishment to Gamevironments, several books were published on the topic. Notable anthologies are Halos and Avatars (ed. Dettweiler, 2010) and Playing with Religion in Digital Games (eds. Campbell and Grieve, 2014), both of which compiled case studies and theoretical reflections on different kinds of relationships between religion and games. Influential monographs have also surfaced. Robert M. Geraci’s Virtually Sacred (2015) discusses mythology and meaning-making processes in World of Warcraft and Second Life. In eGods, William Sims Bainbridge (2013) analyzes digital games content using a series of concepts common to the study of religion, such as “deities,” “priests,” “shrines,” “magic” and others. Rachel Wagner’s Godwired (2012), however, is the field’s most theoretically innovative publication to date as it not only expands upon a nascent tradition of thinking about games from a study of religion perspective, but also examines the potential of digital game studies concepts to be “part of religious world making” (Mahan, 2012: 86). Studying the ways in which religion and games intertwine is not entirely uncontroversial. In an article proceeding from the annual convention of the American Academy of Religion in Baltimore, 2013, Heidi A. Campbell and her colleagues noted that “[r]eligion and digital games are frequently perceived to be antagonistic,” and compared mixing the two to “mixing pickles with ice cream” (Campbell et al., 2016: 642). Despite the culinary metaphor, the perceived antagonism between the two may go beyond matters of taste and convention. If you primarily think of games as a form of entertainment, the following reflection by game designer Jason Anthony will probably resonate with you: “It is hard to imagine two more different arenas than games and religion,” he says. “Games strike us as a pleasant distraction, a space where amiable conflicts play out to a conclusion which, tomorrow, won’t matter much” (Anthony, 2014: 25).10 But these conventions are beginning to crumble. Historian Marley-Vincent observes that the “claims of virtual mediums not reflecting reality are becoming increasingly less clear” (Lindsey, 2015: 133). Juridically, virtual worlds are treated as “non-real entities,” but the development points in a direction where “the interaction between reality and virtuality” is understood “to be more involved than simply the projections of one onto the other. Virtual space has begun to exist on its own,” and “can have results on [sic] the real world” (Lindsey, 2015: 133).11 The earlier example of

10 Anthony’s words come from his chapter in Playing with Religion in Digital Games (2014), edited by Heidi A. Campbell and Gregory Price Grieve, so it seems reasonable to infer that he is referring to digital games specifically. 11 For example, when the Playstation 3 game Resistance: Fall of Man had a battle take place in a virtual version of Manchester Cathedral, Sony was charged with “virtual desecration” (Wagner, 2012: 79, 168–172). Another example is Hanuman: Boy Warrior, where the player avatar acts as Hanuman himself, which “drew significant negative attention” from gaming communities, where criticism was leveled against the technical inadequacies of the game, and from (mainly

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John Paul II’s virtual or spiritual pilgrimage is a good example although, as Chapter 2 will show, I think the parallels go much deeper. In research literature, the intersection between games and religion is young, barely a couple of decades old. As the examples above show, however, it is growing. Drawing interest from scholars of religion, game studies scholars, and game designers alike, those involved in this area of study understand the relationship between games and religion in different ways. Scholars of religion have tended to ask how religion is expressed in game contexts, and how gamerelated activities can be understood as forms or expressions of religion. Campbell, Radde-Antweiler, Wagner, Simone Heidbrink, and Tobias Knoll have made considerable contributions in those areas (e. g. Campbell, 2010; Campbell and Grieve (eds.), 2014; Campbell et al, 2016; Heidbrink and Knoll, 2014; Heidbrink et al., 2015; Wagner, 2012). Game designers Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman take a relativistic approach to games and religion.12 Drawing on social theorist Clark C. Abt’s Serious Games (1987 [1970]), they suggest that games are “a way to understand aesthetics, communication, culture, and other areas of our world”—including religion (Salen and Zimmerman, 2004: 3, 32, italics added). Game studies scholar Liel Leibovitz holds a third, structuralistic view: “Religion is a game,” he declares, adding that religion, like games, is “exacting but modular, rule-based but tolerant of deviation, moved by metaphysical yearnings but governed by intricate, earthly designs” (Leibovitz, 2013: Introduction, section 1, para. 6. Kindle edition, italics added). He also adds that approaching religion as a game is “in no way belittling religion” because he sees “precisely these playful elements” as what has “made religion so prevalent” (Leibovitz, 2013: Introduction, section 1, para. 6, Kindle edition). Disclaimer aside, some might object to Leibovitz’ statement, whether or not they they agree that religion’s (or religions’) “playful elements” have contributed to its (or their) spread and staying power.13 Nevertheless, the idea of making connections between religion and games is not new and its birth precedes the popularization of digital games. To Abt, (analog) games seemed to have an obvious, functional connection that was also present in religion. In his words, games offer “a kind of spiritual conquest of all diaspora) Hindu groups who questioned the “appropriateness of including Hindu deities in digital gaming” (Zeiler, 2014: 74). 12 Readers should be aware that Katie Salen has changed names since the publication of Rules of Play, to Salen Tekinbas¸. 13 Readers need not be well-versed in the study of religion to recognize that the differences between these scholars’ views rest on fundamental philosophical differences. Anthony’s understanding is phenomenological, taking games and religion to be essentially separate, which gives him the comparative impetus to provide a typology for digital games that relate to religion in various ways, including didactic, hestiastic, poimenic, and praxic religious games (Anthony, 2014). Leibovitz’ approach is structuralistic, based on an observation of underlying similarities he observes between games and religion. His approach enabled him to approach video games as a “spiritual pursuit”, thereby joining the two cultural constructs (Leibovitz, 2013).

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evils by incorporating them into stimulating adversary roles that are as necessary to the good as the black is to the red—something the religion game developed long ago” (Abt, 1987 [1970]: 6). Echoing Abt, Salen and Zimmerman take a relativistic approach where a game is “a particular way of looking at something, anything” (Abt, 1987 [1970]: 5–6, italics added; cf. Salen and Zimmerman, 2004: 3). All of these perspectives have influenced studies in the intersections between games and religion, and they tend to be governed by a specific angle, namely how religion is like a game or games, while the approaches I mentioned earlier have been concerned with religion in games, or how games are like religion. It may surprise some readers that digital games “have some of their earliest roots in the university” (Heineman, 2015). Even so, adults in the 1980s would often abandon digital gaming “due to public shame” (Williams et al., 2008: 993). In our time, by contrast, 40 percent of adults and 83 percent of teenagers in the United States play digital games on a regular basis (Williams et al., 2008: 993), and in 2018 Reuters reported that gaming is now both the most popular and profitable form of entertainment (Reuters, 2018). One might think that the increasing popularity would close shut the jaws of oblivion on gaming shame and stigma. However, as recently as 2012, media scholar Johannes Fromme and psychologist Alexander Unger argued that “digital games and gamers are still targets of public derision and prejudice. Computer games have seemingly not yet arrived at the center of our culture and society” (Fromme and Unger, 2012: 1). Psychologists have also been working toward identifying criteria for classifying “Internet Gaming Disorder” which was introduced to the American diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders DSM-5 (Lehenbauer-Blaum et al., 2015: 343). More sinister associations have been created discursively in news media, where digital games have been blamed for acts of violence and terrorism, for example in the terrorist attack on Norwegian soil on 22 July, 2011 (e. g. Melgård, 2012). This is not surprising given the influx of digital games in military training programs (Smith, 2009), which constitutes an institutionalized acknowledgement of digital gaming as preparation for violence in the context of military service. Fromme and Unger recognize that “gamers have learned to use the new media for articulating their protests in efficient ways […] The status of computer games and game cultures in society is obviously in a state of flux – also in the academic world?” (Fromme and Unger, 2012: 1–2). According to Dmitri Williams and his colleagues, the stereotypical gamer as portrayed in news media is “male and young, pale from too much time spent indoors, and socially inept,” but like many other stereotypes, it crumbles upon studying the phenomenon to which it is linked (Williams et al., 2008). It would appear that some social stigma still sticks to gaming. Returning to the study of religion, Wagner has observed that recognizing. This is important, because it challenges some discourses on religion that rest on phenomenological bases. With these notes in mind, the analytical framework of this book may test some readers’ willingness to entertain a

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digital game studies-based approach to religion—an approach where terms that may otherwise seem familiar, like interaction, are associated with content derived from this particular field of study. Terminology is probably the area that is most likely to ruffle feathers and thus merits some reflection from a research ethics perspective, which is more elaborately treated in the Appendix. Some notes are still helpful here, because analyzing religion with concepts inspired by digital games studies also means redescribing religion as game and play more broadly construed. That can easily be conceived as down-playing the seriousness and/or authenticity of participants’ engagement.14 This is not the intention. In Wagner’s words: If there is anything to the claim that both rituals and video games can shape our view of the world, then looking at what the rules are in any ritual or gaming experience could tell us something about what we are meant to derive from the experience. This, in turn, should enable us to be critically aware participants in any rule-based environment. In a way, then, we could argue that religion itself can work as a sort of game, shaped by an agreed-upon set of rules, defining how we should act, what’s possible, and what the goals are (Wagner, 2012: 6–7, italics added).

Although her wording is more cautious, Wagner’s approach resembles Salen and Zimmerman’s but also Leibovitz’. To Wagner, taking a game studies-based approach to religion does not necessarily imply that religion is a game or set of games, but that there are interesting parallels between the two types of cultural products that merit attention. The parallels that concern her the most are identified by means of Wagner’s fusion of ritual, narrative, and games into one concept she calls the “ritualgame-story thing” (2012: 6, 10, 54–56). This tripartite hybrid concept rests partly on Catherine Bell’s work in ritual studies (Wagner, 2012: 56), partly on narratological research, and partly on Johan Huizinga’s ludology. Huizinga, who “noted the deep kinship between ritual and play” (Wagner, 2012: 2), stated that play—the object of study in ludology and much of game studies—“is older than culture, for culture, however inadequately defined, always presupposes human society, and animals have not waited for man to teach them their playing” (Huizinga, 1938: 1). Game studies scholars often draw on Huizinga, also when their studies involve digital games, live role-playing games, and roleplaying board games (e. g. Campbell and Grieve, 2014; Geraci, 2015; Laycock, 2015; Leibovitz, 2013; Salen and Zimmerman, 2004; Wagner, 2012). As gaming gradually became a distinguished commercial enterprise, ludology also began

14 A ludic turn in the study of religion has become observable. One fascinating contribution in this direction is Tao Thykier Makeeff ’s fascinating and well-written thesis defended at Lund University in Sweden in 2019. He, too, found a ludic framework to be fruitful in his analysis. For his fascinating work on contemporary Hellenic polytheism, music, and martial arts, see Makeeff 2019.

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to inform studies of gaming cultures, including aspects of socially shared imagined worlds (e. g. Fine, 1983). Like many abstract concepts at the center of a dedicated field of study, there is no universally accepted definition of play or game, as they may refer to widely differing phenomena and activities. To my knowledge, however, no one questions the validity of placing digital adventure and role-playing games in the “games” category, even as they draw on Huizinga who, writing in 1938, could scarcely have imagined their invention. Would he have considered “digital games” to be games? Attempts to answer such a question are bound to be speculative, but we should pay attention to the underlying issue: Are digital games games in the conventional sense? Genres may affect how we answer that question. Digital versions of Backgammon or Chess might best be described as virtual simulations of their original analog counterparts. Tetris, a puzzle game, bears resemblance to analog jigsaw puzzles, with its gradually dropping bricks adding the pressure (and stress) of racing against time. Digital racing games, flying games, fighting games, sports games, and war games simulate their counterparts in the physical world, removing most risk of losing limb. Such games frequently allow multiple players to compete against one another, letting that competition unfold in a virtual realm that enables people to engage in simulated versions of activities they might otherwise never experience. Consider Robert N. Bellah’s statement: Play is the luxury of luxuries. No daily-life concerns allowed. You can play-fight, but if you bite too hard, the game is over. You can play at sexual intercourse […], but if you really try to do it, the game is over (Bellah, 2011: xxi).

To Bellah, it seems, play is pretty much synonymous with simulation. Digital adventure games and role-playing games, however, are not simulations; they are emergent narratives unfolding in virtual space through the enaction and involvement of the player. Realms of fiction are not simulated either; they are not performances of pretense. They are told, enacted, envisioned, often visualized, and sometimes those visualizations are realized in theater plays, as movies or series. In short, they are experienced through dynamic interaction by means of an interface. Players make their impact on the virtual realms, and as those realms unfold by the interaction of the player, they in turn make their impact on the player. Digital adventure games and role-playing games may have more in common with tourism and pilgrimage than with puzzle games or competitive games. They invite exploration of virtual realms, and they require the performance of specific tasks along the way to a narratological destination in virtual space. Such tasks are often prompted by social interactions with computer-controlled NPCs (Non-Playable Characters). Increasingly promoted by means of cinematic game trailers, social media reveals and screenshots, not to mention anticipatory preview articles in online game magazines like IGN, digital games are cultural products that invite people to embark on digital journeys. Their

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virtual realms accommodate the “ritual-game-story thing” by virtue of the complexity and sophistication of these games, which not only generates a greater whole, but depends upon it for enactment and completion. It is this level of complexity and sophistication that affords the invitation to compare religion to digital games—not their perceived simplicity or even their sets of “rules.” Such games provide profound visual and audial experiences, complex social situations and relationships to navigate, and often emotionally moving and engaging music compositions. Choices made by the player at narrative crossroads have consequences to bear on how the story unfolds. As I argue in Chapter 2, however, three deeper structural parallels of engagement in religion and digital games do more than invite us to consider the commonalities of these cultural constructs—they implore us to do so. This is where my own lifelong interests of digital gaming and religion intertwine. To my eyes, the marriage of these two is more akin to mixing ice cream with forest berries than with pickles. Until now, Wagner is the only scholar of religion to have made a book-long attempt at approaching religion and games from a perspective that hybridizes theoretical concepts from both digital game studies and the study of religion (2012). Wagner will be a visible influence in both the theoretical framework and the ensuing analysis, but I also aim to expand upon some of her insights, though I diverge from others. However, Wagner’s conceptual bridge crumbles whenever she grapples with the big boulder of “the sacred” which, unfortunately, is quite often (2012: 3, 11, 18–19, 43, 51, 65, 76–97, 127, 153–156, 172–176, 182, 211–241). Undefined and simply opposed to “the profane,” “the sacred” becomes an obtuse and opaque container onto which readers may project content or emptiness. I have tried to avoid the “sacred” boulder entirely—it is too big, unruly, and poorly hewn to serve in theoretical bridge-building. I take a different route, one built on the concept of interaction. As I will show, this concept provides a common platform with digital game studies that puts interaction in religion and digital games on the same platform. With interaction, we do not need a bridge at all; we only need a few towers from which to may view the scenery below from slightly different angles. My ambition is to develop a framework for understanding religious interaction as what I call transrealm interaction. Transrealm interaction is a wider concept, one I bring down to “the ground” by employing it in the analysis of source material gathered through archival and ethnographic research. The approach taken is pragmatic, functionalistic, and stipulative: It is pragmatic because I take concepts from digital game studies, connect them to concepts from the study of religion, combine them into a theoretical framework centered on interaction, and apply that framework in an analysis of religion. It is functionalistic because those concepts, combinations, and applications are based on a governing assumption that there are functional parallels between gaming and religion as human activities. It is stipulative because it redescribes some previously established terms by suggesting new definitions for them, in

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order to accommodate the larger framework, which in turn is telling of a pragmatic approach. One might ask what ludology and game studies offer that other fields of study may not. It is not so much that other fields offer less, but rather that ludology and digital game studies provide the terminology and conceptual tools needed for constructing a coherent framework of religious interaction. It is to this framework that we turn in the next chapter.

1.5 Summary and outline of chapters Research literature on WYD is dominated by contributions from medicine and sociology, with anthropological and historical approaches taking a backseat. Most sociological studies have taken an event studies perspective, concluding that WYD is an event—a “hybrid” event or a “pilgrimage event.” Despite the prevalence of the terms pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage in WYD material and research literature, the phenomenon has yet to be approached as such, partly because WYD escapes conventional concepts of pilgrimage within that field of study. This book weaves together several topics: WYD, pilgrimage studies, and digital game studies. It involves one historical argument, one argument related to pilgrimage studies, and one theoretical argument. The historical argument is that WYD emerged from a multi-layered context saturated with associations to pilgrimage conventionally construed, and came to be called a pilgrimage as it developed. The argument related to pilgrimage studies is that a framework construed on the basis of another field of study, digital games studies, can enrich and extend the considerable insights of these bodies of scholarship by providing some new language for interpreting the personal experiences of WYD participants as travelers. The theoretical argument is that a digital game studies-based framework can offer some helpful perspectives on interaction, interface, and immersion in studies of pilgrimage, but perhaps also other rituals like Hindu darshan, visionary dreams in Muslim spirituality, and embodied manifestations of the Holy Spirit among Charismatic Christians. This book has six chapters, a conclusion, and an appendix on methods and research ethics. This introductory chapter has given a brief presentation of WYD, established that it began in the mid-1980s, and developed from then on. Its bi- and later tri-ennial manifestations as centralized events have expanded in duration, its host locations have grown more diverse, and its initial ties to the Palm Weekend have dissolved. Chapter 2 introduces a theoretical framework for analysis inspired by digital game studies, establishing and centering on the terms interaction, interface, and immersion as key concepts, which are used in the later chapters. Chapter 3 asks why WYD began and how it became a pilgrimage. It argues that WYD emerged from a multi-layered context

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saturated with associations to pilgrimage as conventionally understood, presenting the emergent official narrative of WYD’s origins and, taking the historical context into account, suggests other intriguing possible influences that merit attention, notably a communist youth festival. Chapter 4 shows how the most important shift in the event’s history came through WYD 1993 in Denver, Colorado. Not only was this the first time WYD was held in a country where Catholics are a minority; it was also the first time it took place in a city without ties to an officially sanctioned pilgrimage site of national or international renown. As a consequence, the term pilgrimage in the context of WYD took on new dominant connotations and strengthened some existing ones. Both sets of connotations were embedded in a mobile religious interface consisting of familiar and new elements that would reverberate throughout WYD’s later history. Chapter 5 begins the examination of WYD 2016 in Kraków. It argues that WYD 2016 centered on a set of interfacial elements that are simultaneously place-bound and unrestricted, showing the reverberations of WYD 1993 two decades later. Chapter 6 continues with more material from WYD 2016, focusing on whether participants today agree to self-describe as pilgrims, and what that entails for them in the WYD context. The Appendix describes the methods employed in gathering, producing, and analyzing source material, and discusses the methodological implications of the study. The central argument of this book is that pilgrimage in the WYD context is about immersion in a superhuman realm which, ironically, places it back in line with journeys conventionally understood as pilgrimages. The conclusion sums up the book’s findings, the utility of the religious interaction framework, alludes to how it might be applied to a few other religious phenomena, and makes some suggestions for future research.

2. Religious interaction: What gaming can teach us about religion

2.1 “Lucy looks into a Wardrobe” In C. S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, young Lucy Pevensie walks into a wardrobe while playing hide-and-seek with her siblings. She is astonished to discover that this wardrobe is unlike any other; it leads into a snow-clad forest with an odd, ever-glowing lamp post. Lucy steps into Narnia, a land she soon discovers to be full of magic—the abode of dwarves, werewolves, talking animals, and other mythological creatures. After meeting and having tea with Mr. Tumnus the faun, she returns to “our world” and is excited to share her otherwordly experience with her siblings. To her dismay, all three of them believe Lucy to be indulging a mere fantasy. As the story progresses, however, she is vindicated as her siblings discover the same world through the wardrobe. The literary genres of fantasy and science fiction are fraught with examples of protagonists who enter other worlds where reality differs from the world they come from. That latter fictional reality tends to resemble the mundane world of daily life, while the realms the characters discover tend to differ from it to a greater or lesser extent. In J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, Frodo the hobbit dons the One Ring and finds himself in the shadow realm, rendering him invisible to his friends—and them to him. While there, Frodo is able to see what was unseen to him while in the realm of the living. J. K. Rowling has Harry Potter’s first trip to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry go through a brick wall to train station platform 9¾. Numerous Star Trek episodes feature Starfleet Captains and their crew traveling back and forth in time and into parallel dimensions. In BBC’s Doctor Who, the Doctor travels to strange places by means of a Tardis—an indigo police booth concealing a house with an everchanging interior, capable of transporting its residents through space and time. In the cult series Twin Peaks, FBI agent and avid coffee lover Dale Cooper enters the mysterious and surreal Black Lodge—a place only accessible at a specific place and time. Among the many intriguing similarities and differences between these fictional settings, I wish to draw attention to two parallels. First, there is a mundane, everyday world that most people know and share, and then there are other worlds and dimensions of reality inhabited by various “others.” Second, whether those worlds and dimensions are near yet veiled or distant yet accessible, journeys there are enabled by very specific elements—objects,

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places, times—that function as apertures. In a sense, the very text you are reading can be viewed as such an aperture, by which and through which readers visit my memory of an afternoon in the summer of 2016 (cf. Wagner, 2012: 7). The past, too, is another realm, imagined and re-imagined rather than directly accessible from the present, as all visits to the past must rely on reconstruction and mediation (cf. von Stuckrad, 2013: 11).

2.2 Running out of Hosts at World Youth Day The afternoon in question was spent in Błonia Park, one of Poland’s vast green fields, surrounded by the lush woods of western Kraków, and occupied by hundreds of thousands of young Catholics. The air smelled of wet grass and dirt, saturated with the humidity that pervades the air after a thunderstorm. That thunderstorm inspired nuns to form prayer circles and say the Rosary, and made me feel slightly happier than usual for wearing my Thor’s hammer necklace. Damp from the rain condensing on the inside of my red plastic poncho, it was a relief to pack it away and feel the warm rays of the evening sun as they broke through the clouds, shining down on me and hundreds of thousands of people. People from 185 countries descended upon Błonia Park that afternoon (Polish Press Agency and Catholic News Agency Poland, 2016).1 Facing a chalk-white altar and a gargantuan white cross, this semi-organized choir was singing a hymn with a drum beat identical to Queen’s “We Will Rock You”—stomp-stomp-clap, stomp-stomp-clap—but with devotional lyrics set to a triumphant melody: Jesus Christ, You are my life Hallelujah, hallelujah Jesus Christ, You are my life You are my life, hallelujah

As far as I could see, and in almost every direction, people were waving flags (the exception being the food court behind us, and a billboard advertisement high up to its left side with a large photo of Mike Tyson advertising the caffeinated drink Black Energy)—each one adding to a kaleidoscope demonstrating the international diversity of the community present. 1 Numbers of attendants are always difficult to estimate and tend to vary considerably. They are often inflated as rumors of estimates spread by word of mouth during and after the event(s). The most conservative estimates for the Opening Mass were around 200,000 (Catholic News Service, 2016), but numbers rose to between 800,000 and 1 million in among participants in my travel group.

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It was Tuesday, July 26, at the Opening Mass of WYD 2016 in Kraków. Over the past half week, my travel group and I had been traveling around Poland by bus, visiting Warszawa, Cze˛stochowa, Katowice, and Wadowice—places given special significance by connecting them to the life of Pope John Paul II, the Polish pope and an official Catholic saint since 2014. Outside Błonia Park, we waited in line for an hour before entering the event site under flashing lightning and clapping thunder. A few hours more were spent waiting at our group’s allocated spot. Except for me, who had journeyed from Norway, our group traveled from the United States. They had been looking forward to this—a Mass celebration with Catholics from all over the world. That Mass was led by Cardinal Stanisław Dziwisz, Archbishop of Kraków and John Paul II’s personal secretary for forty years (Dziwisz, 2008). Eerily concurrent with the beginning of the Mass, the weather changed; the evening sun broke through the clouds, bathing the field and everyone present in golden light (figure 2.1). As the Mass liturgy was celebrated, people’s behavior also changed: Chatting, dancing, trading, singing, praying, laughing, and waving flags ceased, and turned to silence as the moment arrived for the Eucharistic Host to be consecrated and, according to Catholic teaching, for God to be made really present. Then came the waterfall-like sound of hundreds of thousands of knees bending on wet grass, jackets, and ponchos. Moments later, priests began distributing Communion. People around me lined up in front of them to the sound of Blessed Are the Merciful—WYD 2016’s official theme song. Like the unofficial hymns I mentioned earlier, this too was set to a triumphant melody. The voices of so many people blending together in song enhanced the impression of something epic taking place. People formed lines in front of the priests who were fairly difficult to spot in the crowd, despite wearing liturgical white vestments and being accompanied by assistants holding up white umbrellas to signal their location (figure 2.2). Waiting for my fellow travelers to return, I recognized the familiar feeling of being an outsider—a non-Catholic researching Catholicism. I soon learned that some of my fellow travelers were involuntary outsiders of a different kind. Our group leader, “Caspar,” returned to our group location with several others. “They’re out of Hosts,” he said, looking quite crestfallen along with others who were missing out. Whether by refill or other priests arriving in our area, my fellow travelers received Communion about 15 minutes later. Scholars of ritual studies might have considered the disruption a ritual mistake—such disruptions are “everywhere” (McClymond, 2016: Introduction, section 2, para. 1, Kindle edition). But that seems to be scratching the surface. My companions’ anxiousness to receive Communion was not due to ritual going wrong so much as the consequences: not receiving Communion meant not ingesting the Eucharistic Host that was Christ, and staying outside a fellowship that Communion would envelop them in. In that liminal moment between not receiving and receiving, the wardrobe was closed—the brick wall at the train station, solid.

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Figure 2.1: From the Opening Mass in Błonia Park, outside Kraków. Author’s photograph (2016).

Figure 2.2: Communion is distributed at the Opening Mass. Priests’ white umbrellas marked with red circles. Author’s photograph (2016).

2.2.1 Realms of lived reality Let us turn our gaze once more to apertures between realms. Whether by magic or machine, Lucy’s wardrobe, Frodo’s Ring, Harry’s wall, time travel, the Eucharistic Host, a miraculous image, or the screen, speakers, and control devices of digital “games”—the function of these objects is analogous in that they link two separate realms of a larger, socially constructed and culturally postulated lived reality. One realm is the physical, human realm—often referred to as the “ordinary world,” “normal world,” “everyday world,” or “first

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frame” (Goffman, 1986 [1974]: 7, 465; Huizinga, 1938: 10; Laycock, 2015 14; Partridge, 2004: 41; Wagner, 2012: 86, 163). Other realms, whether named “other worlds,” “temporary worlds,” “fictional worlds,” or the “third frame” (Goffman, 1986 [1974] 185; Huizinga, 1938: 11; Laycock, 2015: 10; Wagner, 2012: 49), differ both from the physical, human realm and between themselves in various ways. For example, “other” realms differ in how they expand and limit human agency. Books and movies permit lower degrees of human agency and interaction than do games (Wagner 2012: 83), but book readers and movie audiences are not passive. The predictable reactions from readers whose favorite books make their way to the silver or TV screens give evidence to this with each reader’s remark that the book was better, that they had pictured things differently, or that the movie did not adequately portray what happened in the books. Books, movies, TV shows, and games all place the flow of time within their realm at some form of human control: books can be put down, movies and (most) digital games can be paused. The physical, human realm and some virtual realms on the other hand, go on—with or without our consent. In principle, movies and TV shows are mediators of the past as recorded in audiovisual clips, but they are edited and constructed to bring forth the illusion of a different realm—one where a specific story is retold each time the book, movie, or TV show episode is seen again. To Wagner, digital game platforms provide a “window into which we peer – and into which we are invited to project our selves in some way or other” (Wagner, 2012: 82). Quoting Torben Grodal, she describes the resulting state as “trancelike immersion in the virtual world” forged by “the strong neuronal links that are forged between perceptions, emotions, and actions” (Grodal, 2003: 148; cf. Wagner, 2012: 82). The “other” realms of religions, fiction, and digital games may overlap to a greater or lesser extent, but they share a frequently though not exclusive accessibility through material objects that permit people to interact with those realms and their inhabitants. Books, TV shows, movies, and games link realms by constituting access points or “portals” between them (Wagner, 2012: 7, 83). They may not physically translocate readers and viewers like a door would let us pass from one room to another, and they are not always so much doors as windows to the imaginations of their authors. Besides, they are always carefully manufactured and yet subject to some degree of differing interpretation and materialization. Like books and movies, role-playing games and digital games offer people new realms to engage. Once we attempt to describe what people do with games, however, words like reader and viewer no longer satisfy; they do not convey the level of participation that these media offer and require. Games require participants—players—and the difference between the types of engagement is comparable to the difference between music listeners and instrument players. Listeners are not entirely passive—they are only passive in comparison to players. As Wagner puts it: “Literature and painting,” and I would add music, movies, games, and religion, “have the ability to draw us into other worlds”

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(Wagner, 2012: 7). Put differently, they stimulate our minds in ways that encourage us to become immersed in other, imagined realms—always individual, sometimes shared (Fine, 1983: 72). The social reality of a roleplaying game, for example, results from an enacted agreement among players seated together.2 What digital games are to movies, role-playing and live roleplaying games are to books and theater: Where movies, books, and theater require a less active forms of participation, digital games, role-playing, and live role-playing let people take control of a character imagined to inhabit another realm. Religion(s) also involve(s) an argument or attitude that shared imagined realms are real beyond the narratives and rituals that help construct them. Drawing on Bernard Suits, Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman employ the term lusory attitude, where players “willingly and deliberately accept the [game’s] rules, taking on unnecessary limitations to achieve a goal and comprehending that the experience itself depends upon stepping into the world of the game,” which to Wagner makes it seem as if they were “recognizing the religious implications of the lusory state” (Wagner, 2012: 74; cf. Salen and Zimmerman, 2004: 76–77).3 To Wagner, “[b]elief today is less about assent to propositions than it is about the choice to engage” (2012: 214). Although Carole M. Cusack does not use the term, the implications of the lusory attitude is clearly relevant to her work on “invented religions,” where fictional realms become something “more” for those who engage them (Cusack, 2016: 585–587; cf. Cusack, 2010). The consequence of the lusory attitude, whether applied to games or religion(s), is that although game designers guide the unfolding interaction and resulting narrative(s), action and attitude remain at the hands of the people as players and participants. It is they who turn imagined realms into social realities.4 What can we learn if we approach socially constructed religious realms from the perspective of the lusory attitude employed in engagement with virtual realms? Wagner writes: [S]ome see the virtual as the opposite of the physical; for others, it is “unreal” when compared to the sacred; for others, it is a “realm” of its own; for others, it is imaginary and not a “place” at all. For others, it is a mere designator of space, a territorial marker, such that “virtual space” is as real as physical space, it’s just in a different, well, place (Wagner, 2012: 78). 2 I take social reality to mean the “portions of the real world, objective facts in the world, that are only facts by human agreement” that John R. Searle referred to as “things that exist only because we believe them to exist. I am thinking of things like money, property, governments, and marriages” (Searle, 1995: 1). 3 Eva Nieuwdorp refers to the same state as the “paraludic state” (2009: 205–207). 4 With improved technology, games offer “virtual reality,” which lets players experience game realms in a visual, audial, and haptic surround system. Augmented reality does something similar as it lets people take photographs of themselves with CGI dinosaurs, monsters, and superheroes that only appear in the virtual realm of their smartphones and tablets.

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My own view is most akin to approaching virtual realms as a “realm of its own,” albeit in the plural—as realms of their own—but contingent upon being played, as well as the social and digital processes that construct and uphold them. In that context, play becomes a metaphor for how humans juggle the realms that comprise their respective social realities (Fine, 1983: 181). Approached with a lusory attitude, transrealm interaction can lead to religious immersion. Wagner makes another intriguing observation that will be of interest here, that “one could see a parallel between the ‘lusory attitude’ and the ‘faith attitude.’ Both assume purposeful challenges, a discoverable set of rules, and both involve the voluntary submission of the mindsets” (Wagner, 2012: 3). The voluntary submission Wagner describes is not a yielding of the will to human or superhuman persons or even to sets of rules—at least not yet. Instead, it is incorporation of another realm into one’s social reality that facilitates any relationship whose partners inhabit two separate realms. It is possible to build a theoretical framework around such an approach that pays attention to the windows or apertures we engage in order to access realms otherwise disconnected from our own. In this chapter, I propose such a framework in order to apply it for analysis in the later chapters on WYD. Yet, as I show in various places, the framework is applicable to other religious phenomena as well, rooted in the three terms interaction, interface, and immersion. In order to clarify their role in the framework, however, it is necessary to conceptualize religion in a way that accommodates them. In what follows, I aim to show how participation in religion can be viewed as analogous to participation in the realms of digital games. In order to do so, it is helpful to conceptualize religion as a form of interaction.

2.3 Religion as interaction In the framework of this book, I stipulate a definition of religion as interaction with culturally postulated superhuman persons, and a religion as culturally patterned interaction with culturally postulated superhuman persons. Both stipulative definitions are taken to be working definitions rather than attempts to define cores, causes, functions or substances. The difference lies in the inclusion or exclusion of “culturally patterned,” signaling that a religion is a social construct that tends to facilitate interaction according to culturally specific (yet often contested) patterns. The definition of religion is related to Ingvild Gilhus and Lisbeth Mikaelsson’s definition (2001: 29), and Colin Renfrew’s definition (1985: 15– 17). It is meant to widen the relevance of the framework beyond the present case study and beyond Catholicism and Christianity. Gilhus and Mikaelsson’s definition is helpful for bringing an emphasis on “people’s relations to

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universes of belief(s),” but otherwise differ from mine in the same two ways as Renfrew’s.5 The first is a distinction between religion as a category of human activity and religions as culturally conditioned expressions thereof, while the second is the replacement of beings with persons. The first distinction is intended to accommodate the academic construction of religion as a metacategory of human activity and object of study that far from always are expressed within the bounds of religions as commonly conceived. The second, replacing beings with persons, may seem an odd trade; both are (in)conveniently vague and, like all other analytical concepts and perspectives, bring their own sets of problems. Superhuman persons has no general advantage over superhuman beings; its convenience is context-specific: Having taken interaction as the central metaphor for a definition of religion, person helps highlight interaction as a processual activity involving human and superhuman beings as social agents.

2.3.1 Superhuman persons I have chosen person because of the social context it intuitively inspires. A person is therefore here understood as an entity with whom one interacts, and thus establishes and maintains a social relationship. Person has been subject to diverse philosophical (e. g. Carrithers et al., 1985; Taylor, 1985), theological (e. g. Barth, 2010 [1960]; Wojtyła, 1979 [1969]), psychological (e. g. Bickhard, 2009; Shweder and Bourne, 1982), anthropological (e. g. Carrithers et al., 1985), and sociological discussions (Smith, 2010), none of which I can hope to do justice here. Nevertheless, it is necessary to clarify the concept for this book. Highlighting persons as social agents does not imply that personhood is reducible to social agency, but that this aspect is the most relevant in the context of interaction. As Barry Barnes puts it, “[h]uman beings are not independent individuals; they are social creatures. More specifically, they are 5 Colin Renfrew defines religion as “culturally patterned interaction with culturally postulated superhuman beings” (Renfrew 1985: 15–17). This is a shortened version of Melford E. Spiro’s 1966 definition that discards “institutions” (Spiro, 2004 [1966]: 96). Spiro’s definition itself was an elaboration of Edward B. Tylor’s “minimum definition of Religion [as] the belief in Spiritual Beings” (Tylor, 1889)—one that primarily seeks to improve on belief and spiritual with more technically precise terms. Ingvild Gilhus and Lisbeth Mikaelsson’s definition is more expansive and reads: “Religion is people’s relations to universes of belief(s) characterized by communication about and with hypothetical gods and powers” (2001: 29, my translation from Norwegian). Apart from solving the problems with religion encompassing far more than belief (however conceptualized) and that superhuman beings need not be “spiritual,” the older terms remain laden with connotations to Protestant theology that invite direct translation of non-Christian terms, concepts, and practices into an ultimately Christian framework and is problematic from a variety of perspectives, particularly postcolonialist and postmodern critiques, and has implications for research ethics more broadly.

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interdependent social agents, who profoundly affect each other as they interact” (Barnes, 2000: 64). Extending Barnes’ statement to superhuman persons involves the assumption that human and superhuman persons are understood to affect one another through their interactions. Furthermore, the difference between a human and a superhuman person lies in their respective capacities for action— with those of superhuman persons surpassing those of human persons. It is tempting to write that such entities are thought capable of interaction, but thought itself is too narrow and too imprecise; it seems to necessitate conscious deliberation, which constrains the concept too harshly (Boyer, 2001: 18). Superhuman persons are conceived of as stably or unstably amorphous, zoomorphous, or anthropomorphous; human-like or animal-like, trees or rocks, mountains or rivers, energies or ethers, images or texts—their imagined or depicted appearances are inconsequential to their status as superhuman persons. What matters is the imagined capacity for interaction by attribution of social agency. Attribution of social agency has parallels to personification, which Huizinga described in the following way: As soon as the effect of a metaphor consists in describing things or events in terms of life and movement, we are on the road to personification. […] There is no question of first conceiving something as lifeless and bodiless and then expressing it as something that has body, parts and passions. No; the thing perceived is conceived as having life and movement in the first place, and such is the primary expression of it, which is no afterthought. Personification in this sense arises as soon as the need is felt to communicate one’s perceptions to others. Conceptions are thus born as acts of the imagination (Huizinga, 1938: 136, italics added).

There is another need besides communication about a personified entity that engenders the process of personification: communication with “the thing” or what “the thing” lets you communicate with. Huizinga’s concept of personification can be related to anthropomorphization as understood by cognitive scientists of religion (Guthrie, 1993). What is at stake is the conversion of otherwise social non-agents into agents through human attribution and interaction. Making a rhetorical point, Huizinga asked: Which of us has not repeatedly caught himself addressing some lifeless object, say a recalcitrant collar-stud, in deadly earnest, attributing to it a perverse will, reproaching it and abusing it for its demoniacal obstinacy? If ever you did this you were personifying in the strict sense of the word. Yet you do not normally avow your belief in the collar-stud as an entity or idea. You were only falling involuntarily into the playattitude (Huizinga, 1938: 140).

Similar points have been made by other scholars, not least by Stewart E. Guthrie, who defines religion as “systematic anthropomorphism: the attribution of human characteristics to nonhuman things or events” (Guthrie, 1993: 3). There are parallels, then, between Guthrie’s anthropomorphization and

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Huizinga’s personification, but Huizinga places personification in the context of play, which is more easily compatible with interaction with other realms because the capacity for doing so is rooted in human imagination. 2.3.2 Interaction and presence Sociologist Erving Goffman identified interaction as “that class of events which occurs during co-presence and by virtue of co-presence” (Goffman, 1982 [1967]: 1). As a term, presence is prevalent in works by scholars of religion who focus on material culture and media studies (e. g. Brown, 1981; Meyer, 2005; Morgan, 1998, 2005, 2012; Orsi 2005, 2016; Taves, 2016). Qualifying noun phrases have also been applied. A few examples are “ontological presence” (Morgan, 2012: 232), “communal presence” (Morgan, 2012: 232), “formless presence” (Morgan, 2012: 161), “real presence” (Orsi, 2016), “authentic presence” (Meyer, 2005: 161) “unmediated presence” (Meyer, 2005: 161), “actual presence” (Meyer, 2005: 178) and even “absent presence” (Meyer, 2005: 171). Anthropologists and art historians have also employed presence, which captured David Morgan’s imagination and has been a key term in several of his books (Morgan, 2005, 2012, 2016). David Freedberg writes that “almost every image provides its beholders with clues to the organic presences registered upon it” (Freedberg, 1989: 245, italics added). In a similar but slightly more forceful vein, Birgit Meyer argues that some icons have the power to “go wild and act upon people” (Meyer, 2010: 127, italics added). Meyer, who has helped push the envelope on religion and material culture, is influenced by Alfred Gell, who argued for and presented an “anthropology of art” based on the idea that “art objects” have social agency: they are not only acted upon by people, but may themselves act upon people (Gell, 1998: 22). Presence, then, plays an important role in the “‘material turn,’ widespread in the humanities and the social sciences” that has led scholars to move “beyond studying beliefs” to “examine the processes […] whereby people materialize what they view as non-ordinary in the ordinary world” (Taves, 2016: 8). Presence was also central to Thomas A. Tweed’s historical exploration of the presences, past and present, at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C. (2011). Scholars of religion Ann Taves and Robert A. Orsi also employed the term in their volumes, Revelatory Events (Taves, 2016) and History and Presence (Orsi, 2016). Taves is interested in “[e]xperiences in which people sense unseen presences, see apparitions, hear voices, or feel themselves and the world suddenly transformed” (2016: xi). While her previous book provides a “building-block approach” to the study of religion regarding “experiences deemed religious” (Taves, 2009), it is only in the latest volume that presence takes center stage in her concept of revelatory events (i. e. “happenings”). The book, however, focuses on the historical interpretative and meaning-making processes that unfold in their aftermath.

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She considers these experiences “unusual” from the outset, yet nonetheless them “more common than we suppose” (2016: xi). I agree with this latter sentiment; understood as assumed availability for interaction, superhuman presence is as commonplace as prayer or any other form of transrealm interaction. What distinguishes revelatory events from commonplace forms of transrealm interaction is not superhuman presence, but what is interpreted as superhuman persons’ spontaneous initiative to interact and the production of means for further transrealm interaction with the initiator after the event. Orsi’s History and Presence takes a different path. He asks readers and scholars to “approach history and culture with the gods fully present to humans” (Orsi, 2016: Introduction, section 4, para. 5, Kindle edition). Orsi’s book is embedded in the “material turn,” and looks at how material objects mediate presence to individuals in unusual and often distressing situations. Orsi’s take on presence is not unlike my own. In my master thesis (2012), I argued that relics, sculptures, images, and sometimes even symbols and inscriptions of the name of John Paul II mediated his presence to those who seek to communicate with him (Skjoldli, 2012). The present book does not abandon presence altogether, but stipulates it according to its function. I propose that presence is part and parcel to religious interaction. In America’s Church, Tweed describes presence as referring “to claims about whether a thing or person is actually there or not” (Tweed, 2011: Introduction, section 2, para. 3, Kindle edition). Combined with Orsi’s exhortation and translated into the present framework and source material, this means that we approach WYD with the Catholic gallery of superhuman persons as fully present, “actually there” to its participants. This, I contend, is due to the lusory attitude of religious participants toward the superhuman realms they engage. Rather than ask what presence “is” or “is not,” I stipulate presence according to its functional quality: assumed availability for interaction. Such an assumption is latent in interaction itself, as attempts to interact with someone or something not presumed to be “there” in some capacity would be pointless. In human interaction, such availability is oftentimes suggested by visual, audial or tactile cues; we see a human face or body, we hear a human voice, or feel the touch of a human hand on the shoulder. The presence of superhuman persons, however, is often facilitated by images, sculptures, relics, texts, people or other elements that are presented as means of interaction and frequently analyzed as religious media. What and how objects are used and not used in interaction with superhuman persons is subject to individual variation and cultural conditioning. However one chooses to interpret presence, the term is connected to both interaction and social agency—human and superhuman. Goffman’s conceptualization of interaction as dependent upon co-presence paves the way for defining presence functionally as assumed availability for interaction. Incorporated into a theoretical framework for a book in the study of religion, presence takes on a meaning that extends beyond Goffman’s “face-to-face

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behavior.” If (co-)presence thus conceptualized is necessary for interaction, and interactions comprise relationships, it follows that the presence of superhuman persons is necessary for interacting with them. Taken together, the various qualified forms of presence and social agency seem to invite systematization and typology, but lacking deconstruction and definition, they give the term an air of essentialism. Taking interaction as the central metaphor is not without its problems. Wagner considered interactivity (a combination of interaction and the potential thereof) useful as a “common feature in games, rituals and stories,” but noted that this term, too, is “plagued with controversy and imprecision” (Wagner, 2012: 56). As scholars of game studies know, interaction can also be used to describe how people act upon game systems and the virtual realms they produce. Following Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman, Wagner observes that interactivity “is one of those words which can mean everything and nothing at once” (Salen and Zimmerman, 2004: 57; Wagner, 2012: 56). In response to the issue, Salen and Zimmerman developed a typology of four interactive modes, all of which take place between a human person and various constructs: “a system,” “the material components of a system,” “overt participation” and “participation outside the experience of a single designed system” (Salen and Zimmerman, 2004: 59–60). None of their models involve interpersonal interaction, however, rendering their models less helpful for the definition of religion employed here. The reason I am more interested in reported examples of concrete interactions with superhuman persons than “interactive systems,” is that I agree with scholar of religion Håkon Tandberg that humansuperhuman relationships merit far greater attention from scholars of religion than what they have received so far (Tandberg, 2013, 2019). What we need, then, is a definition of religious interaction that takes seriously the relationships that people construct on the basis of superhuman persons’ presence. Psychologist Robert A. Hinde’s formula provides that link: “a sequence in which individual A shows behaviour X to individual B, or A shows X to B and B responds with Y” (Hinde, 1976: 3; cf. Tandberg 2019: 26–28).6 Hinde’s formula is helpful in two ways: It defines relationships as consisting of interactions. It also accommodates both mono-directional and bi-directional interaction. Interactions frequently “consist of a sequence of such events,” Hinde admits, “but it would be unprofitable to attempt to specify precisely either the limits of complexity of the behavioural events or even the precise dividing line between an interaction and a relationship” (Hinde, 1976: 3). Hinde’s definition of interaction follows from his definition of social relationship, which consists of “a series of interactions over time” (Hinde, 1976: 3). Transferred to the concept of religion as interaction with superhuman persons, a religious relationship 6 I am indebted to Ha˚ kon Tandberg for pointing me in this direction. For an ethnographic study of Parsi Zoroastrians’ relationships with temple fires as confidants, please see Tandberg’s book, Relational Religion (2019), resulting from his dissertation, which he defended in October 2017.

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consists of a series of interactions over time between human and superhuman persons—of transrealm interaction.

2.3.3 Transrealm interaction One consequence of the definition of religion above is that while religious interaction may be individual or collective, it is always social. One important example for this discussion will be activities conventionally categorized as prayer. Mason, an important contributor to research on WYD, has studied prayer. In his view, prayer “should be understood as the most fundamental of all religious activities, because it is through prayer that the sacred world becomes real for believers” (Mason, 2015: Section 1, para. 1, Kindle edition). Translated into the framework of religious interaction, the quote can be read as interaction with superhuman persons being that which lets people incorporate superhuman realms into their social reality. Criticizing rationalist explanation models for prayer as a coping mechanism motivated particularly by relative economic disadvantage, he points out that “prayers for financial security were by far the least frequent content theme,” both in the studies that purported the rationalist model and in the data produced in the study he and his colleagues conducted (Mason, 2015: 26). “Prayers for family and friends, and prayer that was about one’s own relationship with God were more than twice as frequent, among those who prayed at all” (Mason, 2015: 26). Instead, he hypothesized that the content of prayer would be “that of a personal relationship with God; seeking worldly benefits will play a major role” (Mason, 2015: 28). From a sample of 9,536 respondents who had registered for WYD 2008 in Sydney, he found that the most frequently appearing item in prayer was requests God “for guidance in making decisions” (81.5 percent), thanking “God for blessings” (80.6 percent), prayer for “individual people you know” (78.3 percent), asking for forgiveness of sins (70.1 percent), expressing “love for God” (54.4 percent), praying “for the world – e.g. for peace, justice, relief of poverty” (40.7 percent), and asking “God for material things you need” (21.9 percent) (Mason, 2015: 34).7 His results therefore speak to the significance of prayer as a way to maintain relationships with superhuman persons, in this case God. As a way to maintain relationships with superhuman persons, prayer 7 One problem with Mason’s study is that about four fifths of his respondents come from Anglophone countries with large economies and some form of welfare system: Australia, the United States, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and Canada (Mason, 2015: 30). Furthermore, income and standards of living are not among his parameters, so we do not know to what degree his respondents had their material needs covered already. Nevertheless, Mason’s study can tell us something about what to expect about prayer among Anglophone young Catholics: emphases on transrealm interaction to build and sustain relationships with God and other superhuman persons.

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denotes a type of transrealm interaction—a fundamental one if we follow Mason’s reasoning. Prayer involves a human person speaking or thinking (spontaneously or in recitation) with the intention of the resulting utterances and/or thoughts to be heard (and preferably acted upon) by a superhuman person—an inhabitant of a superhuman realm. If relationships are comprised of interactions, that premise holds regardless of motivation. Mason’s argument rests on the assumption that prayer content is indicative of motivation, but that limits our view to explicit supplications and thus risks concealing apotropaeic and tacit motivational factors. Ritual content does not necessarily reveal its ends within the given ritual. Consider, for example, this quote on the apparitions of Mary to three children at Fátima from historians Thomas A. Kselman and Steven Avella: According to Sister Lucia, Mary in 1917 had asked for the consecration of Russia to her Immaculate Heart, and for Catholics to receive Communion on the first Saturday of five consecutive months. Fulfilling these requests would lead to the conversion of Russia and world peace, while ignoring them would result in war, hunger, and the persecution of the Church (Kselman and Avella, 1986: 409).

In the late 1940s, “American Catholics were told insistently that they could obtain world peace and the conversion of Russia by praying the Rosary and making the Five First Saturdays” (Kselman and Avella, 1986: 409). While the consecration of Russia—whether seen as a state, nation, or a geographical area —can be seen as a direct ritual attempt at converting the whole country, receiving Communion and praying the Rosary are less obvious means for achieving that end. Considering the prevalence of prescribed prayer formulae in many religions, research on prayer motivations must ask what motivates people to perform them—as well as what we find in the content of private and spontaneous prayers. The above quotation also hints at something else: Seen through the lens of religious interaction, praying for conversion was not what would bring about world peace, but invigorating relationships with superhuman persons through frequent interaction with and obedience to them. Transrealm interaction also includes activities associated with terms like worship, offering, sacrifice, trance, veneration, and consecration—all of which might be included in the “messy” meta-category of ritual. The only criterion is that they involve interaction with a superhuman person. Yet interaction also involves superhuman persons communicating back to their human interaction partners, whether experienced by elicitation through ritual or by seemingly spontaneous revelations. When superhuman persons purportedly reveal themselves or act upon humans without invitation, they are taken to initiate interaction. Interactions may also manifest in gifts—material or immaterial— where human or superhuman persons can be givers and recipients. All interactions with superhuman persons materialize in the mind-body of humans as a result of more or less conscious and deliberate interpretation. Some forms of transrealm interaction are specific to particular religions, such

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as Muslims performing salah, Christians receiving Communion, or Sikhs taking hukam from the Guru Granth Sahib. Such religion-specific interactions with superhuman persons correspond to particular cultural patterns. Insofar as superhuman persons inhabit realms different to the human realm, these examples are variations of transrealm interaction. In Crossing and Dwelling (2006), Tweed mentions tı¯rtha, “a term that originally referred to a ford, or a place to cross a river,” but mainly focuses on them as places—geographically and metaphorically (Tweed, 2006: Chapter 5, section 10, para. 7, Kindle edition). Ian Reader also pays attention to the related term tı¯rthayatra (2014: 22), which is sometimes idiomatically translated to pilgrimage (e. g. Aukland, 2016: 52). While the term threshold evokes Arnold van Gennep’s rites de passage and Turnerian liminality, the interfacial framework takes a different route. By thinking about crossings and thresholds as links between realms, some of the metaphors Tweed employs are helpful for making transrealm interaction intelligible. Tweed’s analyses often include terminological constructions involving the prefix trans-, such as translocative and transtemporal (Tweed 2006: Chapter 3, section 3, para. 2, Kindle edition), and his chapter on “crossing” is helpful in this respect, particularly due to the motion implied by the metaphor itself; transrealm interaction is dynamic, dialectical, and processual. When human and superhuman persons are discursively placed in different realms connected by religious interfaces, crossing thresholds between realms implies transrealm interaction. In the introduction to Pilgrimage in the Middle Ages (2011), historian Brett Edward Whalen writes: For most pilgrims this physical journey represented a finite circuit to and from their sacred destination, thereby fulfilling a vow taken to perform their pilgrimage. During much of the medieval period, such pilgrims were marked by a special badge and wore distinctive clothes, carrying a staff and scrip (that is, a purse or satchel) that symbolized their status “between worlds.” For others, their pious travels did not have a clear goal but consisted of a more open-ended spiritual wandering; for still others, their journey to a particular holy site was intended as a one-way trip, ending when they settled or even died at the place of their choosing (Whalen, 2011: xii).

While the distinctions between the three groups delineated by Whalen are interesting, the concept of transrealm interaction invites us to see all three as “between worlds”: between home and destination, between the human realm and the superhuman realm—whether one intends to return or not. Pilgrimage in this context becomes a journey characterized by the traveler engaging in transrealm interaction. The concept of transrealm interaction presumes at least two separate but connected realms. With digital games, the distintion between those realms is usually obvious: one is a player’s immediate environment, the “everyday world,” while another unfolds in a virtual space. The former is perceived and processed through the full range of human senses, while the latter is accessed

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through the visual, audial, and (to a degree) tactile interface produced by the console or computer as mediated through the screen, speakers, and control devices (cf. Wagner, 2012: 1). Superhuman realms are less conspicuous: they are not dependent upon computers processing code, but on human social and cultural construction. The choice of realms in this connection may seem strange, considering the established status of worlds both within the study of religion and related disciplines. I distinguish between the two, however. According to Goffman, for example, “[e]very person lives in a world of social encounters, involving him either in face-to face [sic] or mediated contact with other participants” (Goffman, 1982 [1967]: 5). Like William E. Paden’s “plurality of worlds,” superhuman realms are also plural, diverse, and “in constant interplay” with human experience (Paden, 1994 [1988]: Chapter 3, section 3, para. 6, 8, Kindle edition). Paden also writes that “[t]he way one classifies different types of religious worlds also reflects the classifier’s own purposes” (Paden, 1994 [1988]: Chapter 3, section 4, para. 1, Kindle edition), which is no less true of realms here. I distinguish between superhuman realms and religious worlds because my purpose is to identify interfacial elements in religious interaction. Superhuman realms are often part of religious worlds, but they need not be; a “nominal Catholic” who never goes to Mass and almost never prays is as much part of the religious world of Catholicism as the frequent Mass-attender, but the latter engages the superhuman realm more frequently. There are also some likenesses between virtual realms and superhuman realms. Virtual realms are populated with playable and non-playable characters, and superhuman realms with superhuman persons—some of which are playable to some people in some circumstances, while others are not. Catholic priests, for example, inhabit the role of Jesus during the Consecration of the Eucharistic Host, and in Confession, but non-priests are normatively prohibited from performing those rituals. Virtual worlds tend not to mesh or intermingle. Superhuman realms, however, mesh and intermingle whenever they are interacted with communally, but also when people from different religious worlds engage the same means of transrealm interaction, such as when Jews and Muslims visit the same pilgrimage site. If a Protestant enters a Catholic church and sees a crucifix, she will likely recognize it as a a depiction of Jesus—a superhuman person she is likely to interact with. On the other hand, she may refrain from interacting with Mary or other superhuman persons depicted in the same place. Similarly, a game world is shared by anyone who plays the same game; they share references, similar experiences, and the same potential narratives afforded by the game world. A game realm or virtual realm, however, is more specific.8 For example, the millions who have played World of Warcraft are part of the same game world; they share the same possibilities and limitations. They may encounter the same virtual foes, face the same challenges, and acquire 8 In eGods, Bainbridge uses gameworld in the same way that I use game realm (2015).

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identical rewards. Yet they may play in different realms. If two players confine their in-game avatars to singular and separate servers, they will never meet in the virtual realm. Yet if the same two players meet over coffee and speak about the game, they will understand each other’s references due to playing the same game, which means sharing the same game world.9 What is nonetheless shared between these two, is the human realm—the realm in which they converse over coffee. What if we apply this scheme to religion? As suggested above, two Catholics can be said to share in the same religious world. Due to the prevalence of Catholic rituals that share some level of similarity, such as the Mass, they are likely to have a shared reference to the Mass Liturgy. However, Mass is also subject to cultural variation, for example through language differences, whether the Sign of Peace is practiced as hugs or handshakes, what kind of songs are sung, what kind of music is played and by whom. Two Catholics from different parts of the world may also engage different superhuman persons in transrealm interaction. A Mexican Catholic is more likely to pray to Mary as Our Lady of Guadalupe than, say, Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa. Conversely, the case is likely to be the opposite for a Polish Catholic. We might say that these hypothetical Mexican and Polish Catholics engage the “world of Catholicism” in different settings, but if they meet and exchange experiences of their respective variations of “Our Lady,” they are also likely to recognize each other’s variations of Our Lady as the Virgin Mary. Like game worlds, religious worlds are shared among all who take part in them, even though their variations may differ according to the superhuman persons and realms they engage. In the context of WYD, examples of transrealm interaction include ingesting the Eucharistic Host, making Confession, praying, singing, reading, and listening. At times, certain actions are required for engaging in interaction. In order to interact with Jesus in the Eucharist, people are required to participate by lining up, waiting, receiving, and ingesting the Host which is simultaneously a wafer and the Body of Christ. By enacting their part of the liturgy—standing, sitting, kneeling, reciting precribed formulae—they enact the community that is interpreted as the Church, which is simultaneously present in the human realm, and the superhuman realms of the deceased in purgatory and the saints who are already in heaven. Human and superhuman realms are connected by a religious interface.

9 In fact, this very difference is encapsulated in this particular game, as the game’s name is World of Warcraft and the servers are called, precisely, “realms.” The two servers may also differ between themselves. On Bloodhoof, the Horde faction might be more prominent and advanced than the Alliance faction, while the opposite might be the case on Terenas.

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2.4 Interface 2.4.1 Religious interfaces For the purposes of this book, religious interfaces are comprised of any means by which humans interact with superhuman persons. Put differently, they are communication technologies for transrealm interaction. They can be material, immaterial or both, observable or non-observable, and are simultaneously subjective and socially constructed. Language is such a means, a “technology” shared between human and human-superhuman interaction, the religious use of which underscores assumptions of personhood in interaction with superhuman beings. The metaphor of interface is taken from human-computer interaction, and may conjure up images of an interactive yet rigid window for accessing and administrating a digital object such as a text, an image, a social media profile, or an internet web page, where the highest degree of interface manipulation is moving buttons from one side of the screen to another. In a broader, metaphorical sense, “User Interfaces have been around as long as computers have existed, even well before the field of Human-Computer Interaction was established” (Jørgensen and Myers, 2008). Indeed, the morphological components inter and face—between face(s)—are semantically equivalent to the morphological components of the Greek word for person: pro´sopon (πρόσωπον).10 Resulting from dynamic social processes, which reflect their malleability, interfaces constitute the apertures that let individual minds communicate, such as when we use language (body and verbal) to communicate with one another (Bickhard, 2007). In our time, some of these layers are digitized, such as when people send text messages or e-mails where “emoticons” or “‘emojis’ substitute body language’s enhancement of verbal communication (Rezabek and Cochenour, 1998). While the analogy of interface is scarcely widespread in the study of religion, it is not without precedent. David Morgan uses the metaphor to describe Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s characterization of the human body—the “interface with the world” (Morgan, 2010: 10; cf. Morgan, 2012: xvii). Later, in The Embodied Eye, Morgan used the analogy more extensively; “iconicity” for him is the “power of interface” (2012: 89). His homonymous analogy also drew on computer technology. He took interface in computational contexts to refer “to the compatibility of systems or devices, that is, their capacity to connect and communicate with one another” (Morgan, 2012: 101). This usually means one device plugging into another, such that they become an integrated, single system operating harmoniously. The idea extends to the ethics of 10 I would like to thank Alexandros Tsakos for bringing this to my attention.

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human encounter and to the believer’s experience of gazing upon Christian icons (Morgan, 2012: 101, italics added).

Gaming enthusiasts and computer-savvy coders know that interfaces are highly malleable and manipulable. My concept of the religious interface plays on both of these associations; what seems rigid and stable to one, appears dynamic and mouldable to another. The concept of the religious interface resembles Morgan’s analogy in three ways. First, Morgan wrote that “the interface […] happens instantaneously in the visual economy of iconic veneration” (Morgan, 2012: 101). The brilliance of this particular formulation is that looking at an “icon,” in this case a painting of Jorge Manuel, is treated as looking at Jorge Manuel himself. When images depict superhuman persons, the icon is “the hidden deity looking back” (2012: 102). In other words, the religious interface is that by which transrealm interaction happens. Second, he writes that “the icon is the site of interface between the devotee and saint,” just as “the flesh of the face is the living mediation of self and other” (Morgan, 2012: 101), which means that it is involved in religious interaction. Third, Morgan suggests that the interface leads viewers “into a world of faith” (Morgan, 2012: 101), which posits the interface between two realms and is therefore compatible with the concept of transrealm interaction. This is also apparent from his statement that “[s]eeing an icon is like seeing a face, which is the gateway to the person embodied in the face” (Morgan, 2012: 103). There are several differences between how Morgan and I use interface. First, mine is inspired by digital game interfaces, and so I consider religious interfaces to be dynamic and malleable sets of interfacial elements. To Morgan, interface is limited to images that can be construed as “icons”—that is, images that facilitate the experience of eye contact—a reciprocal gaze with a superhuman person (Morgan, 2012: 71).11 The religious interface is far from limited to sight and visuality; the religious interface can be audial, tactile, olfactory, gustatory, or even located entirely within the mind. Morgan’s “religious seeing” shares interfacial capacity with religious hearing, touching, smelling, tasting, and feeling. As such, I argue that the religious interface is a universal feature of religious interaction because religious interaction involves transrealm interaction. The second difference concerns Morgan’s caution in how widely he applies the metaphor, saying that “it is clearly at work in […] Roman Catholicism. One can also find it among Protestants” (2012: 101). I think that the concept’s potential for application extends much further—to texts as they are written, read, and performed; to books and objects; to people and places; to thoughts, 11 In Hindu terminology, this is the experience of dars´an—the act of seeing and being seen by the superhuman person depicted. But a unilateral gaze can also give entry to other realms. Consider the rich traditions of narrative images used in ritual, such as the Stations of the Cross.

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emotions, and memories; to images, videos, movies, music and digital games, and also to religion(s). Third, I consider it imperative for scholars of religion to pay attention to the complex power-negotiating dynamics involved in defining religious interfaces to and on behalf of religious groups and traditions. I am interested in how various agents and groups construct rules that allow, legitimize, and promote this object for religious interaction, but disallow, delegitimize, destroy, distort, or neglect that one. For example, the prohibition to “make unto you any graven image” in Exodus 20: 4 can be an interfacial text by virtue of constituting a commandment from a superhuman person, in this case one that forbids the creation of “idols” or “graven images” for worship. As such, it legitimizes the interfaciality of text and delegitimizes the interfaciality of images. The passage is interpreted in a variety of ways: For Catholic and Orthodox Christians, visual interfaciality remains intact by inclusion of the following passage: “You shall not worship them or serve them,” which enables an interpretation that it is the image itself that is forbidden to worship, but using images as aids in or means for interacting with God or the saints is fine. For Calvinists and many Jews, the prohibition meant excluding images from any worship context altogether. How passages in texts held to be authoritative on religious interaction are interpreted, where the boundaries are drawn and by whom, reveal the politics of the religious interface, explored further in section 3.5 of this chapter. To my eyes, interfaces are not “primarily ritualistic” in the sense that they are closed circles of rules (Walter, 2014: 90). I am fascinated by the capacity for transrealm interaction that they afford those who enact and animate them. 2.4.2 Interfacial elements Religious interfaces consist of interfacial elements. They are often objects typically associated with religion such as texts and books, tarot cards and runes, images and sculptures, relics and talismans, but also songs, movies, people, animals, trees, rocks, mountains, ponds, rivers, lakes, and celestial bodies. It is more difficult to imagine what may not be an interfacial element than what may, as the interfacial capacity of these elements is not inherent, but socially constructed and attributed through imagination, enaction, and/or transmission (Berger, 1967: 5)—much like the realms they connect. Moreover, religious interfaces are dynamic. New interfacial elements are encountered and acquired, while old elements are lost, forgotten, or discarded; religious interfaces are continuously woven as new and old elements spin in and out of view or reach. Interfacial elements comprise the interface between realms, and so simultaneously separate and connect them. As we have seen, interfacial elements can be internal or external to human mind-bodies, or indeed be bodies. When the interface is located within the mind, it is internal. Material

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objects such as texts, images, sculptures, relics, or other human bodies are examples of external interfacial elements. By looking at what religions offer as interfacial elements, we learn something about human communication; any interfacial element is a testimony to what an individual considers appropriate elements for interaction and communication with their communicative object(s). Interfacial elements are often treated differently, set apart, and that is how an outsider may distinguish between an interfacial element from a non-interfacial element, by observing and identifying differences in how they are treated. Applied to WYD, the realms of human and superhuman persons merge through interfacial elements: the Host imagined as Christ, the community imagined as Church. Unlike human and superhuman persons in their respective realms, interfacial elements are ambiguous and liminal in terms of belonging. To non-participants, these elements clearly belong to the human realm, but to participants, they belong to both human and superhuman realms. Interfacial capacity is, in other words, subjective though not necessarily stable. 2.4.3 What about media? Readers familiar with media studies and material culture are likely to inquire as to why I write about interface and interfacial elements rather than wellestablished metaphors like media and mediation. In order to clarify, it is useful to enter into dialogue with anthropologist Birgit Meyer, whose work has pushed the envelope for the concept of religious media. This quote is particularly useful: What do a spirit medium, an icon, the Bible, a taped Islamic cassette sermon, and a poster depicting a Hindu god have in common? These diverse items—the list could easily be extended—are all media that have been authorized within particular religious traditions as suitable for humans to link up, in one way or another, with the divine or spiritual […] Media are understood here as central to practices of mediation through which religious identities are represented and the “sacred” becomes manifest in “the world.” From this perspective, modern mass media and digital information and communication technologies form a subcategory of the more encompassing notion of the medium (Meyer, 2011: 59).

At first glance, it may seem as though interface and interfacial element bring nothing new to the table. Might we not have established Meyer’s concept of medium and left it at that? I do not think so. While I agree with Meyer that all of her examples (and countless others) count as religious media, we cannot state that they are all interfacial elements without some important caveats. Because religious interfaces are subjective, whether these media are interfacial elements or not is subject to individual variation. The Bible is always a medium to its reader, but whether it is an interfacial element depends on who reads it and

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how. Read by an atheist the texts of the Bible are not means of interacting with God—or indeed any superhuman person. Read by a Christian, however, it can be because some of the most central superhuman persons engaged by Christians are presented as authors of various quotes and passages. Likewise, in my office, I have a poster of the Hindu deity Shiva (and Vishnu next to him). It may be said to mediate Shiva’s presence to me, but unless I employ it in religious interaction, it is not an interfacial element. By contrast, I also have an image of the Ásatrú goddess Freya on my office door. It, too, is persistently a medium to me, but it is also an interfacial element because I happen to employ it for religious interaction from time to time. The reason is simple: Freya is a superhuman person with whom I interact and sustain a relationship, while Shiva is not. In the hypothetical event that I hand over these media to someone who happens to be a Shaivite Hindu, their roles as interfacial and noninterfacial religious media might well be reversed. Should an atheist begin to treat the Bible as an interfacial element in interaction with God, or I begin to interact with Shiva using the poster in my office, the framework of religious interaction is capable of accommodating these practices as examples of transrealm interaction without running into the problem of whether to classify the atheist as suddenly Christian or my practice as suddenly Hindu. As such, the concept of the religious interface enables an approach to religion that is fluid and does not need to classify persons or practices as belonging to one (a)religious stance or identity rather than another. Media also creates a problem of differing interpretations of the presence mediated by a given religious object or spoken of in a mythical narrative. Consider an example from Tweed’s Our Lady of the Exile (1997), where some visitors to the shrine of Our Lady of Charity in Miami are members of the Catholic Church and interact with Yoruba deities. According to Tweed, the local bishop stated in a 1975 interview that: [P]eople “have [Our Lady of Charity] mixed up with pagan imagery.” He meant Santería and Ochún, as he indicated in that interview. “From my office sometimes,” he elaborated, “I see people who come to the Shrine and who also get close to the water and throw things into it—a practice which is part of pagan rituals” […] The Cuban clergy’s catechetical concern is expressed clearly in their attempts to distinguish Our Lady of Charity from Ochún, the Yoruba goddess of the river, with whom she is “confused” (Tweed, 1997: 48).

The concept of religious media is not well-suited to accommodate such “confusion,” because it places too much emphasis on the mediating object and the material culture with which it is surrounded. The material culture of the Catholic shrine Tweed writes about is saturated with components that place Our Lady of Charity among superhuman persons available for interaction within its own frame of reference. The material context at the shrine, filled with references to a Catholic religious world, did not seem to bother those who employed the place for interaction with Ochún. Nor can we be satisfied that the

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employment of the shrine for interacting with Ochún is merely a question of interpretive identification, because without the mythical narratives that conflate Mary and Ochún in Our Lady of Charity, or favor the latter over the former, there would be no incentive for Ochún devotees to visit the shrine in the first place. From the perspective of religious interaction, however, this “confusion” is explicable by reference to the superhuman persons and realms with which visitors interact, and the subjective religious interfaces of individual visitors. When focused on objects rather than what part(s) they play in transrealm interaction, religious media perspectives risk depriving people of their agency and self-determination. Focusing on people and their relationships to superhuman persons, however, and objects as interfacial elements in constellations of relationships with superhuman persons, accommodates people’s power to tweak their respective religious interfaces. That power was something the bishop of Miami in this case wished to place in the hands of the Catholic clergy. Consider another example, one where I explicitly employ a medium for making my point. The photograph below (figure 2.1) shows a statue of the Child Jesus in a church in Rome, adorned with rosaries and surrounded by notes, letters, photographs, and lit candles. The statue mediates the presence of the Child Jesus to any viewer who identifies Jesus as the superhuman person depicted; it is a religious medium. Yet the many rosaries and letters suggest that some visitors are more than viewers; by leaving behind these tangible expressions of transrealm interaction, these visitors’ presence lingers and invites others to do the same through precedence. Those who left letters or rosaries treated the statue as an interfacial element, an aperture for interacting with Jesus. Of course, others may also have employed the statue as an interfacial element without leaving behind such material traces, for example by praying and then leaving. But some viewers may not have used the statue for religious interaction. Absence of transrealm interaction does not mitigate the statue’s capacity as a medium of presence but renders it non-interfacial to those visitors. Thus, the framework of religious interaction lets us distinguish between different types of religious media according to their function to the individual viewer, listener, or visitor. The photograph itself is a medium of that statue, and therefore of the Child Jesus himself. While not unimaginable, I suppose few readers would employ the photograph as an interfacial element because the function it serves in this text is to illustrate an argument. That said, merely mentioning that reflection may prompt readers to oppose my prediction. In any case, it is important to pay attention to religious media, but we should be careful not to turn up the volume so high that it drowns out the agency of people who (do not) employ them in religious interaction. Consider also Meyer’s insight that: Instead of assuming that the recent adoption of electronic and digital media into religion would mark an extraordinary watershed, scholars realized that media,

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broadly understood, offer a fruitful starting point for analyzing religious change (Meyer, 2011: 60).

I agree and would extend Meyer’s observation to interfacial elements as well. In other words, religious media predate electronic and digital media, just like interfacial elements for transrealm interaction predate interfacial elements for human interaction, like telephones or computers. Interfacial elements, then, can be seen as a sub-category of religious media. As Morgan puts it, “The icon enables interface as a special kind of visual mediation” (Morgan, 2012: 101, italics added). In other words, Morgan’s statement can be taken to support interfacial elements as a sub-category of religious media. However, without the context of religious interaction, focusing on religious media—interfacial and non-interfacial—risks concealing the agency of the people who do or do not employ them. A related problem with religious media emerges when religious interaction takes place within the mind of a single human person. If the mind itself is construed as a medium, it obscures the process of distinguishing “thoughts” considered to come from another source than the human person whose mind it is. This means that we need to employ a different terminology in order to make visible the potential interactive quality of the human mind. The interactive framework solves this problem by showing how some thoughts can be identified as different from other thoughts because their source is another than the human person whose mind they appear in. Enter: the interfacial mind.

2.4.4 The interfacial mind Consider this passage from William James: “The more concrete objects of most men’s religion, the deities whom they worship, are known to them only in idea” (James, 1985 [1902]: 53–54). One might object that superhuman persons are frequently anchored in material objects: their words in text or their faces in images and sculptures. Yet, they are also often considered accessible independently of those media. People see superhuman persons in dreams, visions, during meditation, and drug-induced states; they may be believed to speak through thoughts, feelings, and encounters with other people. The consistent factor is a need for means of interacting with them. No wonder, then, that they may also be anchored in mind and memory, as anthropologist Tanya M. Luhrmann has shown. In her book When God Talks Back (2012), Luhrmann examines the notion of “hearing God” among Evangelicals in the American Vineyard Movement. Most of her interviewees are quite clear that they do not hear God audibly. Rather, “hearing God” is a metaphor for distinguishing between thoughts practitioners identify as their own, and thoughts they identify as coming from God

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(Luhrmann, 2021: 39–41). These metaphors seem to indicate interfacial capacity attributed to thoughts in the mind of a devotee.

Figure 2.3: Statue of the Child Jesus. Rome. Author’s photograph (2011).

Human persons who begin to discern supernatural presence(s) as part of one’s “internal dialogue,” “inner speech,” or “stream of consciousness” are learning to make their own minds interfacial spaces; they discern an “other”

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than their own self present in their own minds, communicating with them. The author of Dialogue with God, whom Luhrmann cites, seems to have successfully set up his own intra-mind religious interface, which allows him to consider God as speaking to him as “interjected thoughts” (Luhrmann, 2012: 46). These thoughts are believed to come from a different source than himself, as the very application of the term interjected suggests. Thus, these thoughts become interfacial elements, within which the human self is made distinct from the superhuman agent; two realms meet within in the mind, rendering the mind an interfacial space. “Congregants,” Luhrmann explains, “believe not only that inner speech and imagery can be God, but that there are subtle rules that allow someone to identify God and that with experience one can become more expert in applying the rules and discerning the divine presence” (Luhrmann, 2012: 60). It seems more likely that such rules are tacit rather than subtle—their tacitness itself is part of the socially generated power structure that constructed them. Nevertheless, such rules correspond to the Goffman’s “second frame”, which governs the superhuman realm here described. A note from Laycock is relevant here: These worlds are able to coexist because they each occur within their own frame of meaning. By navigating these frames of metacommunication we are able to participate in different games and “walk between worlds.” […] The ability to define these frames of meaning is perhaps the greatest form of political power (Laycock, 2015: 279).

In the Catholic Church, the most wide-reaching claim to the power to define the religious interface is made and maintained by the magisterium—the pope, the episcopal college, and the bodies that claim the authority to interpret Scripture and Tradition. Their definitions are socially constructed and communicated through texts and speeches, and their power is upheld by their and their representatives’ exclusive right to allow or restrict interaction with God through the most central interfacial element: the Eucharistic Host. Unlike religious media, interfacial elements as means of mono- and bidirectional interaction with superhuman persons provide a sub-category of religious media through which superhuman persons are thought to have acted in the past and are expected to continue to act in the present and future. These interfacial elements become the proverbial “wardrobes” through which people can become immersed in the superhuman realm, and they make up the religious interfaces of people with the agency to select or forgo them for interacting with superhuman persons.

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2.4.5 Governing the interface: Magisterial and other normativities So far, I have stressed the agency of human individuals and the subjectivity of religious interfaces. However, religious interaction does not take place in a vacuum, and there are limits to the individual agency involved in the construction of religious interfaces. Leaders of religious organizations frequently claim the authority to define what is and is not acceptable as interfacial elements and what kinds of transrealm interaction they may afford. As noted earlier, the second frame of Goffman’s frame analysis is made up of “the rules of the game.” In Laycock’s words, “[t]hese are models of how the fantasy world works and the mechanisms through which players direct the course of the fantasy” (Laycock, 2015: 10). In frame analysis, to define the frames of reality is to define reality itself. As Goffman later put it: All social frameworks involve rules, but differently. For example, a checker move is informed by the rules of the game, most of which will be applied in any one complete playing through of the game; the physical manipulation of the checker, on the other hand, involves a framework involving small bodily movements, and this framework, if indeed it is possible to speak in terms of a or one framework, might well be manifest only partially during the playing of the game. […] In sum, then, we tend to perceive events in terms of primary frameworks, and the type of framework we employ provides a way of describing the event to which it is applied (Goffman, 1986 [1974]: 25– 26).

The rules of the game constitute Goffman’s second frame and govern what is possible and impossible within the game realm, and under what conditions. So also with religion; the second frame of social reality governs what is possible and impossible, allowed and disallowed in given realms, and in the construction of the interface between them. The social reality of these rules raises questions about who makes them, who upholds them, whether and to what extent they are successful in doing so, how they are legitimized, who is expected to keep them and what consequences follow if they do not, who challenges them, and how. Several of these questions will be relevant in upcoming chapters. For now, suffice it to say that the answers will be contextdependent, and that the prima facie rule-makers in the WYD context are the magisterium and the event organizers who interpret, plan, and execute the magisterium’s directives. This means that we can speak of a magisterial normativity as the second frame governing the religious interface at WYD. As subsequent chapters will reveal, however, it does not reign unchallenged. Magisterial normativity and the social processes by which it achieves social reality, are associated with and embodied in the pope, cardinals, bishops, and the institutions whose task it is to continually construct, uphold, and distribute the normativity they formulate. The prime example of such an institution is situated within the Roman Curia: the Congregation for the Doctrine of the

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Faith (CDF, 1965–), formerly the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office (1908–1965), formerly the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition (1542–1908). Among other institutions, the most relevant to this book are the papacy, the CDF, and the Pontifical Council for the Laity (PCL, later the Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life), the latter of which was responsible for the organization of WYD at the highest instance until September 2016, when its responsibilities were transferred to the newly set up Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life. Describing magisterial normativity as one kind of normativity accommodates the observation that Catholicism embraces numerous normativities. Some normativities constructed by the priesthood, others by theologians, yet others in lay communities and religious orders. Magisterial normativity is also contested on the magisterial level despite (or due to) claims to a unified, ultimate definition of Catholic orthodoxy and orthopraxis. Furthermore, it paves the way for an agent-centered view of magisterial normativity, rather than a content-oriented one. As such, it enables a dynamic view of both magisterial normativity and magisterial authority. Speaking of magisterial authority, magisterial normativity construction is a process through which the magisterium produces and maintains its power to define Catholic orthodoxy, orthopraxis, and identity. Magisterial normativity construction is most visible when the processes of doctrine construction are seen in conjunction with the right to officiate the seven sacraments. For example, ordained deacons may baptize and wed couples, but other sacraments are normatively exclusive to the priesthood, especially hearing Confession, saying Mass, and Ordination. Seen in conjunction with the sacraments exclusive to ordained priesthood, hearing Confession and saying Mass helps maintain clerical hierarchy and influence. So do the power to define Catholic orthodoxy, orthopraxis and, as has recently been exemplified, orthomateriality.12 Sacraments add strength to magisterial normativity by keeping the right to officiate them exclusive to ordained members of the clergy. Most privileged among these are ordained priests, who are the only ones who may consecrate the Host at Mass. This means that it is within the power of the Catholic priest to change the noninterfacial wafer into the interfacial element of the Host. This in turn enables interaction with Jesus through gazing at or ingesting the wafer. Religious interfaces are often at the center of intra- and interreligious disagreements and conflicts. Webb Keane notes a polemic between Protestants and Catholics in Indonesia, where Protestants reportedly pray with their eyes 12 The Greek-Latin hybrid term orthomateriality was born in a discussion with Oskar Tobias Henriksen on Twitter. We discussed the magisterial invalidation of gluten-free wafers for Communion, announced a month earlier. On June 15, 2017, the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments published a circular letter to the bishops of the Catholic Church that stated: “Hosts that are completely gluten-free are invalid matter for the celebration of the Eucharist. Low-gluten hosts (partially gluten-free) are valid matter” (Sarah, 2017: No. 4a).

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shut while Catholics pray with their eyes open: “Why? So they [Catholics] can read the words of their prayer books instead of speaking from within” (Keane, 2007: 2). Moreover, Catholics were targets of the classic Reformed critique that “Catholics even worship statues of the Virgin Mary as if they were alive” (Keane, 2007: 2). Viewed from the framework of religious interaction, this polemic reflects a disagreement over what elements are appropriate for incorporation into the religious interface—what means are legitimate in religious interaction.

2.5 Immersion The word immersion comes from Latin immergere, “to dip into” (Oxford Living Dictionaries: English, 2017). I stipulate that immersion will refer to a mode of transrealm interaction that results from the interface being so well synchronized that interaction with superhuman persons considered is experienced as seamless. Wagner speaks of increasing levels of synchronization when she predicts how “new levels of immersion, new ease of interface with virtual environments will be taken for granted” as new technologies emerge (Wagner, 2012: 236). However, we can also speak of immersion in transrealm interaction. Consider the following quote from Edith and Victor Turner: The Holy Places of Palestine have been visited by pilgrims since the early days of Christianity […] Pilgrims to the Holy Land have never gone in expectation of miraculous cures or favors. Rather they go to make their understanding of Christianity—a faith brought to them from afar—more vivid by immersing themselves in its geographical setting (Turner and Turner, 1995 [1978]: Chapter 4, para. 36, Kindle edition, italics added).

Admittedly, Turner and Turner’s assertion regarding pilgrims’ motivations is too bombastic and historically inaccurate (see for example Bar and CohenHattab, 2003: 133–134).13 However, it is interesting to note their assumption that immersion is about making something distant more vivid, that the anticipation of immersion can be a strong motivational factor, and that geographical settings can be conducive to such immersion. In order to conceptualize immersion for the present book, it is useful to look at how the term is used in digital game studies. In digital game studies, immersion is frequently used but rarely defined. 13 Doron Bar and Kobi Cohen-Hattab studied “modern tourist pilgrims” in nineteenth century and early twentieth century Palestine. They found that, “[f]or the Greek, Russian and other Eastern Christian communities, the pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and especially to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, constituted an essential part of their preparation for death and salvation. Those pilgrims also hoped that the pilgrimage would cure them of illness, help them find spouses and bear children, and even enrich them materially” (Bar and Cohen-Hattab, 2003: 133–134).

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Among gamers, it is a well-integrated piece of jargon. Usually, it refers to a desirable state of involvement in a digital game, we might say a lusory state resulting from a lusory attitude. For game developers, immersion is also the foremost sign of successful game design. Consider this quote from a game developer in the promotional video for Microsoft’s console Xbox One X (formerly Project Scorpio): My job as a game-maker is about immersion. It’s about to put you into an experience and let you live that experience. The richer and more accurate those visuals are, the more immersive it is (Xbox, 2016).

There are two layers to this statement that make it connect to interfaces: First, a game-maker defines his job as being about immersion, which seems to exist on a scale from lower to higher levels. Second, Microsoft’s marketing team evidently considers the promise of immersion to be an important selling point. In short: There is a tacit assumption that immersion sells, and thus immersion, and ever-higher levels of it, is an on-going pursuit for game producers because it represents the experience desired by gamers. Yet because of continuous technological advances, the highest level of immersion thinkable is always a step ahead. In the words of game studies scholars Lennart Nacke and Craig A. Lindley, immersion is “the holy grail of digital game design” (Nacke and Lindley 2009: 1). Scholars of religion have employed immersion in various ways. Interestingly, Carlos Alberto Streil used pilgrimage to describe a kind of religious travel where “immersion into the sacred” is more prominent than other forms of religious tourism (Stausberg 2011: 10). This seems to offer a theoretical shortcut, but I think there is something to be said for immersion as understood by scholars of religion working in game studies as well. Simone Heidbrink, Tobias Knoll, and Jan Wysocki describe immersion as “the feeling of ‘being drawn into a world,” and a ‘main motivation for playing’” (Heidbrink et al. 2015: 65–66, 74, 95). In their words, “[d]oing something in a world, participating in its ruleset, to get involved in its world through exploration and/ or through the repertoire of action of the player’s avatar lets the player become part of the gameworld” (Heidbrink et al., 2015: 66). Stephen Jacobs draws on the work of literature scholar Janet H. Murray when he defines immersion as “having ‘the experience of being transported to an elaborately simulated place’” (Jacobs, 2015: 95; cf. Murray, 1997: 98). In all of these cases, immersion denotes the experience of another realm as fully incorporated into the reality of human persons. In other words, it denotes a high level of involvement in transrealm interaction. Experiences here categorized as immersion constitute the very aim and purpose of game interfaces and, I contend, those of religious interfaces. Such theoretical translation requires some illustration. Recall the words of Microsoft’s game developer “the richer and more detailed [the] visuals are,” he said, “the more immersive it is.” If immersion in game worlds is aided by realistic

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visuals (and, I would add, a well-composed music score, intuitive controls, a well-written narrative, and proficient voice actors), then what aids immersion in superhuman realms? Games must capitalize on the senses available to them: visual, audial, and tactile. Religions, however, can play on smell and taste as well, giving them a larger reportoire for aiding immersion. Facilitating immersion is about persuading human beings that another realm besides the physical realm merits and requires their full attention. Note also that not all of the components that aid immersion are interfacial elements; in this case, neither bells nor incense constitute apertures to the superhuman realm or means of interaction with God. Nevertheless, one seminarian I interviewed in Rome in 2011 described them as helpful for persuading people of God as an “invisible reality,” which translates to facilitating immersion in a superhuman realm. Nevertheless, immersion depends on more than sensory stimuli; it relies upon a synchronized interface. From this perspective, the purpose of “sacred spaces,” understood as spaces dedicated to transrealm interaction, is to preserve interfacial synchronicity and aid immersion in superhuman realms. Illustrations would be helpful here, so let us look at a few examples: An author immersed in the virtual realm of a text-editing program would consider the experience of pressing the buttons on the keyboard and watching the results on the monitor, to be the act of writing itself. A gamer immersed in Tetris on her smartphone is touching her phone’s screen and making various maneuvers, but if you ask her to describe what she is doing while playing, she may say that she is laying bricks, trying to put together pieces that fit on a line. A Catholic priest celebrating Mass makes specific gestures and utters particular phrases as part of the liturgical sequence, but he would likely describe his actions as performing the Sacred Liturgy or consecrating the Host. A Muslim reciting the Qur’an musically vocalizes Arabic words written by the followers of a historical individual called Muhammad, but might say he is making audible the revealed words of Allah. The point is that interfaces and the elements that comprise them are necessary for interacting with other realms, but we rarely go through the trouble of describing our means for performing these activities. Instead, we tend to describe what we (think we) are doing by those means. Immersion has a parallel to transcendence in cases where the latter refers to a state of absorption attainable by human persons. For example, Regina Chow Trammel has recently argued that “detachment from the world’s sufferings helps individuals practicing mindfulness experience transcendence” (Trammel, 2017: 6). In other words, immersion in a superhuman realm might produce experiences that might be labeled as transcendent and immersion, like transcendence, requires effort (Leibovitz, 2013: 57). The parallel stops there, however, as there are notable differences between the two concepts as well. Immersion concerns human persons, but transcendence can also refer to a “divine attribute”—a quality of a superhuman person as “existing above and independently of the material world” (Smith, 1995c: 1086). Moreover,

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transcendence often assumes the opposing concept of immanence, another “divine attribute” which refers to a quality of being “present in the cosmos and not existing apart from it” (Smith, 1995d: 481). Immersion, too, has an opposing concept: distraction. At times, the two concepts are one and the same; distraction from one realm results from immersion in another. Consider the employment of digital games in medicine. Engaging interactive virtual realms has been shown to be a more effective distraction from chronic pain than, say, watching a movie (Bidarra et al., 2013; Jameson, 2011; Mehrer and Gold, 2009). These studies rest on the common assumption that distraction from pain lessens the experience thereof. Interestingly, interaction with supportive superhuman persons, has also been shown to distract medical patients from pain (Ashby and Lenhart, 1994; Bush et al., 1999). Taken together, it appears that engagement in other realms, whether virtual or superhuman, has the potential to distract people from pain. I do not think this common feature is coincidental. It would be interesting to flip the coin and ask whether and to what degree immersion in other realms— whether virtual or superhuman—is the cause of distraction in such cases. As I show in Chapter 6, this is my suspicion: that immersion causes distraction, and thus relief, because immersion in one realm produces distraction from another. Conversely, distraction can disrupt immersion: Leibovitz notes how “pausing the game every few minutes to save my progress […] greatly interrupted game play” (Leibovitz, 2013: 44), and observed that his “assistant asking me to pause the game so that he could ask me a series of mathematical questions” transported his cognitive faculties “entirely out of the world of the game” (Leibovitz, 2013: 57). Such distractions reset Leibovitz’ level of “absorption,” which he could only regain with renewed effort (Leibovitz, 2013: 57). Having compared immersion and transcendence, we also need to tend to immersion’s relationship with other related terms. 2.5.1 Immersion, flow, presence, and vulnerability The role of interfaces for aiding immersion is frequently overlooked in publications that tend to the intersections between games and religion. Immersion is related to terms that designate other “loosely defined subjective experiences,” such as flow and presence (Nacke and Lindley, 2009: 1). Both are distinct from immersion but connected to it in different ways, which will be explicated by engaging Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Johan Huizinga, and Robert A. Orsi respectively (Csikszentmihalyi, 2002 [1992]; Huizinga, 1938; Orsi, 2016). Immersion has sometimes been likened to Csikszentmihalyi’s popularized and widely employed concept of flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 2002 [1992]). However, Jennett and colleagues argue that “immersion in games differs from flow: whereas Csikszentmihalyi (1990) claims that flow involves a serene

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mindset, immersion is much more emotionally charged” (Jennett et al., 2008: 657). Not only do I concur with their distinction; Csikszentmihalyi’s flow is characterized by a combination of joy, creativity, and total involvement (Csikszentmihalyi, 2002 [1992] “About the book,” section 1, para. 2, Kindle edition). While total involvement is certainly a common feature between flow and immersion, the latter is not necessarily happy—neither in gaming nor religion. There is nothing serene about “dying” yet again to a monstruous digital foe you have attempted to conquer thirty times in order to rescue your digital friends. Console controllers, computer keyboards and screens have often suffered loss of limb due to gamers’ frustrations in such situations. Similarly, there is nothing joyful about the far more serious concern that your superhuman friend of choice is not listening or otherwise failing to acquiesce to your request for help in a dire situation, or that they might punish you in this life or later. Nevertheless, frustration in both situations is indicative of immersion: it is a symptom of total involvement, and is often emotionally charged. Consequently, Michael Mason’s suggestion of Csikszentmihalyi’s flow as a possible route of interpretation for “the more intense moments” of WYD (Mason, 2008: 17), seems instead to call for interpretations that draw on the concept of immersion. Immersion is akin to Huizinga’s notion of the enchantment play casts “over us; it is ‘enchanting’, ‘captivating’. It is invested with the noblest qualities we are capable of perceiving in things: rhythm and harmony” (Huizinga, 1938: 10, italics added). There are two components here that I wish to draw attention to: first, the “spell of play,” and second, the “rhythm and harmony” with which it is invested, and I discuss the two points in turn. The “enchantment” and “captivation” Huizinga alludes to, correspond better to immersion than flow. However, it does appear that Huizingian ludic enchantment is connected to the serene rhythm and harmony of flow. In digital games, immersion relies on a harmony between the computer or console’s processing of game code, its output to and representation on-screen, and the player’s input through the pushing of buttons. These elements need to be synchronized for the play experience to unfold as intended. Should the computer or console process information too slowly, or should the internet connection fail, the game’s representation on-screen will suffer, player input will be delayed or, in gamer lingo, the game will “lag.” In other words, player immersion depends on interfacial synchronicity, perhaps we could say it depends on interfacial flow. Lag, no matter the cause, distracts from the game realm because it disrupts synchronicity; it disturbs interfacial flow. Religious interfaces, for their part, can be desynchronized if priests run out of Hosts in the middle of distributing Communion or a Qur’an reciter’s voice breaks. If immersion is the holy grail, flow is the interfacial zen needed to attain it. Orsi argues that “[o]rdinary people tended to become aware of theological turmoil within the Church when the saints disappeared from their familiar niches and supplies of holy cards, votive candles, and rosaries dwindled” (Orsi,

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2016: Chapter 1, section 6, para. 3, Kindle edition). He is referring to a negation of saint depictions in sculptures and cards used in prayer—of interfacial elements being removed from the religious interface that “ordinary” people had grown used to employing in transrealm interaction. He considers these removals “[a]ttacks against popular piety” that “provided emotional and religious intensity to reformers’ broader ecclesiastical agendas, bringing their efforts at changing ritual practice and theological orientations close to the ground of everyday lived experience and religion” (Orsi, 2016: Chapter 1, section 6, para. 3, Kindle edition). From the perspective of religious interaction, this “politics of presence” is ultimately a politics of the religious interface, of attempts at governing what elements people use and do not use in transrealm interaction by claiming the authority to define what is and is not appropriate. If emotional intensity is indicative of religious immersion, and the removal, destruction or distortion of interfacial elements produces emotional responses, such removal may inadvertedly enhance immersion. That, in turn, points to the relationships between human and superhuman persons and the violation people experience when denied access to interactive aids. Distorting or destroying interfacial elements can also be viewed as imposed immersion in the human realm— distraction in the place where immersion is sought, desired, and expected. The consequences of manipulating people’s religious interfaces demonstrates their vulnerability. For all the ways in which religious interfaces invite interaction and facilitate immersion in superhuman realms, interaction and immersion are also vulnerable to disturbance through disruption and distraction when interfacial elements are distorted or destroyed. If iconoclasm signifies the destruction of interfacial elements, describing acts and depictions as “blasphemous” is a symptom of interfacial distortion. If an interfacial element, such as the Eucharistic Host, is subject to acts considered to desecrate it, or an icon considered miraculous is destroyed, the denial of presence amounts to a denial of the element’s capacity for facilitating interaction with a given superhuman person. When, for example, Communion is unavailable such as in the episode from WYD 2016 earlier in this chapter, access to a particular interfacial element is denied as a consequence, and thus disrupts immersion. Immersion is vulnerable to the destruction and distortion of the religious interface as the facilitation of interaction with superhuman persons is in some way hindered. Distortion and destruction may hinder flow, but may also increase motivation for immersion; the Mass participants in my travel group kept looking for priests with Eucharistic Hosts to distribute until they found one. Obstacles to immersion also present threats to the normativities and normativity-constructing bodies that govern the religious interface, which in turn guide religious transrealm interaction. As Laycock asserts, “[i]t is when [the] frames break down and worlds collide that the potential for confusion and danger arises. The ability to define these frames of meaning is perhaps the greatest form of political power” (Laycock, 2015: 279).

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Summary

2.6 Summary If religion is interaction with culturally postulated superhuman persons who inhabit superhuman realms, then such interaction is facilitated through the provision of the religious interface. The religious interface consists of interfacial elements, which are characterized by their function as means of interaction that are inducive to human immersion in other realms. Interfacial elements can be anything that is treated as a link between human and superhuman realms. Religious interfaces are governed and guided by normativities, which are socially constructed by institutional and other elites imbued with various forms of authority. Attempts at controlling the interface between human and superhuman realms is ultimately an attempt to control interaction and immersion—restricting their availability by defining the rules of interaction with the interface, such as the criteria for participation. When interaction between human and superhuman persons is experienced as seamless, it is due to the synchronized state of the religious interface, which is conducive to immersion—the experience of two realms merging.

Figure 2.4: Religious interaction model

For the purposes of this book, themes of religious interaction can be sorted into three sub-categories (figure 2.4): interactive relationships, interactive modes, and interactive technologies. Interactive relationships take shape along two axes: one vertical, the other horizontal which, for the heuristic purposes of this book, typically correspond to transrealm interaction and interaction within the human realm respectively. As we will see in upcoming chapters, analysis does not allow such tidiness. People who are treated as interfacial elements straddle a combination of the two. Interactive modes denote more or less immersed or distracted states during interaction. Interactive technologies are here understood to be religious interfaces, consisting of interfacial elements that can be either external (e. g. images, sculptures, other people) or internal (e. g. the body itself, the enacted mind) to the body of the respective human participant. Transrealm interaction takes place by employing interfaces between the human realm and other realms, here specifically superhuman realms as the abodes of superhuman persons.

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Moving into the examination of the source material for WYD, we are now equipped with an approach to religious interaction that combines concepts from ludology and (digital) game studies with material culture. Moving forward, we will be studying interactive relationships, interactive modes, and interactive technologies: what they are, how they are utilized, constructed, and synchronized. We will also see whether and to what extent they play a part in respondents’ understanding of pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage. We have seen that thereligious interface is subject to socially constructed normativities, and that it is vulnerable to various forms of disruption that, in turn, threaten immersion. In what follows, we will explore how the religious interface at WYD is helpful for discerning the ways in which WYD’s historical development has impacted the Catholic concept of pilgrimage by redefining the religious interface, the forms of and invitations to immersion provided at these events. In the words of Gandalf: “The board is set. The pieces are moving” (Jackson, 2003).

3. World Youth Day Origins: From Youth Gathering to Pilgrimage, 1984–1991

WYD—transnational and diocesan—emerged from a series of events in Rome in the period 1984–1986, with Palm Sunday 1986 as the first officially named “World Youth Day.” An overview of WYDs (table 1.1) hints at changes in the event design of centralized WYDs: Their duration expanded from two days to nearly a full week, and they began taking place in July–August. WYDs were also relocated to other host cities, first to other officially sanctioned pilgrimage sites, and later to other locations as well. These changes hint at structural alterations taking place at a deeper level. Reconstructing that development requires that we consult historical source material. In this chapter, I trace the origins of WYD in order to find out two things: first, how and why WYD emerged and second, how it became so strongly tied to pilgrimage. To answer these questions, it is helpful to focus on language use— especially the keywords pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage. Scholars of religion have employed a variety of methods for understanding religious language in various contexts, but one perspective is particularly promising here. Anthropologist Webb Keane has noted that John L. Austin’s concept of speech acts (Austin, 1962), combined with studies of “religious practices,” has inspired a plethora of “scholarly efforts to understand language as a form of action” (Keane, 1997: 56). Building on Austin’s concept, John R. Searle developed a speech-act theory. He hypothesized that “speaking a language is engaging in a rulegoverned form of behavior […] talking is performing acts according to rules” (Searle, 1969: 22). From a ludic perspective, any rule-governed activity invites us to consider that activity as a game—a view that infuses wordplay with a whole other level of meaning; speaking becomes word-play. Yet, it is when meaning becomes ambiguous that we consider whether someone is indulging in wordplay as a distinct form of using the words involved. We remember from Chapter 2 that Abt considered a “game” to be “a particular way of looking at something—anything” (Abt, 1987 [1970]: 5), and Salen and Zimmerman built on this perspective in examining the “rules of play” (Salen, 2004: 3). What can we learn from paying attention to how naming WYD a pilgrimage and participants as pilgrims developed as speech acts, combined with the lens of religious interaction? I argue that it reveals a gradual process of consecutive events that became increasingly discrete from its original contexts. Throughout that process, pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage grew increasingly interwoven with the WYD vocabulary, which is visible in papal writings and WYD theme songs.

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Later, I discuss various intra-Catholic currents that influenced the emergence of WYD. In the third section, I take a step back to consider some intriguing possible influences outside Catholicism: communism and Charismatic Protestantism.

3.1 From youth gathering to pilgrimage 3.1.1 World Youth Day emerges Taking proto-WYD 1984 as a starting point leaves us with two different celebrations one week apart: the Palm Weekend on April 14–15 and Easter Sunday on April 22. Rather than picking one over the other, it is more helpful to see how each contributed to the concept of WYD: The Palm Weekend gave WYD its placement on the liturgical calendar and Easter Sunday gave WYD its very own cross and icon. What they had in common was an encounter between the pope and young Catholics in Rome, in the context of Holy Week and the conclusion of the Holy Year of Redemption. This means that the events were embedded in the context of three other, at the time much larger and more conspicuous celebrations—all of which were associated with a total of four occasions for pilgrimage: the (1) “Youth Jubilee” or “Festival of Hope” (April 11–15); (2) the beginning of Holy Week; (3) the conclusion of the the Holy Year of Redemption (1983–1984) (Cleary, 2013: 17).1 Last but not least, we need to consider (4) the city of Rome itself — historically and institutionally one of the most important among Catholicism’s many officially sanctioned pilgrimage destinations.2 Pilgrimages to Rome have been rewarded with religious rewards like indulgences, both in older and newer times (McNeill, 2003: 536; Norman and Johnson, 2011: 379). As the “New Jerusalem,” Rome is littered with interfacial elements that are connected to mytho-historical narratives of Jesus, Mary, the apostles, martyrs, and other saints and other saints.3 In sum, we may 1 Holy Week and Jubilees have been occasions for making pilgrimages to Rome for centuries, as have papal initiatives to capitalize upon them (Dickson, 1999). Jubilee Years, or Holy Years are connected to special indulgences associated with places and practices that take on particular significance in such years. One example is the Holy Door of St Peter’s Basilica and other church buildings, which is opened at the beginning of the Holy Year and sealed again after its conclusion. 2 Turner and Turner attribute Rome’s “official importance as a center of pilgrimage unity” to “the higher clergy’s obligation to journey ad limina apostolorum (‘to the threshold of the apostles’)”; that is, to Peter and Paul (Turner and Turner 1995 [1978]: Chapter 5, section 2, para. 37, Kindle edition). But pilgrimages to Rome have also been made by scores of lay Catholics for centuries (Rinschede, 1992: 55). 3 Consider, for example, the Scala Sancta (“Holy Staircase”) across the street from the Basilica of Saint John in Lateran and the old papal Lateran palace. Previously known as Scala Pilati (“Pilate’s Staircase”), the staircase in their original location “had been those up which Christ had walked into the Praetorium for judgment by Pilate. Tradition claims that the stairs were brought to Rome by St. Helena after her visit to the Holy Land in 327 […] Many pilgrims ascend the stairs on their

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say that the pilgrimage associations to proto-WYD 1984 were charged not only spatially and temporally, but also materially due to the city’s plentiful religious interface that punctures the veils between human and superhuman realms. Together, these four factors wrapped proto-WYD 1984 in a multi-layered pilgrimage-associated context with traditions reaching centuries back in time. Consequently, the end of the Youth Festival on Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday together set the precedent for diocesan WYDs and the first centralized WYDs, and that precedent was saturated with associations to conventional Catholic pilgrimages. As such, it was hardly surprising when John Paul II addressed the young people present on Palm Sunday as pilgrims throughout his homily (John Paul II, 1984b: Nos. 1, 2, 5, 7, 8). The USCCB claims “hundreds of thousands” of young people came to the Vatican for this “special Palm Sunday celebration” with Pope John Paul II (USCCB, 2011), indicating that this particular event brought something new to Palm Sunday for its participants.4 Addressing those present as “Pilgrims of the Jubilee Year of the Redemption,” his reason for calling them pilgrims was clear: It was their Jubilee-related journey that made them pilgrims, and not the Youth Festival (John Paul II, 1984b: No. 1). He also likened them to the Pueri Hebraeorum (“Hebrew children”) among the Passover pilgrims in Jerusalem at the time of Jesus (John Paul II, 1984b: Nos. 1, 2, 8). The pope’s establishment of a connection between young pilgrims past and present is also important in another regard. It was the first out of all John Paul II’s Palm Sunday homily manuscripts that referred to a “special participation” on the part of young people, and the first where he employed pilgrims(s) and pilgrimage beyond scarce mention (John Paul II, 1984b: No. 2). If we approach the manuscript with a view to speech act theory, one of his most interesting speech acts was to describe Jesus himself as “one of the pilgrims to the Easter Feast” who “walked around surrounded by the crowd of pilgrims” (John Paul II, 1984b: No. 5).5 John Paul II was not merely rehearsing a familiar narrative; he was inviting those present to imagine themselves as among those pilgrims in Jerusalem, with Jesus himself among them. knees to gain the indulgence granted by Pope Pius VII” (Ball, 2003: 511, 645). Given the traditional narrative, it is an interfacial of Jesus’ judgment that, by connection to that narrative, invites and enables transrealm interaction. Similar examples are the “True Cross” relics found in the Basilica of the Holy Cross, also believed to have been found by Saint Helena, Constantine’s mother. 4 Education scholar Anthony Cleary narrows the number down to 300,000 participants at the Youth Jubilee (Cleary, 2011: 19; Cleary, 2013: 17), but as he jumbles the Festival of Hope (April 11–15) together with the “end of the Holy Year of Redemption,” it is unclear to what event(s) he is assigning these attendance numbers. It also remains unclear whether similar numbers of attendees can be attributed to the days prior, or if this was particular to Palm Sunday. 5 The notion of Jesus as pilgrim, along with Mary and Abraham, would gain additional prominence eight years later, as it appeared in the 1992 Catechism (The Catholic Church, 1993 [1992]: Nos. 583, 593). In the Catechism, Jesus even remains a pilgrim through the Church as “the whole Mystical Body of Jesus Christ, the Church in its pilgrim members” (The Catholic Church, 1993 [1992]: No. 958).

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A less obvious development was the release of what today is considered the first WYD theme song: Resta qui con noi (“Stay here with us”). It is the last track on the music album World Youth Day: The 12 Official Theme Songs, published in 2011 (Various Artists, 2011), and its lyrics are the first among those listed on the Vatican’s official website (Vatican.va, 2000).6 Since the present text prohibits the reproduction of the melody, suffice it to say that it is set to a harmonious slow rock melody. Still, the lyrics are what will be of greatest interest here; when lyrics address a superhuman person, they invite interfacial use. This is compatible with Keane’s suggestion that “concrete activities such as speaking, chanting, singing, reading, writing—or their purposeful suppression—can be as much a condition of possibility for the experience of the divine as a response to it” (Keane, 1997: 48). As a communal prayer in the form of a song, the theme song had interfacial capacity insofar as it became a means of transrealm interaction. The lyrics are gloomy and dramatic, the first and third lines of the chorus being Resta qui con noi, il sole scende già—“Stay here with us, the sun is setting already” (my translation). Additionally, the third verse reads (Vatican, 2000, my translation): Italian

English

Davanti a noi l’umanità lotta, soffre e spera come una terra che nell’arsura chiede l’acqua da un cielo senza nuvole, ma che sempre le può dare vita. Con Te saremo sorgente d’acqua pura, con Te fra noi il deserto fiorirà.

Humanity struggles before us, suffers and hopes Like a land in scorching heat, [humanity] begs water from a cloudless sky, (but) which is always able to give life. With You, we will be a spring of pure water, with You, the desert will bloom among us.

This song was sung in the Catholic heart of Rome while the famed Doomsday Clock was set to three minutes to midnight as U.S.-Soviet relations had reached “their iciest point in decades” (Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, 1984, 2017). It is a hymn—a prayer set to music—where “Lord” is used to address God in the second person. This means it invites people to employ the song as an interfacial element in interaction with a superhuman person—the highest one in the Catholic superhuman hierarchy and the one normatively attributed the most extensive powers.7 To the extent that the theme song expressed contempora6 The list appears not to have been updated since 2000, as it does not contain lyrics from later theme songs. Also of interest is the now more general, albeit unofficial WYD theme song composed by Catholic priest Marco Frisina, “Jesus Christ, you are my life,” which was released for the 2005 papal visit to Cologne by Benedict XVI. During WYD 2016 in Krako´w, it was sung at the Opening Mass during distribution of Communion, at the Welcoming Ceremony, at the Way of the Cross, during the Vigil, and during distribution of Communion again at the Closing Mass. 7 The performance of interfacial songs at mass gatherings was also important to the spread of

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neous concerns, they would help WYD participants articulate those concerns as a plea to God, who is indicated as capable of making oases out of deserts—to make dry land flourish. That plea was not just for themselves and other Catholics, but on behalf of humanity; it encouraged a global perspective. The next WYD to have a theme song of its own would be WYD 1987 in Buenos Aires. On the following Easter Sunday, a cross that had been kept in Saint Peter’s Basilica throughout the Jubilee was presented to a transnational group of young people from the San Lorenzo Center in Rome—an institution selfdescribed as “an international centre dedicated to the youth of the world” (Centro San Lorenzo, 2016). The cross, which I shall refer to as the WYD Cross, was also accompanied by a Madonna icon. John Paul II “entrusted” both to a transnational group of young Catholics, charging them with bringing the items around the world (John Paul II, 1984c). Proto-WYD 1984 brought together three aspects that would gain in significance as the event concept and design evolved: pilgrimage, evangelization, and a global perspective. In 1985, proto-WYD was bereft of the previous year’s pilgrimage associations tied to the Jubilee. Nor was there a new distinct “Youth Festival” that lasted several days. Nevertheless, there was a two-day gathering in Rome during the Palm Weekend. On Palm Saturday, March 30, John Paul II welcomed an international group of thousands of young people, this time at the Piazza San Giovanni in Laterano. A United Nations delegation was also present, led by Leticia Ramos Shahani, Assistant Secretary-General of the Center for Social Development and Humanitarian Affairs and the UNESCO delegation, led by Gérard Bolla and Pier Luigi Vagliani, as well as a representative of Italy’s Foreign Minister (John Paul II, 1985a: No. 1). John Paul II described the family and the Church as schools of participation, and warned against the family being “destroyed” (John Paul II, 1985a: No. 5).8 He emphasized participation at Mass as the most important event in the life of the Church. To participate meant more than being present, he explained, because to “attend Mass” was not a spectacle to be watched “from the sidelines”; it was “the sacrifice of Christ and the banquet which he himself instituted” (John Paul II, 1985a: No. 5, my translation). Everyone is invited to this banquet, John Paul II stated (John Paul II, 1985a: No. 6), a statement that ritual criticism would have us remember stands in contrast to the practice of only admitting Catholics to the Sacrament. With a quote from Matthew 18: 20, “Where two or Charismatic Christianity. As Harvey Cox put it, Pentecostals “felt more at home singing their theology” than writing books about it (Cox, 1995: Introduction, para. 14, Kindle edition). 8 The Church and family as schools of participation recounts the idea of the family as the “domestic Church” from the central Vatican II document Lumen Gentium, the “Dogmatic Constitution on the Church.” “In it,” the document continues, “parents should, by their word and example, be the first preachers of the faith to their children; they should encourage them in the vocation which is proper to each of them, fostering with special care vocation to a sacred state” (Paul VI, 1964: No. 44).

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three are gathered in my name, there am I in their midst,” the pope emphasized: “How much more is his presence real and living in the community tight around his altar! Here is he in the reality of his flesh and his blood which is at the center of the community,” through which he “makes all one in himself […] for we all partake in the one bread” (John Paul II, 1985a: No. 5, my translation). The pope’s proclamations of Jesus’ real presence simultaneously declare the interfacial potency of the consecrated Host and the gathered community—separated and combined. Those proclamations are also pleas for young people to engage Jesus in transrealm interaction by those very elements. The statements are more than calls for young Catholics to immerse themselves in the superhuman realm, however, as the next example will show. On Palm Sunday, March 31, John Paul II addressed young people once again, this time in Saint Peter’s Square. According to Weigel, an estimated 250,000 partook in the event, while the PCL’s estimation reached 300,000 (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 493; Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). This time, however, the pope’s intended audience was not limited to the group of youth gathered before him. Instead, he spoke to the youth of the entire world—much like Vatican II’s Message to the Youth of the World had done two decades earlier (Paul VI, 1965). The instrument he picked for doing so was an apostolic letter —Dilecti Amici (“Dear friends”)—a phrase that consistently opens John Paul II’s and his successors’ addresses to young people (John Paul II, 1985b).9 Dilecti Amici is the first papal document dedicated to youth as a distinct social segment, as previous mentions of young people are limited to discussions and exhortations regarding “them” in the third person plural. Dilecti Amici centers on four main themes: youth, family, identity, and eternal life. The pope called youth a “special treasure,” and Catholic youth the “youth of the Church” (John Paul II, 1985b: Nos. 3, 1). He described the Church, in turn, in Vatican II terms as “the real youth of the world” (John Paul II, 1985b: No. 16; Paul VI, 1965). With the Cold War undercurrent still strong, the pope warned young people that their youth is not just their own “personal property or the property of a generation” (John Paul II, 1985b: No. 15). Rather, their youth belonged “to the whole of that space that every man 9 Norman and Johnson inaccurately refer to Dilecti Amici as an “Apostolic Exhortation”—a different genre of public papal documents (Norman, 2011: 374). In Polish, there are several words that translate into the English word “friend”: znajonym, kolega, and przyjaciel. Each of these words signals a different level of social proximity and intimacy. Znajonym, literally “[someone] known” is most widely used and may fathom as far as acquaintances and contacts called “friends” on social media sites. Kolega has a dual meaning; it can refer to a “coworker” and “colleague,” or it can mean a friendship that is closer than that indicated by znajonym. Przyjaciel, by contrast, is a close friend, a confidant, and indicates a high level of intimacy. Considering Wojtyła’s Polish background, it is worth noting that, in addressing young people in Polish, he employed przyjaciel, thereby indicating a high level of social proximity—one that implies the kind of intimacy that ordinarily signals social closeness if not hierarchical equality. Used in a meeting between people of different hierarchical ranks it is a noteworthy speech act that reinforces the very hierarchy it appears to diminish.

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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” (John Paul II, 1985b: No. 15). In other words, young people had a responsibility to live their youth in ways that were beneficial to the world at large, thereby conjuring the global perspective established the year before. It was a move against individualization—a call for young Catholics to view their time of youth as a resource they should place at the pope’s disposal. Speaking on behalf of humanity at large, the the pope pointed to a global community. That community was not entirely imagined because humanity was represented by the people around them from countries around the globe. Dilecti Amici was in many ways an updated, adapted, and personalized version of Vatican II’s Message, but with one fundamental difference: John Paul II’s letter framed his message with the conversation between Jesus and a “young man” in Mark 10. This was more than a rhetorical move; it was an invitation to interpret the words of Jesus as spoken to them personally. At the end of the letter, John Paul II made a similar move, this time referencing Mary at the wedding of Cana: “Christ’s Mother says these words to those serving at the feast: ‘Do whatever he tells you’. He, the Christ. I repeat these words of the Mother of God and I address them to you, to each one of you young people: ‘Do whatever Christ tells you’” (John Paul II, 1985b: No. 16). These New Testament phrases, grounded in biblical narrative, were invitations to treat those words as interfacial elements in transrealm interaction with Jesus and Mary.10 By speaking those words himself, the pope became a medium of those words, and suggested that he could also be viewed as an additional interfacial element. Another important date in 1985 is December 20, when the pope announced that WYDs would be held annually, beginning the following Palm Sunday, March 23, 1986 (John Paul II, 1985d). This was done in the Christmas address to the College of Cardinals and the Curia, which opened with the bible passages from Isaiah 40: 5, and Luke 3: 6: “all flesh shall see the salvation of God” (John Paul II, 1985d, my translation). Proto-WYD 1985 was one of three events John Paul II emphasized, and the first of those three he spoke about. Before beginning, he gave thanks to the Trinity for letting the Church celebrate the three events: “It is God who guides history, the history of man and the world.” Interpreted as “salvation history” going according to “a plan of redemptive love that culminates in the Incarnation of the Word.” It was “in this light, [that] the three events receive their full meaning” (John Paul II, 1985d: No. 1, my translation). As in Dilecti Amici, John Paul II again credited the United Nations for the idea of WYD: The UN’s International Year of Youth “is of great 10 Some bible versions emphasize phrases in a similar way, namely the so-called Red Letter versions, where the words of Jesus, and sometimes also of God in the Old Testament, are printed in red rather than the black of the immediate contextual content. Red letter emphases give bible texts a dual layer: They materially distinguish between words spoken by God, and words spoken by humans, instructing readers to treat the red text as interfacial elements in religious interaction.

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significance,” he proclaimed, “for all generations, for individuals, for communities and for the entire society” (John Paul II, 1985d: No. 2, my translation). He also pointed out that “the theme chosen for the XVIII World Day of Peace was, as is well known, ‘Peace and youth go forward together’” (John Paul II, 1985d: No. 2, my translation). Paired with his global perspective, the ambition he had set for young people was to gain and maintain world peace. The way to do that was by realizing their own potential as interfacial bodies— vehicles for God’s invitation to transrealm interaction and immersion in the superhuman realm. John Paul II expressed that God had blessed his meeting with young people “in an extraordinary way, so that, for years to come, it is established [as] World Youth Day, to be celebrated on Palm Sunday, with valid collaboration of the [Pontifical] Council for the Laity” (John Paul II, 1985d: No. 3, my translation). “Christ is looking for young people,” he said, “today as in the day when, looking upon him, he loved that young man (Mk 10, 21), who was questioning him about eternal life” (John Paul II, 1985d: No. 3, my translation). He was telling the College of Cardinals that Jesus was speaking to young people through those bible passages. There were several reasons for the significance of youth, the pope stressed, the first of which was “vocations”; that is, for young people to enter the priesthood and religious orders, “which are the guarantee of fruitfulness of the Church in the third millennium” (John Paul II, 1985d: No. 3, my translation). His audience was painfully aware of the growing challenge of recruiting young people to the priesthood and religious orders (cf. Stark and Finke, 2000), and he presented them with WYD as a solution to that problem. In order to succeed, however, he posited that the Church in its entirety needed to be more committed to youth, “to its anxieties and concerns, their openness and hopes, to corresponding to their expectations, communicating the certainty that is Christ […] through appropriate training, which is [a] necessary and updated form of evangelization” (John Paul II, 1985c: No. 3, my translation). WYD then, was supposed to bring youth certainty in a time of global uncertainty, as part of evangelizing them so that they might be recruited to the priesthood and religious orders, and in any case evangelize others by becoming interfacial elements. The key was participation in the Mass, and which he proclaimed time and again in his various WYD Messages (John Paul II, 1990: No. 2, 1992: No. 4, 1993: No. 5, John Paul II, 1996: Nos. 3, 7, 8; John Paul II, 1997: Nos. 3, 6; John Paul II, 1999: No. 3; John Paul II, 2001: No. 4; John Paul II, 2004: Nos. 3, 4, 7).11 In his Message for WYD 1990, for example, he said:

11 From 1990 onwards, he also began mentioning the Sacrament of Penance—usually in connection with the Eucharist (John Paul II, 1990: No. 2; John Paul II, 1992: No. 4; John Paul II, 1993i: No. 5; John Paul II, 1996: No. 3; John Paul II, 1999: No. 3; John Paul II, 2001: Nos. 1, 4). I look more closely at the connection between the Eucharist and Confession in Chapter 5.

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To be living branches in the vineyard of the Church means above all to be in living communion with Christ the vine. The branches are not self-sufficient; they are totally dependent on the vine. In the vine is the source of their life. Likewise, in Baptism, each one of us was grafted onto Christ, and received the free gift of new life. To be living branches, you must live this reality of your Baptism, deepening every day your communion with the Lord, by listening to his Word and obeying it, by participating in the Eucharist and the sacrament of Reconciliation, and by speaking personally with Our Lord in prayer. Jesus says: “He who abides in me and I in him bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing” (Jn 15:5) (John Paul II, 1989: No. 2).

In terms of religious interaction, John Paul II’s emphatic stress on Jesus’ (real) presence in the Eucharist signaled the Host as an interfacial element to Jesus as a top-ranking superhuman person. Drawing on Jesus’ words—another interfacial element—the community of those who ingest the Host were an interfacial element also. The Eucharist as a means of transrealm interaction was related both to the materialized presence of Jesus, and to the communal body of those ingesting it. Admonitions to “participate” then, were calls to employ the Eucharist as an interfacial element in transrealm interaction with Jesus. Frequent interaction through the Eucharist was equivalent to life itself. In his 1992 Message, he said: “New life, the gift of the risen Lord, then spreads far and wide, flowing into every sphere of human experience: the family, the school, the workplace, everyday activities and leisure time” (John Paul II, 1992: No. 5). And in his Message in 1996, he referred to the community of Mass as a “missionary communion” (John Paul II, 1996: No. 7). Apparently, the solution to the challenge of recruitment was transrealm interaction with Jesus in the Eucharist as interfacial element. WYD would become a means for achieving that purpose. There is one further aspect to this ambition. The pope’s vision for WYD seems to have been that “proper” participation at Mass would turn the participants themselves into an outer layer of interfacial elements; by staying immersed in transrealm interaction with Jesus, they would become this superhuman person’s interface to the outside world. At the first official WYD, Palm Sunday 1986, the pope defined the purpose of the gatherings: “‘Youth Day’ means just this: to go [and] encounter God, who has entered the history of humanity through the Paschal mystery of Jesus Christ. He has entered [it] irreversibly” (John Paul II, 1986a: No. 8, my translation). In the lens of religious interaction, the “meaning” of WYD was transrealm interaction as a response to a superhuman initiative through Jesus as an interfacial person. The “irreversibility” hinted at the permanence of Jesus’ interfacial capacity, available through the Eucharist, as provided by the Church. The proto-WYDs and the first official WYD took place in Rome. Both were enveloped in the pilgrimage occasions of Holy Week (and, in 1984, the Jubilee Year). As time went on, the terms pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage would become more prominent as links to conventional Catholic pilgrimages gradually

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weakened. When the youth gathering of Palm Sunday 1986 was officially named “World Youth Day” ahead of the event, it was set apart from the events in which it had previously been embedded. John Paul II was already traveling extensively, so WYD’s emergence as a singular event that centered on a meeting between the pope and young Catholics both synthesized with existing papal mobility and afforded new occasions to expand mobility. With its mobility came the need to identify what WYD was. 3.1.2 Naming World Youth Day a pilgrimage WYD 1987 took place in Buenos Aires, which detached the event from Rome spatially, even though it remained connected to the Eternal City to the extent that the pope can be said to embody “Rome.” In his Message for WYD 1987, John Paul II mentioned pilgrimage only once, in reference to the annual pilgrimages Argentinians make to the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Luján in Buenos Aires (John Paul II, 1986b No. 4). He repeated that during the Palm Saturday event, calling Mary “the one who guides and comforts you in that pilgrimage through the faith to which the Love of God has destined you” (John Paul II, 1987b). That statement was an invitation to embrace the lusory attitude throughout life, where Mary is always present and available—a faithful companion on a journey that traverses the human and superhuman realms and maintains relationships with those who interact with her. In his Palm Sunday homily at the two-day event, John Paul II called WYD 1987 itself a pilgrimage, greeting “the priests, the religious men and women, and all the others who have accompanied the young [people] on this pilgrimage” (John Paul II, 1987b: No. 2, my translation). It was the first time John Paul II used pilgrimage to describe the concurrent WYD. On Palm Sunday, he used the same word to describe the Palm Sunday gathering in Rome three years earlier (John Paul II, 1987c: No. 2), and pilgrims to describe the participants at that time (John Paul II, 1987c: No. 7). That was the first time John Paul II used pilgrimage to describe an earlier WYD, although he linked it to the Jubilee rather than the youth gathering per se. He fortified the pilgrimage connection by speaking about Jesus and his contemporaries who journeyed to Jerusalem for the Jewish Passover celebrations as pilgrims (John Paul II, 1987c: No. 1), a theme we recognize from WYD 1985. He also spoke of the annual Argentinian pilgrimage to the image of Our Lady of Luján (John Paul II, 1987c: No. 8)—the patroness of Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay (Ball, 2003: 332; Di Stefano and Mauro, 2016: 279; Pereyra, 2014: 585). With roots in a mythical narrative from the seventeenth century, the image is an interfacial element in an interfacial place.12 The narrative encapsulates in the statue the hope of superhuman 12 The mythical narrative involves a “Portuguese landowner in Cordoba” who “wished to build a

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intervention with miraculous results.13 In sum, John Paul II used pilgrimage to refer to the Jubilee youth gatherings, to Jesus in Jerusalem, to visits to Our Lady of Luján, and to WYD 1987. Viewed as a series of speech acts, the use of these terms aligned all WYD locations to one single term and concept. With WYDs so far having been held in places associated with pilgrimage, that series of speech acts conformed to Catholic convention. WYD 1987’s theme song made no references to pilgrim(s) or pilgrimage, but it emphasized brotherhood, solidarity, and a world without borders—the joining of hands that “together will form a stronger chain than war and than death. We know it: Love is the path.”14 Called Un nuevo sol (“A new sun”), the chorus reads (Vatican.va, 2000, my translation): Spanish

English

Un nuevo sol se levanta sobre la nueva civilización que nace hoy. Una cadena más fuerte que el odio y que la muerte lo sabemos: el camino es el amor

A new sun rises on the new civilization that [is] born today. A stronger chain than hatred and than death We know it: love is the path

The hymn played on the theme chosen for WYD 1987: “We ourselves have known and put our faith in God’s love towards ourselves” (John 4: 16), and on the papal Message for WYD 1987, which said “May Jesus be the ‘cornerstone’ (cf. Eph 2: 20) of your life and of the new civilization you are called to build in a spirit of generous solidarity and sharing” (John Paul II, 1986: No. 3). The “new civilization” he had in mind was what he called a “civilization of love” (John Paul II, 1986: No. 3). The idea of the “new evangelization” for the youth of the “new millennium” resulting in a “new civilization” was nothing church in honor of the Immaculate Conception and asked a friend in Buenos Aires to send him an appropriate statue” (Ball, 2003: 332). The landowner was sent two statues, and one of them “was left behind near Lujan when the oxen refused to move until the case containing the statue had been removed” (Ball, 2003: 332). The implication is that Mary-in-the-statue chose that location for a shrine to be built to her. 13 John Paul II had visited the Our Lady of Luján before, in 1982. According to David Pereyra, it attracted the “largest crowd ever of pilgrims in the history of the sanctuary” and, since the first “general pilgrimage” to the Shrine in 1871, “millions of people have come to visit each year” (Pereyra, 2014: 585). 14 Some readers may see the camino as a reference to pilgrimage, but it doing so is a stretch. That same year, John Paul II’s encyclical Sollicitudo Rei Socialis proclaimed: “Solidarity is undoubtedly a Christian virtue” (John Paul II, 1987d: No. 40), and “a path to peace and at the same time to development. For world peace is inconceivable unless the world’s leaders come to recognize that interdependence in itself demands the abandonment of the politics of blocs, the sacrifice of all forms of economic, military or political imperialism, and the transformation of mutual distrust into collaboration. This is precisely the act proper to solidarity among individuals and nations” (John Paul II, 1987d: No. 39).

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short of a global revolution John Paul II worked for towards the turn of the millennium, as José Casanova has also observed (Casanova, 2001: 420). The lyrics do not address God or any other superhuman person in the second person pronoun, so they do not constitute an interfacial element, and singing it was not an act of transrealm interaction. This is one instance where the framework of religious interaction is less helpful for the analysis. Compared to the lyrics of proto-WYD 1984, it was neither gloomy nor pleading, but optimistic and cheerful. Were the lyrics a reflection of a new global “mood”? It would seem so. 1987 saw the start of Mikhail Gorbachev’s realizing his ambitions for the Soviet Union with the introduction of glasnost and perestroika—two programs that would reform the Union and eventually lead it down the path to dissolution (Westad, 2007 [2005]: 375, 381). The Cold War was cooling down and in 1988, the Doomsday Clock was set back to six minutes to midnight, from which point on it was set back further and further until the Cold War ended (Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, 2017). There was also another occasion for optimism. From the beginning of his pontificate, John Paul II had referred to the time before the onset of the third millennium as the “new advent.” He concluded his first encyclical, Redemptor Hominis (1979), with the words: Above all, I implore Mary, the heavenly mother of the Church, to be so good as to devote herself to this prayer of humanity’s new Advent, together with us who make up the Church […] I hope that through this prayer we shall be able to receive the Holy Spirit coming upon us and thus become Christ’s witnesses “to the end of the earth” (John Paul II, 1979b: No. 22).

That quote is itself an act of transrealm interaction with Mary, asking her to continue interaction with God through prayer on behalf of the Church, with the “hope” that every single person in the Church—every limb on Christ’s “mystical body”—would themselves become interfacial elements that would open religious interfaces for the whole world. Returning to WYD 1987, John Paul II made both the gathering and its calendaric occasion, Palm Sunday, interfacial elements that linked contemporaneous WYD participants to Jesus and his contemporaries. Powered by mytho-historical narratives, the pope brought those present to the past by bringing the past to those present, as he had done on many times before. It was the last time, however, that the international gathering would be held on the Palm Weekend, which means that the calendaric link to Catholic pilgrimage events was broken. It would continue, however, to be connected to established pilgrimage sites—at least for a time. The next centralized WYD was held in 1989, in Santiago de Compostela—a city whose historical significance as a Catholic (and later interreligious) pilgrimage destination can barely be overestimated (Mikaelsson, 2011; Slavin, 2003). On that occasion, John Paul II ramped up his use of the terms pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage. “I will go there, a pilgrim like yourselves,” he announced in his

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WYD Message (John Paul II, 1988: No. 3). He also explained what he meant by pilgrimage in this context: “Pilgrimage has a very deep spiritual significance; it can represent in itself an important form of catechesis. The Church – as the Second Vatican Council reminded us – is, indeed, a people of God on the march, ‘in search of a future and permanent city’” (John Paul II, 1988: No. 3). The reason, it appears, was as follows: In the world today there is a revival of the practice of going on pilgrimage, especially among the youth. Today, you are among those more inclined to experience a pilgrimage as a “way” to interior renewal, to a deepening of faith, a strengthening of the sense of communion and solidarity with your brothers and sisters and as a help in discovering your personal vocation (John Paul II, 1988: No. 3).

On the papal level, then, making WYD a pilgrimage was comprised of a series of speech acts. Those speech acts appear to have grown in frequency as a conscious promotion and recruitment strategy in response to observations that the concept appealed to people—young people in particular. That strategy was partly legitimized by invoking Vatican II’s concept of the “pilgrim church” (e. g. O’Malley, 2008: Chapter 1, section 7, para. 26, Kindle edition)—a term that would also find its way into the 1992 Catechism (e. g. nos. 97, 671, 815, 1045, 1111, 2692).15 John Paul II was aware of differences between older and newer understandings of pilgrimage; it was in the context of “today” that young people were “among those more inclined to experience pilgrimage” as “interior.” This suggests that the pope knew well that he was employing pilgrimage in ways that diverged from established uses. References to WYD as a pilgrimage and participants as pilgrim(s) were not just rhetorical tools.16 Nor were they merely artifacts of papal public performance. The chorus of the WYD theme song of 1989, Somos los jóvenes (“We are the young [people]”), made participants identify as pilgrims as they sang (Vatican.va, 2000, my translation): Spanish

English

Somos los jóvenes del dos mil peregrinos siempre en busca de la fuente de la libertad. Seguimos el camino de Santiago que nos lleva a Jesucristo Camino, Vida y Verdad.

We are the young [people] of two thousand pilgrims forever in search of the fount of freedom. We follow the way of Santiago which brings us to Jesus Christ [the] Way, [the] Life and [the] Truth.

15 At the time, the Catechism was in the process of being written, under the auspices of then Cardinal Joseph A. Ratzinger—head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (Benedict XVI, 2011: Foreword, section 1, para. 3, Kindle edition). 16 For a collection of critical examinations of John Paul II’s rhetorics, see Blaney and Zompetti (eds.), 2009.

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The papal vision of WYD as a pilgrimage, then, was transmitted to WYD participants through singing. As we saw earlier, John Paul II was enthused by the advent of the third millennium, which is also referenced here. Those who sang this chorus performatively identified themselves as the youth of the new millennium, specifically in the capacity of being pilgrims. In the absence of ethnographical data, we might speculate that they sang themselves into a pilgrim identity. That identity also enveloped the pope as a pilgrim in the third verse: Spanish

English

El Papa, aún peregrino, al corazón nos habla aquí; la mies ya ha madurado: él espera sólo nuestro sí. Desde este “rincón de cielo” por el mundo nos mandará, por una tierra sin fronteras cuyo destino es la felicidad.

The Pope, still [a] pilgrim he speaks [to] us in our hearts here the harvest is already ripe he only waits for our yes From this “heaven’s corner” he will send us to the world to a land without borders whose destiny is happiness.

Along with the eschatological utopianism indicated in the ripe “harvest” and the borderless future global community of joy, we find the pope embraced as a pilgrim and his message boiled down to one of ambassadorship. The verse is about evangelization and connects the themes of pilgrimage and evangelization in the person of the pope as part of the WYD community. “Heaven’s corner” is on the margins of heaven—here in the human realm, and there in the superhuman realm simultaneously. In his WYD Message for 1990, the pope reiterated that WYD 1989 had been a pilgrimage, as he had gone on pilgrimage “together with many of you” (John Paul II, 1989: No. 1). This speech act included the entire community of WYD 1989 as pilgrims. He repeated that same speech act in his Message for WYD 1991 in Cze˛stochowa as well (John Paul II, 1989: Nos. 6, 7)—a place he himself had visited many times (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 309). Like WYD 1987 before it, WYD 1991 would be particularly linked to Mary: “For each one of us, our pilgrimage will be, therefore, a great act of entrustment to Mary,” he stated, which meant that the journey itself would be a form of transrealm interaction. The pope also described the host location as “a Shrine which, for the Polish people, has a very special significance as a place of evangelization and conversion; a Shrine to which thousands of pilgrims make their way from all parts of the country” (John Paul II, 1989X: No. 6). Once again, John Paul II reinforced the idea of WYD as a pilgrimage by reference to centuries-old pilgrimage traditions already in place. And now, pilgrimage was also about evangelization.

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The theme for WYD 1991 was “You have received a spirit of sonship,” and the official theme song was called Abba Ojcze (Vatican.va, 2000, my translation). Polish

English

Ty wyzwoliłes´ nas Panie Z kajdan i samych siebie A Chrystus staja˛c sie˛ bratem Nauczył nas wołac´ do Ciebie:

You liberated us, Lord From shackles and [from] ourselves And Christ becoming a brother Taught us to call to You:

Abba Ojcze! (x4)

Abba Father! (x4)

Bo Kos´ciół jak drzewo z˙ycia W wiecznos´ci zapuszcza korzenie Przenika nasza˛ codziennos´c´ I pokazuje nam Ciebie

Because the Church is like the tree of life [with] roots reaching into eternity [It] permeates our everyday [living] And guides us to You

Abba Ojcze! (x4)

Abba Father! (x4)

Bóg hojnym Dawca˛ jest z˙ycia On wyswobodził nas z ´smierci I przygarniaja˛c do siebie Uczynił swoimi dziec´mi.

God is [the] generous Giver of life He liberated us from death And embraces us unto himself [He] made us his children

Abba Ojcze! (x4)

Abba Father! (x4)

Wszyscy jestes´my brac´mi Jestes´my jedna˛ rodzina˛. Tej prawdy nic juz˙ nie zac´mi I teraz jest jej godzina.

Everyone we are brothers We are one family This truth is no longer darkened And now is her time [i. e. of truth].

Like the lyrics of the theme song from WYD 1984, parts of these lyrics were also interfacial. The first verse and the chorus are all interfacial elements that invite people to sing to God as father—a form of transrealm interaction that encourages a specific kind of relationship with that superhuman person. The second and third verses align more with the theme songs of the two previous WYDs, emphasizing unity, solidarity, and brotherhood. “The truth is no longer darkened” referred to the fall of the Iron Curtain two years earlier, which allowed for the participation of young people from countries previously under the thumb of the Soviet Union. After WYD 1991 Stanisław Nowak, the Bishop of Cze˛stochowa, called the event a “miracle of unifying the powers of [the] Holy

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Spirit of the Young from [the] East and [the] West” (Nowak, 1991: 5, my translation). It was a realization of what John Paul II had hoped for decades; in his 1987 encyclical Redemptoris Mater, he articulated that hope as the Church breathing “fully with her ‘two lungs,’ the East and the West” (John Paul II, 1987a: No. 34).17 At WYD 1991, the pope saluted those present as pilgrims (pielgrzymek), and declared: “Starting in Saint Peter’s Square in Rome, we pilgrimage [pielgrzymujemy] together through[out] the world” (John Paul II, 1991c: No. 3). The implication was that previous WYDs had been parts of the same pilgrimage, and that pilgrimage in the WYD context was a communal activity with the world as its destination. He elaborated: It is necessary that you enter the great roads of history not only here, in Europe, but on all continents, and everywhere become witnesses of Christ’s blessings: “Blessed are they who bring peace, for they shall be called sons of God” (John Paul II, 1991c: No. 3, my translation).

The purpose of “our pilgrimage,” he stated, was to hear the word of God and to keep it (John Paul II, 1991c: No. 4)—a direct imperative to accept heard messages as interfacial elements. He then addressed Our Lady of Jasna Góra, the icon that was proclaimed Queen of Poland in the 1600s and 1700s (Niedz´wiedz´, 2010): Lady of Jasna Góra, accept our pilgrimage to this particular special Upper Room – like [you did] to the [Upper] Room of Jerusalem, where you stayed in prayer with the apostles before they began “to lead the Holy Spirit” to the ends of the earth (John Paul II, 1991c: No. 4, my translation).

The pope asked that she accept “our multi-lingual Mass, like then – on the Day of Pentecost – you have accepted pilgrims from different nations and languages […] Please lead us on the way of faith after Christ – the way [to which] the Holy Spirit first introduced You” (John Paul II, 1991c: No. 4), before referring to those present as “part of the generation that enters the third millennium” (John Paul II, 1991c: No. 4, my translation). This last quotation is an example of the pope praying to Mary. As an act of transrealm interaction, the content of that prayer also narrativized the icon as Mary by connecting it to the traditional Catholic version of the events at Pentecost, where Jesus’ mother was present in the “Upper Room” in Jerusalem along with the apostles when they received the Holy Spirit. That narrative also provided John Paul II with a link between Mary and evangelization. Invoking the narrative of Pentecost and applying it to WYD 1991 in Cze˛stochowa produced a fountain of references to the past. It drew on the mythical past of Pentecost Day when, according to Acts, the disciples spoke in 17 Those familiar with the Polish language will notice the potential play on words with Duch, “Spirit” and dech “breath.”

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various languages that the people present could understand “each in his own language.” It was a fitting parallel to the multilingual gathering of people before him. To Poles, it would also have been a reference to John Paul II’s first papal visit to Poland during Pentecost in 1979. In one of his speeches during that visit, in Warszawa, he prayed for a new pentecost and for the Holy Spirit to descend upon “this land.” At the time, the square where he spoke was called Plac Zwycie˛stwa (“Victory Square”).18 He also mentioned the mythical events of Pentecost, stating that “[t]he liturgy of the evening of Saturday the Vigil of Pentecost takes us to the Upper Room in Jerusalem, where the Apostles, gathered around Mary the Mother of Christ, were on the following day to receive the Holy Spirit” (John Paul II, 1979c: No. 2, first italics added).19 In terms of religious interaction, John Paul II encouraged those listening—in 1979 and in 1991—to become immersed in the religious past. Pilgrimage was becoming about transrealm interaction and immersion, but it was still connected to a place whose interfacial capacity was testified by miracle stories embodied in votive offerings and enshrined in narratives of Mary’s intervention in the lives of individuals as well as Poland as a whole (Niedz´wiedz´, 2010: Chapter 2, section 3. Chapter 3, Kindle edition; see also figure 3.2). On August 15, the Feast of Mary’s Assumption into heaven, John Paul II “entrusted” the youth and the entire world to Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa (John Paul II, 1991c). This was not just a general consecration, but one of “every human being” (John Paul II, 1991c, my translation). “We want to take responsibility for our future, for the future of the Church and of the world at the beginning of the third millennium,” he said, “so that our children will be able to pass on their faith in God and […] the meaning of life” (John Paul II, 1991c, my translation). His vision was the mission ambition: “All modern reality awaits its complete evangelization. We wish to live – everybody in their way [as] missionaries of this work – together with Christ sanctify and change this world” (John Paul II, 1991c, my translation). Through this public transrealm interaction with Mary, John Paul II tried to make the participants of WYD 1991—whom he considered pilgrims—into evangelizers. The icon at Jasna Góra was not just an interfacial element for Catholics. On August 27, the Cze˛stochowa daily Gazeta Cze˛stochowska, reported that WYD 1991 “has brought our city to Europe and the world.” This was not just due to those present, but also because of “[t]en television stations” that broadcast the main events directly “for many hours.” The Gazeta also reported that, in addition to “thousands of Orthodox Christians from the Soviet Union” and “Lutherans from Western Europe,” “a group of 40 Shiites also came to worship 18 The square was renamed numerous times in the course of the twentieth century. In 1990, it returned to an earlier name: Plac Marszałka Jo´zefa Piłsudskiego. 19 Weigel considers the pope’s 1979 “pilgrimage” to Poland as what “ignited the Polish revolution” of Solidarnos´c´ (“Solidarity”) (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 543).

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the Mother of the Great Prophet,” that is, Jesus. The article went on to call participants at WYD 1991 “pilgrims” (APC 1: A1). To sum up, WYD was named a pilgrimage by the pope in his WYD Messages, speeches, and the rituals he celebrated; by participants who sang theme songs that let them refer to themselves as pilgrims in the WYD context; and in a local newspaper. The context was filled with transrealm interaction with Mary and Jesus/God, and exhortations to evangelize. From the perspective of religious interaction, evangelization was about expanding the social circles of the superhuman persons with whom WYD participants themselves were presumed to interact. 3.1.3 World Youth Day as a pilgrimage In a speech act perspective, applying pilgrimage to a recent phenomenon installs it in Catholicism’s already prolific gallery of pilgrimages. As part of any language, the rules of semantics govern when we may use pilgrimage and when we may not. Definitions of pilgrimage, like those discussed in Chapter 1, are examples of such rules of application. In addition to being context-dependent, definitions are explicit. In the context of WYD, we are rarely so fortunate as to be dealing with explicit rules; we must also take implicit rules and rule construction into account. As I argue in this chapter, it is the tacit connotations to pilgrimage that make its application to WYD so potent. This is where Austin’s concept, further developed by Searle, comes in handy. Austin and Searle classified statements, descriptions, and assertions as illocutionary acts—speech acts that convey the expression of a proposition (Searle, 1969: 24). If WYD is a phenomenon that challenges the rules of application regarding the use of the term pilgrimage, it is through the illocutionary speech acts of those who call WYD a pilgrimage. Duplication of such speech acts performatively adds WYD to the connotations of pilgrimage, and conversely adds pilgrimage to the connotations of WYD. With each utterance these speech acts implicitly renegotiate the rules that govern the application of pilgrimage. If such duplication is diffused in a given group, it has already changed the social rules of when and how to apply pilgrimage. As scholars of religion Alex Norman and Mark Johnson have observed, however, WYD “presents problems when we try to fit it into conventional pilgrimage theory” (2011: 379): Firstly, it has no permanent geographic tradition, which most other pilgrimages have in common. Secondly, at least initially, as an apparently explicitly ‘religious’ pilgrimage, it developed with no clear healing, salvific or retributive dimension, again a key point in other pilgrimages within the Catholic tradition (2011: 379).

The stress should be on “conventional.” From the discussion in the two previous sections, it should be clear that WYDs were permeated with salvific themes from their very beginning, and that at least some of the host cities were

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connected to stories about miraculous events. Furthermore, the framework of religious interaction allows us to see transrealm interaction as a constant theme of WYDs with the purpose of building participants’ relationships with Jesus and Mary. Norman and Johnson yet make an attempt to fit WYD into “conventional pilgrimage theory” by claiming that “John Paul II revived indulgences […] for the WYD in 2000, a measure which coincided with the Jubilee Year” (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 379). They go on to claim that indulgences “added a soteriological ‘legitimacy’ to the pilgrimage which it had previously lacked” (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 379). While the tradition of indulgences was revived for the Jubilee in the Bull of Indiction (John Paul II, 1998: No. 9), no references to indulgence appear even once in any of the papal manuscripts connected to WYD 2000: not in the papal Message for WYD 2000 (John Paul II, 1999), nor in the papal homily for the Mass of the Jubilee on August 17 (John Paul II, 2000c), or even the Closing Mass on August 20 (John Paul II, 2000 f), nor in any of the other five papal manuscripts connected to WYD 2000 (John Paul II, 2000a; 2000b, 2000c, 2000d, 2000e, 2000 f). Indulgences were revived at the Millennium Jubilee, but WYD was apparently not a platform for that revival.20 Perhaps it was not thought to appeal to young people, as John Paul II had predicted pilgrimage for them to mean “interior journey.” Pilgrim(s) and/ or pilgrimage, however, appears in all of the relevant documents (John Paul II, 1998; 2000a, 2000b, 2000c, 2000d, 2000 f), except one—the address at the Saturday night vigil (John Paul II, 2000e). John Paul II made another particularly relevant statement in his Message: “Young people of every continent, do not be afraid to be saints of the new millennium!” (John Paul II, 1999: No. 3). From the perspective of religious interaction, this exhortation implores young people around the world to become interfacial elements—portals to the superhuman realm. The call to be saints might sound like a call to perform miracles, but it appears that was not what he had in mind. Instead, he said:

20 Indulgences in contemporary Catholicism is different from what Martin Luther called the “‘selling’ of indulgences,” which was brought up for discussion at the Council of Constance (1414–1418) and became a “hot point of contention at the Council of Trent” (O’Malley, 2013: 26). The “traffic in indulgences” was “widely observable” and “on the surface often looked like grace and forgiveness on sale at bargain prices” (O’Malley, 2013: 39). At the Council of Trent the legitimacy of indulgences, along with Purgatory and many other doctrines rejected by Protestant reformers, were confirmed (O’Malley, 2013: 133). Historian and Jesuit theologian John W. O’Malley writes that Trent’s “decree on indulgences was short. It declared, incorrectly, that they had been in use in the church ‘from the most ancient times’ and anathemized those who asserted that they were useless or who denied the church’s power to grant them. Then, after enjoining that ‘moderation be used in granting them,’ it [the Council] acknowledged that their abuse had been a cause of great scandal and ordered bishops to stamp out all ‘superstition, ignorance, irreverence and all other abuses’ connected with them” (O’Malley, 2013: 244).

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Be contemplative, love prayer; be coherent with your faith and generous in the service of your brothers and sisters, be active members of the Church and builders of peace. To succeed in this demanding project of life, continue to listen to His Word, draw strength from the Sacraments, especially the Eucharist and Penance. The Lord wants you to be intrepid apostles of his Gospel and builders of a new humanity (John Paul II, 1999: No. 3).

Becoming an interfacial element for the new millennium meant engaging in transrealm interaction through the interfacial elements provided by the church in the sacraments and being immersed in the superhuman realm. To love prayer is to form an emotional attachment to a specific form of transrealm interaction—to stay immersed in the superhuman realm and to invite others to join them. The “new humanity” they would build, then, would be one that creates and upholds religious interfaces between the human and superhuman realms so that interaction could flow freely. Combined with prosocial activity, evangelization would renew the world. As we have seen, by the year 2000, pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage were long since established as papal WYD vocabulary, which added the events to the extensive repertoire of other Catholic pilgrimages such as those to Rome, Lourdes, Fátima, or Guadalupe. In order to find out why WYD was established as a pilgrimage, we need to look at its origins, its early development, and the historical contexts in which these processes took place. So far, we have learned that WYD emerged from a multi-layered context of spatial and temporal pilgrimage associations that crystallized into an event in its own right and was institutionalized ahead of its third celebration. Once thus recognized, it gained mobility and could be relocated to host cities other than its original location. The first three host cities were, like Rome, officially sanctioned pilgrimage destinations with centuries long traditions and significant renown. That status gave legitimacy to WYD as a pilgrimage. Papal references to WYD as a pilgrimage further added to that legitimacy as they increased in frequency and theological sophistication. In that capacity, transrealm interaction with superhuman persons, interfacial elements became prominent, especially the Eucharist and Marian images. Throughout the early WYD period, evangelization became a more central topic. With the whole world entrusted to Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa—John Paul II’s favorite interfacial element to Mary—and the Soviet Union crumbling, WYD as a pilgrimage and evangelization workshop, could turn its gaze on capitalism and consumerism. The reins of conventionalism were off.

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3.2 Acknowledged influences in the official narrative 3.2.1 John Paul II Literature on John Paul II is plentiful. Genres stretch from historical biographies and hagiographies to critical examinations of his rhetorics, writings, and impact on the Catholic Church and the world. Among these, WYD is often among the inventions for which he is credited (e. g. Spinello, 2012: 8). Church historians tend to describe this period as a pinnacle of papal centralization (Collins, 2009: 498; O’Malley, 2010: 328–329). Roger Collins, for example, writes that “[t]he papacy in the twentieth century was more defensive on its impregnable rock than at almost any other time in its past, and more disturbed by changes in human society and in thought than at any previous period, at least since the Reformation” (Collins, 2009: 498). O’Malley cites Vatican II’s attempts at curbing the centralization of Vatican I (1869–1870) as ultimately failed due to John Paul II’s re-centralization. He concludes that “‘Rome’ is today as much the center of Catholicism as it has ever been” and “Catholics today live in an essentially Ultramontanist church” (O’Malley, 2010: 328–329).21 What this means is perhaps best described by religion scholar Evyatar Marienberg: The reigns of popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI were characterized by a growing centralization of power in the Vatican and heavy interventions by its officials in the affairs of local churches […] Many claim that the idea of collegiality, which was developed to some extent at the [Second Vatican] Council at any rate, was emptied of its content during this period, though formally the innovations instituted by the Council were maintained (Marienberg, 2015: 188).

The John Paul II of the first WYDs was “John Paul at the height of his powers” (Perry, 2007: 12)—a relatively young and athletic man as popes go. John Paul II in the 1980s stands in stark contrast to the frail and suffering John Paul II in the 2000s who nevertheless remained a powerful public presence even as his youth and health diminished.22 It was the John Paul II of the 1980s who instituted WYDs, and he would continue to preside over them as he aged.23 A prominent 21 O’Malley uses Ultramontanism in a broader sense than that implied by its original context. In his use, Ultramontanism largely corresponds to papal absolutism. 22 Following John Paul II’s address to the United Nations general assembly in New York, 1995, the Catholic journal Commonweal wrote that the pope possessed “mastery of the media event, a celebrity-driven spectacle that he himself might dismiss as a symptom of the ‘culture of death’ in other contexts” (quoted in Corkery, 2010: 224). 23 John Paul II’s compelling presence in public is often attributed to his past as an actor (e. g. Corkery, 2010: 224, 231), but it would be a mistake to disregard his decades of experience as a teacher and lecturer—not to mention priest and bishop—all of which provided ample training for speaking in public. The Catholic University of Lublin, Poland, where Wojtyła taught for the

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part of the papal program were travels, which John Paul II often referred to as ““pilgrimages” with himself as a “pilgrim.” Quoting reporter Caroline Pigozzi (2005), historian James Corkery writes: “He was ‘a pilgrim, in the original sense of a religious traveller, and his witnessing of the Christian faith in 129 nations, comprising almost all of the 1 billion Roman Catholics on earth’” (Corkery, 2010: 232).24 The now archived official website of the Pontifical Council for the Laity opens its “short history of WYDs” with the words: “Many people say that WYD is Pope John Paul II’s best invention. He used to say that it was the young people themselves who invented it” (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2015). Similar statements can be found in other online “histories” of WYD—official and unofficial (Krakow2016.com, 2016; Pope2016.com, 2016; WorldYouthDay. com, 2017). In other materials like the YouCat (Schoenborn, 2011: No. 65), and in theologian Richard A. Spinello’s comprehensive summary and analysis of the pope’s encyclicals (Spinello, 2012: Chapter 1, section 2, para. 22, Kindle edition), John Paul II is called the “founder of World Youth Days.” Consequently, when Norman and Johnson argue that “WYD is a legacy of John Paul II—a vehicle through which the Catholic Church addresses perceived problems within contemporary Western life, thus providing a new means of evangelism” (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 372), they merely repeat the official magisterial narrative. When scholars refrain from critical inquiry, they legitimize dominant narratives and reinforce their position, which is problematic for several reasons. In this section and the upcoming one, I aim to make those reasons clear. First, asserting that “WYD was born of the apostolic writings of John Paul II” is at least as obscuring of WYD’s history as uncritically “applying the label ‘religious pilgrimage’ to it” is to WYD’s “character” (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 372). While the writings of John Paul II are important sources for understanding the history of WYD, this is not because they are the driving force behind WYD: Manuscripts are not transcripts, and John Paul II was known for spontaneously diverging from his prepared speeches. Speech manuscripts show the officially recorded version of the pope’s words to the longest, now bears the name “John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin” in his honor. Wojtyła also published a drama manuscript and several poetry collections. 24 Corkery also mentions some critical perspectives on John Paul II’s celebrity status. The prominent theologian Hans Küng criticized WYD and the new ecclesial lay movements for drawing “hundreds of thousands of young people, many of them of good will, too many of them devoid of a critical sense […] ultimately, the attraction of the shared event and of what radiated from ‘John Paul Superstar’ proved mostly more important than the content he [the pope] proclaimed” (Corkery, 2010: 237–238). Cardinal and Archbishop of Cologne, Joachim Meisner, responded to Küng’s criticism in 2005 and dismissed it. He was quoted in the American conservative Catholic newspaper National Catholic Register on August 28 that year, saying: “There is nothing for them [Küng and Drewermann] here, as young people are not interested in the silliness they fostered for so long. We don’t need any Drewermann or Küng or anything else stale at WYD” (Drake, 2005).

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(proto-)WYD audiences and are valuable sources despite their insufficient transparency (Sarasin, 2003: 32; cf. von Stuckrad, 2013: 10). These sources also provide indications of transrealm interaction and the dynamic religious interface of WYDs, two elements of which came to be known as the WYD Cross and Icon. Pfadenhauer, too, states that “since the initiation of World Youth Day by Pope John Paul II in 1985, the Catholic Church has been making intensive use of events” (Pfadenhauer, 2010: 382). Monteiro and Marques make the same assertion (Monteiro and Marques, 2015: 71). This corresponds to the Catholic Church’s official narrative of WYD’s historical development, except that the eventization of papal public performance began much earlier. By the first proto-WYD in 1984, John Paul II had already spent six years travelling the world, drawing multitudes wherever he went in public. In a booklength interview, Stanisław Dziwisz—cardinal, Archbishop of Kraków, and personal secretary to Wojtyła for forty years—places the origins of WYD at a youth gathering the pope attended in 1980 outside Paris (Dziwisz, 2008: 164). While the significance of John Paul II’s encounters with young people during his travels should not be underestimated, we also need to take other factors into account. On December 4, 1984, John Paul II appointed Joaquín Navarro-Valls as the director of the Holy See Press Office (Corkery, 2010: 235).25 A member of the “mixed lay-clerical” organization Opus Dei, he was the first lay Catholic to hold that position (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 490). John Paul II also allied himself with other media professionals by hiring a personal photographer, establishing the Vatican Television Center and, later, the Holy See’s official website (Corkery, 2010: 235). Through the potent combination of extensive travel and media use, John Paul II’s pontificate saw the mediatization and eventization of Catholicism reach unprecedented momentum. Besides, the pope’s encounters with young people, such as young Moroccans in Casablanca in 1985 (John Paul II, 1985c), were a continuation of Wojtyła’s youth ministry as priest and bishop. In terms of religious interaction, the proliferation of media use during John Paul II’s pontificate put him upon the global stage and kept him there. In that capacity, he was an interfacial body almost daily, traversing the formerly distant worlds of laity and papacy. To some, he was an interfacial element to the superhuman realm, as is attested by references to him as a “living saint” and the reported shouts demanding his immediate canonization (Mitchell, 2007: 141). One volume of testimonies that attest to this includes a story from a Nebraskan who considered himself “part of the generation called by God through John Paul II to become something greater” (Mitchell, 2007: 25).

25 Before he was employed at the Holy See Press Office, Navarro-Valls (1936–2017) was trained as a psychiatrist. He later became a journalist and chief foreign correspondent for the Madrid newspaper ABC (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 490).

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Another Nebraskan who participated at WYD 2002 in Toronto, wrote that seeing John Paul II there… …was the most powerful feeling I had ever experienced. The Holy Spirit’s presence enveloped me, and I felt as if I was seeing Christ drive right in front of me. The pope was speaking to thousands of youth that day, but I felt as if he was speaking directly to me when he said, “Trust God because he trusts you” (Mitchell, 2007: 27).

To some Catholics, then, John Paul II was an interfacial element already while he lived—an interfacial person whose words could be interpreted as God interacting with them personally. There are also indications that John Paul II’s interfacial capacity increased upon his death. In his very first homily as pope, Benedict XVI’s words suggest transrealm interaction between the new pope and his predecessor: “I seem to feel his strong hand clasping mine; I seem to see his smiling eyes and hear his words, at this moment addressed specifically to me, ‘Do not be afraid!’” (Benedict XVI, 2005: No. 1). Benedict’s words effectively legitimized John Paul II as a superhuman person. A young Belgian priest told me during the vigil in Rome before the canonization, he had prayed to the deceased pope ever since he died: “I wasn’t even going to wait for this [canonization],” he laughed and elaborated: At the moment he passed away, it was like “Now I can talk to him! Now I can pray for his intercession because I know he is with God.” So at the very first moment. Then cardinal Ratzinger said in his homily for his funeral, “He’s now at the house of the Father, and he is blessing us.” From that moment.

For this Belgian priest, John Paul II’s death translocated him to the superhuman realm and thus made him accessible anywhere and at any time through prayer as transrealm interaction. After the canonization of John Paul II and John XXIII on April 27, 2014, John Paul II was named one of the patron saints of WYD in general, and WYD 2016 in particular. Canonization made his body, belongings, and things he had touched into relics and therefore into potential apertures to the superhuman realm. They became elements that those who prayed to him could incorporate into their personal religious interface. Despite ist importance to his legacy, John Paul II himself did not take sole credit for WYDs, and it is time to look at whom he acknowledged and, afterwards, some influences that have so far gone unnoticed. 3.2.2 Catholic “World Days” WYD is one of many “World Days” celebrated in the Catholic Church and marked publicly by popes. On the Vatican’s official websites for Paul VI, John Paul II, Benedict XVI, and Francis, WYD is listed along with World Communications Day, World Day for Consecrated Life, World Food day, World Day for Migrants and Refugees, World Mission Day, World Day of

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Peace, World Day of the Sick, and World Day of Prayer for Vocations (Vatican. va, 2017a, 2017b, 2017c, 2017d).26 This diversity of “World Days” makes apparent the papacy’s global perspective in the post-World War II era, and hints at the many areas that the popes of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries have sought and continue to seek to influence. Table 3.1: Overview of Catholic World Days.

Francis

Benedict XVI

John Paul II

Paul VI

World Communications Day

x

x

x

x

World Day for Consecrated Life

x

x

x

World Food Day

x

x

x

World Day for Migrants and Refugees x

x

x

x

World Mission Day

x

x

x

x

World Day of Peace

x

x

x

x

World Day of the Sick

x

x

x

x

World Day of Prayer for Vocations World Literacy Day World Youth Day

x x

x

x

As can be seen on the table above (table 3.1), World Communications Day, World Day of Migrants and Refugees, World Mission Day, World Day of the Sick, World Day of Prayer for Vocations, and World Day of Peace began being celebrated under Paul VI. As the table shows, a whole series of “World Days” were already in place when John Paul II was elected. What distinguishes WYD from the others is its focus on youth, and its interval manifestations in grand gatherings. That focus was present from its very beginning, unlike its shifting locations or duration over several days. WYD is also the only one among these celebrations that manifests in large-scale transnational and centralized events at different locations each time. As such, WYD fits into the pattern of Catholic World Days, but is exceptional among them.

26 Due to his short pontificate, which only lasted 33 days, John Paul I scarcely had the opportunity to celebrate any of them.

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3.2.3 The United Nations John Paul II had a largely amicable relationship with the United Nations, where the Holy See maintains the status of “Permanent Observer” since 1964.27 It is the only outside influence John Paul II acknowledged for WYD. He did so in Dilecti Amici, referencing the UN’s proclamation of 1985 as the International Youth Year. [T]his is of great significance, first of all for yourselves, and also for people of all ages —individuals, communities and the whole of society. It is of particular significance also for the Church, as the custodian of fundamental truths and values and at the same time as the minister of eternal destinies that man [and] the great human family have in God himself” (John Paul II, 1985b: No. 1).

The theme selected for proto-WYD 1985 was “Peace and Youth Go Forward Together,” and John Paul II addressed his message to “all of you who believe in the urgency of peace”; to parents and educators, political leaders, “men and women of culture,” all “who suffer for the sake of peace and justice,” but “above all to you, the young people of the world, whose decisions about yourselves and your vocation in society will determine the prospects for peace today and tomorrow” (John Paul II, 1984a). Approaching peace as both a challenge and an “immense hope,” John Paul II stated that “violence and injustice have deep roots in the heart of each individual, of each one of us, in people’s everyday ways of thinking and behaving.” He thus aligned the agenda of the Catholic Church with that of the UN. As John Paul II welcomed those present (some of whom he welcomed back), he linked their gathering to 1985 as the UN’s International Youth Year, in the… …awareness that young people have in any project affecting the future. The Church wishes to make its [own] contribution to this initiative. This is why I addressed specifically to you young people the message for the World Day of Peace, 1 January this year. And now we live together this international meeting in which – I see with great joy – you are converged [of] numbers from every part of the world (John Paul II, 1985a, my translation).28

The pope saw the root of human conflict on the grand scale as the same as that which causes conflict “within families, between married couples, between parents and children, in the schools, in professional life, in the relationships between social groups and between the generations.” To him, such conflict was 27 The UN’s official website refers to the Holy See as “the only religious entity represented among the 193 UN Member States and Palestine, the other non-member observer state” (UN News Centre, 2017). 28 Instituted by Pope Paul VI, the Catholic Church has marked the World Day of Peace every year on January 1, each year with a different theme.

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also expressed in “the cases where the basic right to life of the weakest and most defenceless human beings is violated”—a criticism he leveled at everything that interfered with what have become known in Catholic discourse as life issues, ranging from contraception, abortion, and euthanasia to war and genocide (John Paul II, 1984a: No. 1). By the logic of this theological analysis of the condition of humanity at the time, Catholicism was the answer. While I would not suggest we disregard the influence of the United Nations, there were already important differences between WYD and the UN’s International Youth Day: WYD was a gathering of young people from all over the world in one place as well as dispersed throughout the world. The UN’s celebration, however, was not connected to a particular religious institution, nor did it feature a transnational and centralized gathering. Besides, there was a precedent for celebrating World Days in the Church, although the focus on youth and peace may have gained impetus from the UN. 3.2.4 The revivification of pilgrimage trails As noted earlier, old Catholic pilgrimage sites and trails have been revivified, and new sites and trails have been added to the already diverse gallery (Frey, 1998; Mikaelsson, 2005; Mikaelsson, 2011; Slavin, 2003; Stausberg, 2011: 55– 56). For example, sociologist Massimo Faggioli claims that WYD, along with John Paul II’s extensive traveling… …helped the Church accept the shift from a ‘Tridentine’ idea of a local Church to a more vibrant and missionary Catholic Church, a shift that the new Catholic movements found viable for their particular way of structuring themselves, in silent contrast or often in visible friction with their local bishops and the national bishops’ conferences (Faggioli, 2014 (2008): Chapter 9, section 1, para. 3).

To the extent that he self-described publicly as a pilgrim during his travels and was called a pilgrim by Church authorities and in the news media, the idea of the pope traveling in the capacity of being a pilgrim was disseminated. In this way, the pope’s own travels added to the revivification of old pilgrimage trails, but WYD also made him a trailblazer for new ones. John Paul II was fully aware of this development, as is obvious from the references he made to the “revival of the practice of going on pilgrimage, especially among the youth” in 1988 (John Paul II, 1988: No. 3). “I feel sure,” the pope said, “that, thanks to your youthful enthusiasm, this year will see a new and rich development of the ‘Santiago Trail’” (John Paul II, 1988: No. 3). The pope himself, then, hinted that observing how young people took interest in pilgrimage was part of the reason for making WYD a pilgrimage and for organizing it in officially sanctioned and popular pilgrimage sites.29 Tapping 29 Following the precedent of Paul VI, John Paul II put pilgrimage on the global Catholic agenda

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into such a trend seems to have been an obvious course of action, especially since WYD plays a significant part in a specific, global Catholic project: the new evangelization. 3.2.5 The new evangelization The new evangelization denotes an effort of continuous religious renewal directed mainly at non-ordained Catholics. The new evangelization involves a plethora of lay organizations, and seeks to turn the tide of decline in recruitment to the priesthood in proportion to growth of Catholics worldwide, magisterial influence on lay Catholics in Europe, the Americas, and Australia and, in a wider perspective, perceived secularization. While, as a consequence, countries in Europe and the Americas tend to be mentioned the most often in this connection, the horizon of the new evangelization as a mission ambition is nothing short of global (Kim and Grogan, 2015; Martin and Williamson, 2006; Martin, 2010; Rymarz, 2010a; Rymarz, 2010b; Rymarz, 2010c). Journalist John L. Allen, jr. writes in The Future Church: Under Pope John Paul II, the Catholic Church made an enormous investment in youth ministry, meaning outreach to Catholics from grade school through their young adult years. Such a commitment makes great sense. In a time of declining vocations, it’s a way of inviting young people to consider the priesthood and religious life. In an era of increasing secularization, it’s a way of trying to counteract the values young people absorb fom the broader culture. In the global South, the option for youth is also a natural demographic choice, given the relative youthfulness of most societies (Allen, 2009: 162).

The new evangelization is also directed at young Catholics so that they, in turn, may become its agents.30 It became a way of realizing Vatican II’s vision of a through his many papal travels styled as such. Paul VI had already been called the “pilgrim pope” due to his papal travels reaching six continents. John Paul II’s increase in international travel frequency and self-descriptions as a pilgrim ensured that the title was also applied to him (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 591). On October 5, 1979, during John Paul II’s visit to the United States, the cover of Chicago Tribune was one large photograph of the pope with the headline: “A pilgrim in our midst” (Chicago Tribune, 1979). In his history of the popes, John W. O’Malley, jokingly writes of John Paul II—“no prisoner of the Vatican, he!” (O’Malley, 2010: 315), pointing out the contrast between John Paul II and Pius IX, his predecessor by one century, who declared himself precisely a “prisoner of the Vatican,” admittedly under very different circumstances (O’Malley, 2010: 249). 30 The mission ambition of the new evangelization is not completely uncontroversial. A pamphlet authored by the late Jesuit theologian Cardinal Avery Dulles in 1992 reads: “The majority of Catholics are not strongly inclined toward evangelization. The very term has for them a Protestant ring” (Dulles, 1992: 1). Most Catholics, he maintained, were more involved in “the inner problems of the Church,” and felt “little responsibility for spreading the faith” (Dulles, 1992: 1). It was partly through Protestant theological influence, Dulles argued, that the “terminology of evangelization came into Catholic literature” in the mid-twentieth century, despite Catholicism’s long and extensive history of “missionary involvement” (Dulles, 1992: 1–2).

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missionary laity—a vision found in numerous Council documents.31 Richard Rymarz, who wrote his dissertation on the topic, calls WYD “one of the clearest indicators of his [John Paul II’s] emphasis on the New Evangelization” (Rymarz 2007: 387). According to him, the roots of the new evangelization reach at least as far back as the pontificate of John XXIII (1958–1963), who reportedly stated that “The purpose of this Council is, therefore, evangelization” (quoted in Rymarz, 2010c: 36). This places the origins of the new evangelization in the time before the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965). The theme song of proto-WYD 1984, where young Catholics sang their pleas to God for the salvation of humanity and the world, must have struck a chord with John Paul II, who participated at Vatican II two decades earlier: A document that proceeded from the Council—one often ignored—was the relatively brief Message of the II Vatican Council to Youth (Paul VI, 1965d). As the Council’s “final message,” it is a short appendix to the weighty documents much more frequently analyzed and debated, like Lumen Gentium and Gaudium et Spes (Paul VI, 1964, 1965c). The Council’s Message is interesting for many reasons, but I want to draw attention to four points in particular: First, it demonstrates consciousness of an intergenerational relationship between the “old” and “young” of the Catholic Church. Second, it was the first conciliar document dedicated to youth as a distinct social segment. Third, it promotes values that are clearly intended to be universal rather than specifically Catholic. Fourth, it contains a striking sense of urgency for concerns of global relevance. Together, these factors foreshadowed the themes that would permeate the first WYDs two decades later. Referencing Christ as “the great Living One” who is “eternally young,” the Message called on the youth of the world to build a society that would “respect the dignity, the liberty, and the rights of individuals. These individuals are you” (Paul VI, 1965d). In this context, the meaning of the “youth of the world” is two-fold. On the one hand we find the generalized, universal meaning of all the world’s young people. On the other hand, the document stated that “the Church is the real youth of the world,” because in the eyes of the Council Fathers, the Catholic Church “possesses what constitutes the strength and the charm of youth, that is to say, the ability to rejoice with what is beginning, to give oneself unreservedly, to renew oneself and to set out again for new conquests” (Paul VI, 1965d, italics added). “To renew oneself and set out again for new conquests”—those words sum up the purpose not only of WYD, but of the New Evangelization as a whole.32 31 Apostolicam Actuositatem called lay Catholics “indispensable […] in the mission of the Church” (1965a: No. 1), but that statement was self-consciously a summary and reiteration of what had been established in documents already published (Paul VI, 1964, 1965c). In calling the laity “indispensable” for evangelization efforts, Apostolicam Actuositatem gave equal importance to lay Catholics and members of religious orders, the latter of whom were called “indispensable” in the same capacity in the Council’s decree on mission, Ad Gentes (Paul VI, 1965b: No. 15). 32 Ad Gentes: On the Mission Activity of the Church was also important in this respect (Dulles, 1992:

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Pope Paul VI’s apostolic exhortation Evangelii Nuntiandi was also an important source of influence (Dulles, 1992: 4–5; Rymarz, 2010c: 3, 37–42, 48– 51; Paul VI, 1975: cf), as was the Conference of the Latin American Bishops of 1968 in Medellín (CELAM, 1968). At CELAM in Puebla 1979, John Paul II quoted Evangelii Nuntiandi “extensively” (Dulles, 1992: 6)—23 times in total (John Paul II, 1979a), and the concluding document said that “evangelization in the future depends in large part on the ‘home Church [Iglesia doméstica]’”—that is, on the family (CELAM, 1979: No. IV a, my translation). The same document affirmed the importance of priests and members of religious orders (CELAM, 1979: No. IVb). Importantly, it also contained a short but significant section on youth: c) The youth. What [great] hope the Church places in [them]! What [great] energies circulate in the youth, in Latin America, which [is] needed [by] the Church! How close must we, the pastors, be to [them], so that Christ and the Church, so that the love for brother[s] may sink deeply into [their] hearts (CELAM, 1979: No. IV c, my translation).

Although John Paul II played a significant role in catalyzing the new evangelization, bestowing sole credit for its development upon him would be inaccurate. Perhaps it is more precise to say with church historian Massimo Faggioli, that John Paul II “launched” the project (Faggioli, 2014 [2008]: Prologue, section 1, para. 3, Kindle edition), but not without certain caveats. Today, the new evangelization takes many forms, including catechesis and recruitment to youth groups in parishes and dioceses. Employing new technologies for communicating with youth, platforms like social media sites and smartphone applications are continuously developed, as we will see some examples of later. The use of such media is part and parcel of the promotion and preparation processes for WYD. In addition, WYD is itself an advertising platform for new Catholic smartphone apps, such as DoCat. A Catholic social teaching app, DoCat was repeatedly announced and recommended over the speaker system at WYD 2016’s main events. WYD and the new evangelization are intricately intertwined. In Crossing the Threshold of Hope, John Paul II writes: In the context of the new evangelization, today’s rediscovery of the authentic values found in popular piety is very significant. Until fairly recently there was a tendency to look down upon popular piety. In our time, however, some of its expressions are experiencing a true rebirth—for example, the revival of former pilgrimages and the establishment of new ones. Thus, the unforgettable witness of the gathering at 3; Rymarz, 2010c: 3, 28, 34–38). Its relevance is perhaps best encapsulated in its opening words: “Divinely sent to the nations of the world to be unto them ‘a universal sacrament of salvation,’ the Church, driven by the inner necessity of her own catholicity, and obeying the mandate of her Founder […] strives ever to proclaim the Gospel to all men” (Paul VI, 1965b: No. 1).

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Santiago de Compostela (1989) was followed by the experience of Jasna Góra in Cze˛stochowa (1991). The younger generations in particular are excited about pilgrimages. Not only in the Old World but also in the United States, where, despite the absence of tradition of pilgrimage to shrines, the World Youth Day in Denver (1993) brought together hundreds of thousands of young believers in Christ (John Paul II, 2005 [1994]: Chapter 18, para. 25, Kindle edition, all italics in original).

The pilgrimages mentioned by the pope here, are all WYDs. He also says: There exists today the clear need for a new evangelization. There is the need for a proclamation of the Gospel capable of accompanying man on his pilgrim way, capable of walking alongside the younger generation. Isn’t such a need already a sign of the approach of the year 2000? With ever greater frequency pilgrims are looking toward the Holy Land, toward Nazareth, Bethlehem, and Jerusalem. The people of God of the Old and New Testaments are alive in the younger generation and, at the end of twentieth century, have the same experience as Abraham, who followed the voice of God who called him to set out upon the pilgrimage of faith. And what other phrase do we hear more often in the Gospel than this: “Follow me” (Mt 8:22)? This is a call to the people of today, especially the young, to follow the paths of the Gospel in the direction of a better world (John Paul II, 2005 [1994]: Chapter 18, para. 26, Kindle edition, all italics in original).

I quote these excerpts at length because they demonstrate just how interwoven the new evangelization was with both pilgrimage and WYD. We might say that, for John Paul II, pilgrimage in the context of WYD is evangelization of youth. The target audience is young people, who can have “the same experience” as Abraham and “hear” the voice of God. The question is what John Paul II meant by that and how he thought people “hear” God. The pope answered this by pointing to Jesus quotes in the Gospel texts and redirecting them to the young people in attendance. It was by those Jesus quotes that John Paul II wanted young people to have the “same experience” as Abraham. It was through that specific medium that could they “hear” God. From a theological point of view, “hearing” God through the words of Jesus is a matter of course because Jesus is himself the incarnate Word of God. From a religious media perspective, the bible text is the medium by which these words are conveyed. From the perspective of religious interaction, however, these words are a specific kind of medium; understood as God interacting with the reader, they are interfacial elements that enable people to “hear” (or read) messages from a superhuman person—not to Jesus’ disciples, but to them personally in a completely different time and place. In this view, propagation efforts like evangelization can be interpreted in three ways: as efforts to invite people to enter into relationships with superhuman persons that are new to them, to enter into new kinds of relationships with superhuman persons they are familiar with already, or to start using a specific interfacial element in interaction with a given superhu-

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man person. All three would be informed by the culturally conditioned norms of their respective religious group. The ritual focus of the new evangelization is the sacraments, particularly the Eucharist. Rymarz writes that “Any programme of new evangelization must be centered on the Eucharist as an expression of the theological reality of the Church and also the notion that the Eucharist feeds the Body of Christ” (Rymarz, 2010 #8030 88). With WYD being a new evangelization event, we should expect to find the sacraments not only enacted, but also promoted at WYDs. We will see examples of this in Chapters 5 and 6. Paul Post and Suzanne van der Beek have written on pilgrimages from the perspective of ritual criticism, “[p]ilgrimages were criticized for distracting people from the central core of their faith, for propagating non-Christian practices, for putting people in dangerous situations and leading them into all kinds of temptations, and for undermining the authority of the church and of ritual experts” (Post and Van der Beek, 2016: 2–3). The question of what is the “central core of the faith,” however, invites an essentialist assumption: that the “core of the faith” is the sacraments, the Eucharist in particular. According to Catholic doctrine, the performance of these two sacraments is inextricably linked to clerical authority because only ordained priests are allowed to hear Confession and perform the Sacred Liturgy that produces the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist. By focusing on Confession and the Eucharist, and by locating WYD to a host city that is both an officially sanctioned pilgrimage site and presumably of touristic interest, the festival organizers tap into the pilgrimage and tourism industries. By centering the events around papal presence, it strengthens papal authority. By implication, this reinforces the authority of the clerical hierarchy in general, as it is by virtue of being the topmost bishop of the Catholic hierarchy that the pope as the Bishop of Rome is invested with the authority he possesses. By focusing on these specific sacraments, WYD advertises Catholic priesthood as the exclusive way of gaining access to their performance. 3.2.6 Christocentrism and mariocentrism The focus on Confession and the Eucharist also implies a christocentric emphasis that is obvious at WYD 2016 with the Divine Mercy image(s) and less conspicuous when located at or in the vicinity of Marian shrines. Christocentrism and mariocentrism are sometimes seen as competing Catholic devotional cultures, and mariocentric cultures are perpetually vulnerable to christocentric criticism. This made an impact on the young Karol Wojtyła when he felt a need to “distance myself a bit from the Marian devotion of my childhood, in order to focus more on Christ” (John Paul II, 2005 [1994]: Chapter 32, section 1, para. 3, Kindle edition). That changed, however, when he read Saint Louis-Marie Grignion de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary, through which he “came to understand that true devotion to the Mother of God is actually Christocentric,

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indeed, it is very profoundly rooted in the Mystery of the Blessed Trinity, and the mysteries of the Incarnation and Redemption” (John Paul II, 2005 [1994]: Chapter 32, section 1, para. 3, Kindle edition, italics in original). By virtue of this interpretation of Marian devotion, Wojtyła’s relationship to Mary gained new theological legitimacy. Taking the episcopal motto Totus Tuus (“forever yours”, indicating Mary), he went on to become one in a successive line of Marian popes that includes Pius XII, Paul VI and John Paul I.33 From that theological stance, viewing christocentrism and mariocentrism as competing devotional cultures would seem misguided. To the extent that WYD is christocentric, the location of WYD at Marian shrines like Luján or Cze˛stochowa suggests that Marian devotion is seen to feed into and strengthen christocentrism. This is one example where the framework of religious interaction offers little help: If Mary is considered a superhuman person—an inhabitant of the superhuman realm—and a link to Christ, she would be considered an interfacial person. Yet such a perspective would miss the importance and prevalence of Marian devotions that involve interacting with her directly, appealing to her own agency. That agency is not visible in the Hail Mary, where she is mainly an intercessor (“Pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death”), but far more so in other writings. Using the framework of religious interaction can make it difficult to accommodate one superhuman person functioning as an interfacial element to another, because they are both considered inhabitants of the same superhuman realm. To the extent that pilgrimages to Marian shrines in the WYD context are intended to be christocentric, the framework of religious interaction is insufficient to clarify that dimension and examine that aspect of WYD location strategies. The pope’s consecration of Argentina to Our Lady of Luján, for example, is one in a long series of John Paul II’s consecrations of nations, countries, and even the world to Mary in her various forms. The consecration at Luján was closely tied to his encyclical Redemptoris Mater, published earlier that year (John Paul II, 1987a). In that encyclical, John Paul II spoke extensively of Mary’s “pilgrimage of faith”: It was not “just a question of the Virgin Mother’s life-story, of her personal journey of faith and ‘the better part’ which is hers in the mystery of salvation,” he specified; “it is also a question of the history of the whole People of God, of all those who take part in the same ‘pilgrimage of faith’” (John Paul II, 1987a: No. 5). Drawing legitimacy from Vatican II documents, the pope used the title “Pilgrim Church” to refer to current Catholics, and wrote that the “pilgrimage of faith no longer belongs to the Mother of the Son of God: glorified at the side of her Son in heaven, Mary has already crossed the threshold between faith and that vision which is ‘face to face’” (John Paul II, 1987a: No. 6). Mary was already an inhabitant of the same superhuman realm that is considered Jesus’ residence. Comparing Mary’s 33 Pius XII canonized Louis-Marie Grignion de Montfort in 1947.

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story to that of Abraham, John Paul II presented her pilgrimage of faith as a journey “towards God,” and as “obedience of faith” with “ever greater heroism” (John Paul II, 1987a: No. 14). That journey, he claimed, was characterized by living “in intimacy with the mystery of her Son” (John Paul II, 1987a: No. 17). “Faith,” it turns out, was an intimate and obediant relationship with Jesus. Such a relationship was available to the “Pilgrim Church” through transrealm interaction, and Mary was the one who “guides the faithful to the Eucharist” (John Paul II, 1987a: No. 44). 3.2.7 The emergent official narrative By way of conclusion, the emergent official narrative of WYD’s origins is one where John Paul II carried his pre-papal youth ministry into the papacy where, inspired partly by Vatican II, partly by his experience from Poland, partly by his encounters with youth during papal travels around the world, partly by the new evangelization, and partly by the United Nations. Voilà: The idea of WYD was conceived and realized over a series of consecutive events. There is nothing obviously questionable about this narrative, but it is problematic for several reasons. First, it does not answer why WYD was conceived in the first place, nor why it came to be called a pilgrimage. Second, while it is obvious that John Paul II played a pivotal part in the realization of WYD, crediting this single individual with its invention needs to be seen in the context of the construction of John Paul II as a saint, which was an important magisterial agenda until the he was canonized in 2014. In other words, systematically crediting John Paul II with the invention of WYD, served a specific strategy with a particular goal, and leaves of questions unanswered. A third problem is that the attribution to John Paul II alone veils the global contexts of struggle for influence in which WYD was conceived. Those factors suggest some intriguing other possibilities.

3.3 Other possible influences 3.3.1 Contextualizing World Youth Day In the mid-1980s, the Catholic Church was entrenched in battles for influence on three fronts. American capitalism and Soviet communism struggled for dominance in a post-World War II global modernity (Westad, 2007 [2005]: 17). John Paul II repeatedly criticized both systems (John Paul II, 1981: No. 7, 1987d: Nos. 15, 21, 1991a: Nos. 8, 33, 42), and affirmed Catholic social teaching as a different route—a response to the dangers he perceived in both systems. Yet he explicitly denied that Catholic social teaching was a “‘third way’ between

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liberal capitalism and Marxist collectivism” (John Paul II, 1987d: No. 41). A third contender for influence was encroaching on what had been secure Catholic territory since the colonization of Latin America: As political scientist Guillermo Trejo has argued, Charismatic and Evangelical branches of Protestantism were growing rapidly, especially among the poor. That growth gave Catholic bishops and priests, who previously catered mainly to “rich and powerful elites,” a new and powerful incentive to reinvent their approach to the poorer segments of Latin American societies (Trejo, 2009: 340; cf. Cox, 1995: Introduction, para. 31, Kindle edition). For a long time, the struggle between Catholicism and Charismatic Christianity over Latin Americans received less attention than liberation theology, which has given way to the assumption that the “reformation is being fought, by and large, within the Catholic Church” (Stoll, 1990: Preface, Section 1, para. 1, Kindle edition). A decade later, sociologist José Casanova wrote: Pentecostal Christianity […] is already the most dynamic and fastest growing sector of Protestant Christianity worldwide and is likely to become the predominant global form of Christianity of the 21st century, possibly linking all the Christian churches (Casanova, 2001: 435).

Unlike his criticism of the influences from liberal capitalism and Marxist collectivism, John Paul II welcomed and encouraged Catholic absorption of Charismatic Christianity as a legitimate expression of Catholicism in the form of the Charismatic Catholic Renewal. It was a direct consequence of Catholics turning Charismatic. The strategy on this front, while still competitive, was also marked by post-Vatican II ecumenism and absorption. 3.3.2 The communist World Youth Festival The United Nations celebrated youth-themed “World Days” long before the Catholic Church did, but so did communist countries, not least the Soviet Union and its allies. There was one important difference between the UN and the communist youth festivals however: The communist World Youth Festival (WYF, also called the World Festival of Youth and Students) was initially a biannual mass event hosted at one designated location, while the celebrations of the UN’s International Youth Days are distributed into smaller local celebrations. WYD involves both types, with bi- (and later tri-)annual international mass gatherings, and diocesan level celebrations in the years between the mass gatherings. The parallels between WYD and WYF are therefore also stronger than between WYD and the UN’s International Youth Day. The communist WYF focused on brotherhood, solidarity, and transnational encounters—themes we have seen were important at the first WYDs as well. WYF began in 1947 and was first held bi-annually in different cities under

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communist rule—an interval that parallels WYD under John Paul II. Furthermore, like WYD, WYF’s host cities changed with each celebration: The first was held in Prague before heading on to Budapest, East Berlin, Bucharest, Warszawa, Moscow, Vienna, Helsinki, Sofia, Havana, and Pyongyang. It was then discontinued for nearly a decade and re-launched in Havana in 1997. In August 1955, WYF was held in Warszawa. Each WYF came with a slogan that contained the word peace. According to historian Jon Piccini, Charles Bresland, the Secretary of the youth wing of the Communist Party of Australia, “headed a large delegation” to WYF 1957 in Moscow. “Bresland’s report back,” Piccini notes, “displayed all the piety of a religious pilgrimage. Not only was the USSR awash with bright-faced and committed youth; it was devoted to peace and modernisation after the horrors of the Second World War” (Piccini, 2012: 178–179). Over the next decade, however, tensions and discontent with Soviet influence rose and were systematically culled. Consequently, at WYF 1968 in Sofia, Piccini writes, “much had changed” (Piccini, 2012: 179). Unity had turned to criticism of “bureaucratic timidity, political manipulation and police repression behind the Iron Curtain” (Piccini, 2012: 179). Interestingly, like WYD participants, WYF participants were also sometimes called “pilgrims”—quotation marks and all (Piccini, 2012: 180). It is highly probable that Wojtyła, who taught young adult Catholic students in Poland at the time, was aware of these events. First of all, he kept close contact with the Archbishop of Warszawa and primate of Poland, cardinal Stefan Wyszyn´ski, whom we will return to shortly. Second, the event was covered by various news channels, including the black-and-white weekly video chronicle Polska Kronika Filmowa (YouTube channel: dornista102, 2011). The chronicle issue shows encounters between young people from many different countries, marked by differences in language, and a variety of flags—themes my research has shown were important to the realization of transnational encounters at WYD 2016 (Skjoldli, 2017). While it would be anachronistic to transfer those research results to earlier WYDs, earlier sections in this chapter also show the importance of transnational encounters. Last, but not least, Wojtyła took great interest in youth ministry throughout his time as a priest and bishop. With this in mind, consider the following quote from George Weigel’s Witness to Hope—a biography that should be read with Weigel’s Republican brand of conservative Catholicism in mind. Weigel gives as his source an interview with the pope in 1997 (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 933): The idea of World Youth Day, the Pope remembered, could be traced back to his young friends in S´rodowisko and their exploration of the personal and vocational dynamics of adolescence and young adulthood (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 492).

S´rodowisko (“environment” or “milieu”) was the name of a youth group Wojtyła, under the pseudonym “Uncle Wujek,” organized during the Polish

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socialist regime (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 99). It developed into a “fusing of several networks of young adults and young married couples with whom Father Wojtyła worked” (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 98). Weigel also mentions: Like other charismatic personalities, Father Blachnicki had his rough edges. But Wojtyła admired the man who, he later recalled, “in some measure saved Polish youth.” And Blachnicki did so not only by creating summer “Oases” that were less morally threatening than the communist youth camps (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 195).

According to Weigel, Wojtyła first met Blachnicki in the mid-1950s. Blachnicki, for his part, was “the central figure in a youth movement called ‘Light and Life,’ which had evolved out of another Blachnicki movement,” namely the “Oasis” movement mentioned above (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 194). Though the precise year and date of their first encounter remains unknown, there are reports that Wojtyła led a retreat where Blachnicki took part in August 1955—the same month WYF was held in Warszawa, for example on the official website of the Light-Life Movement (The Light-Life Movement, 2017). Although concrete evidence remains elusive, it seems likely that the two, who shared such a strong interest in youth ministry, would have conversed and shared concerns about WYF. The Light-Life Movement, for its part, boasts its role as the personal inspiration for WYDs (The Light-Life Movement, 2017), linking to a video with the same message (YouTube channel: Oaza na S´DM, 2017). We need not take these secondary sources’ word for it. In his last book, John Paul II himself wrote: As the communists suppressed all Catholic youth associations, a way had to be found to remedy the situation. The Servant of God, Father Franciszek Blachnicki, came upon the scene and initiated the so-called Oasis Movement. I became closely involved with this movement and tried to support it in every way possible (John Paul II, 2004: Chapter 3, section 4, para. 2, Kindle edition).34

Wojtyła’s support included financial support as well as participation in “Oasis” activities. He goes on: During the summer vacation I would often visit the so-called oases, which were camps organized for the young people belonging to the movement. I would preach to them, speak with them, climb mountains with them, and sing with them around the fire. I frequently celebrated Mass for them in the open air. This all added up to a really intensive pastoral program (John Paul II, 2004: Chapter 3, section 4, para. 2, Kindle edition).

John Paul II further states that he brought these experiences with him to Rome. “Here too, I looked for ways to put it to good use, taking as many opportunities as I could to meet young people. In a sense, the World Youth Days could be 34 Servant of God is a title given those whose canonization process has reached the Vatican’s Congregation for the Causes of Saints and is officially a candidate for sainthood.

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seen as a fruit of that experience” (John Paul II, 2004: Chapter 3, section 4, para. 4, Kindle edition). If we combine the experience of the Oasis Movement with the competition over youth with communism, it is easy to see how the transnational communist WYF could have given impetus to initiate large scale events that might counter ist influence. It seems likely that WYD became the Catholic response to communist WYFs. With the many events that already centered on John Paul II as a traveling pope, all that was needed was to take the WYF concept and replace communist content with Catholic content like openair Mass celebrations, which we have seen are part of the regular event design. WYDs and WYFs are both held at several years’ intervals, held in different places each time, sport a thematic slogan, and emphasize international peace and solidarity. Although WYF had no single, celebrity leader whose presence could be used to organize its events and attract participants, it was tied to the ruling communist or parties of its host countries. Consequently, it was “not a horizontalist event” and, according to Lesley J. Wood, “is still dominated by communist parties. Coming out of the Soviet context, this model continues to be dependent on state support” (Wood, 2010: 58). Like WYD, WYF is a topdown initiative. Hosting WYDs requires extensive preparations through concerted efforts by the Catholic Church and state and city authorities of the host countries, just as hosting WYF did. For example, according to Maoz Azaryahu, 159 of the East Berlin’s streets were renamed in April 1951: It is tempting to connect the actual timing of the operation with the “Third World Festival of Youth and Students”, planned for the summer of 1951 in East Berlin. This festival was of crucial importance to the East German regime. It signalled the recognition of the GDR as a member of the socialist community. The Party, conscious of the festival’s significance, tried to “make visible the change which had been accomplished since the liberation from fascism” (Azaryahu, 1986: 591).

The parallel of interest here is not so much one of renaming, but of accommodating the interests of the parties whose message(s) would be encapsulated and promoted in and by their respective festivals. In Poland, public events were already part of the Catholic Church’s toolbox for combating communism, and they revolved around key interfacial elements. 3.3.3 Polish precursors to the World Youth Day Cross The WYD Cross is a wooden cross that stands 3.8 meters tall. It has many names, including the “Holy Year Cross,” the “Jubilee Cross,” the “Pilgrim Cross,” the “WYD Cross,” and the “Youth Cross” (Gebhardt et al, 2007: 13; Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). Upon the 30-year-anniversary of the festival, in 2014, the Pontifical Council for the Laity released a short summary of the history of the “Youth Cross” (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). For clarity, I have chosen to consistently refer to it as the WYD Cross. According to

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the PCL’s summary, the origin of the WYD Cross was that “Pope John Paul II felt that there should be a cross – the symbol of our faith – near the main altar in Saint Peter’s Basilica where it could be seen by everyone” (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014).35 After the conclusion of the Holy Year by the pope’s closing of the Holy Door of Saint Peter’s Basilica, John Paul II “entrusted that Cross to the youth of the world, represented by the young people from the San Lorenzo Youth Centre in Rome” (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). On that occasion, the pope is reported to have said: My dear young people, at the conclusion of the Holy Year, I entrust to you the sign of this Jubilee Year: the Cross of Christ! Carry it throughout the world as a symbol of Christ’s love for humanity, and proclaim to everyone that it is only in Christ, who died and rose from the dead, that salvation and redemption are to be found (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014).

The origin of the WYD cross is, like that of WYD itself, embedded in the celebration of the Holy Year of the Redemption (1983–1984), when the pope wanted a cross placed inside Saint Peter’s Basilica for the Holy Year. Unlike most other Catholic churches, Saint Peter’s Basilica features relatively few prominent crosses and crucifixes. Sculptures, mosaics, and paintings inside the Basilica mostly depict saints and popes, and can therefore be viewed as a monument primarily to the Church itself, and to the Holy Spirit. Presenting the WYD Cross as “the Cross of Christ” is an intriguing speech act which, in a Catholic context, may be associated with the many alleged pieces of the “True Cross”— the ultimate relic whose pieces are scattered around the world. Imbuing a particular material object of the same shape with similar connotations, encourages listeners to draw a symbolic parallel between the WYD Cross and the “True Cross” of the Gospel narrative. Yet the interfacial quality of the WYD Cross does not rest on this speculative point. Rather, it is John Paul II’s exhortation to “[c]arry it throughout the world as a symbol of Christ’s love for humanity” and how the first WYD Cross was treated upon its retirement. The first is a direct command to evangelize, which was anchored in a material object with the shape of a universal Christian symbol. In this context, carrying a symbolic material object enables a visual and performative form of evangelization that complements verbal persuasion efforts in other forms of mission. Here, that form became central. The WYD Cross’ travels have themselves been called pilgrimages, perhaps indicating that agency is attributed to the object itself; the “pilgrimage of the Holy Year Cross” did 35 See also (Centro San Lorenzo, 2016). As the ecclesial body charged with the topmost responsibility for organizing WYD, the PCL pick a selection committee to decide upon the next location, which also suggests and recommends the various alternatives to the pope for his consideration and final decision. A relation of such a process is recounted and analyzed in Chapter 4. Furthermore, “entrust” is a word that is often used in reference to the institution of the WYD Cross. Some examples can be found at (Centro San Lorenzo, 2016; Krakow2016.com, 2016; Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014; WorldYouthDay.com, 2016).

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not denote traveling to that cross, but its own journey (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014).36 The WYD Cross’ pilgrimages have taken it around the world. In 1984, it was taken to Lourdes, Paray-le–Monial, and three times to Germany. “On hearing this,” reads the PCL’s history, “the Pope said: ‘They must also take it to Prague, to Cardinal Tomasek [sic]” (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). This is significant because Prague was the capital of what was then Czechoslovakia, and “the Cross that was carried there by young people would be a symbol of communion with the Pope” (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). John Paul II’s request was realized in 1985, but the Cross was also present at protoWYD that year in Rome. The WYD Cross has had a regular presence at WYDs ever since, being transported around the host country and sometimes neighboring countries prior to upcoming WYDs (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). At WYD 1987 in Buenos Aires, John Paul II imbued the WYD Cross with the history of the events, attributing the beginning of WYDs to the Cross itself (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). The WYD Cross travels in three distinct ways. Apart from being transported to and from WYD main events and as a tool for evangelization, it is also used in preparation for WYDs. Prior to WYD 2005, the WYD Cross’ pilgrimage in Germany spanned three years (Gebhardt et al: 2007: 163). It is WYD’s counterpart to the Olympic Torch (Pontifical Council for the Laity, 2014). The two latter capacities have parallels to how copies of Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa went on “peregrination” to “various parts of Poland” (Niedz´wiedz´, 2010: Chapter 4, section 6, para. 1, Kindle edition). According to scholar of religion Anna Niedz´wiedz´, the practice was “initiated by the Polish Catholic Church hierarchy in the days of communism” and “gained enormous popularity with Polish Catholics” (Niedz´wiedz´, 2010: Chapter 4, section 6, para. 1, Kindle edition). Initiated by Stefan Wyszyn´ski, who served as primate of the Polish Catholic Church from 1948 to 1981, the peregrination—here the practice of parading a pilgrimage destination icon publicly—“was involved in a program of mass religious events connected with preparations of the ‘Polish millennium’ in 1966” (Niedz´wiedz´, 2010: Chapter 4, section 6, para. 2, Kindle edition). The “Polish millennium” refers to the celebration of one thousand years since the introduction of Christianity to Poland, thought to have taken place in 966 CE. Cardinal Wyszyn´ski, now a celebrated Polish national hero, was bishop of Lublin, Gniezno, and arcbhishop of Warszawa, consecrated at Jasna Góra. He was also the prelate of Poland. Statues of him can be found in many places in Poland, one of which kneels at the foot of Jasna Góra, as can be seen on figure 36 In fact, comparisons between WYD and the Olympic Games have been made (Norman, 2011: 372; Weigel, 2016), though comparisons between the WYD Cross and the Olympic Torch so far elude me. Prior to WYD 1993, the priest Dennis M. Schnurr, Secretaray and Treasurer of the NCCB’s WYD organization, said: “World Youth Day is a sort of ‘Olympics in the Church’ only instead of sporting events, we have spiritual events. World Youth Day will have representation from young people from all over the world, at least 70 different countries” (ADA6).

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3.1. The sculpture places him in a state of perpetual genuflection before the icon—a pilgrim frozen in time. In the photograph, we can also see that flowers have been placed at his feet. As the flowers are fresh, we may assume that they were placed there shortly before the photograph was taken—in October 2015. October was also the month when Wyszyn´ski was released from “internment” in 1956, whereupon he commissioned painter Leonard Torwirt “to make an exact copy of the image of Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa” (Niedz´wiedz´, 2010: Chapter 4, section 6, para. 2, Kindle edition). When the image-copy was ready, Wyszyn´ski took the picture to Rome in a special railway carriage compartment (which was decorated and transformed into a sort of chapel). In Rome, the image was blessed by Pope Pius XII and then returned to Poland – where it was to visit all the parish churches in the country (Niedz´wiedz´, 2010: Chapter 4, section 6, para. 2, Kindle edition). The sacral power of the copy was believed to be drawn directly from the original miraculous image – at the moment of the touching of the two images together. From that moment onward, the copy started to be treated as a ‘real copy’ – equivalent to the original (Niedz´wiedz´, 2010: Chapter 4, section 6, para. 3, Kindle edition).

Readers familiar with James Frazer’s ideas of sympathetic magic are likely to call that to mind, but contact with and “exact” resemblance to the original icon was apparently not enough; it also needed to be blessed by the pope before further use. Enshrouded in stories of miracles accumulated over several centuries, the icon was a symbolic tool for Catholics to claim civic space (Tweed, 2011: Introduction, section 2, para. 1, Kindle edition). Its journey around Poland was a reverse pilgrimage in the sense that the interfacial element would come to the people rather than the other way around (Jain, 2010: 95), but it was also a mobile aperture to the superhuman realm for those who would employ it as such. Apart from the absence of miracle stories, the parallels between the icon and the WYD Cross are striking: The WYD Cross was also taken to Rome, blessed and legitimized by the pope, and employed in evangelization efforts. It was not the first time Wojtyła had used a large wooden cross to claim Catholic space. As Archbishop of Kraków, he had let Catholic workers employ a similar wooden cross in order to have a church built in the city’s industrial, communist workers’ utopian district of Nowa Huta (“New Steelworks”) which, according to Stanisław Dziwisz, was “socialism’s answer to Catholic Kraków” (Dziwisz, 2008: 33). One of Nowa Huta’s residential neighborhoods already had a chapel, and after the authorities had denied the residents permission to build a church several times, “the inhabitants went to the chapel site and erected an extremely tall cross pointing toward the sky. But the regime interpreted the cross as a provocation, a challenge” (Dziwisz, 2008: 33–34). Dziwisz characterizes the efforts to build a church in the district as “the beginning of a new strategy based on resistance. The resistance had religious impetus, but for the first time it was

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Figure 3.1: Statue of Cardinal Stefan Wyszyn´ski at the foot of Jasna Góra monastery. Author’s photograph (2015).

Figure 3.2: A small (!) selection of votive offerings inside the crypt that holds the Shrine of Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa. Crutches, silver hearts and legs linger as material testimonies to transrealm interactions with results interpreted as miraculous. Author’s photograph (2015).

being actively applied against the decisions of the authorities” (Dziwisz, 2008: 34). The actions taken by the residents found support with Wojtyła, who “showed up on Christmas Eve to celebrate an open-air Mass” (Dziwisz, 2008: 35). On May 15, 1977, nine years after the Polish youth demonstrations of 1968,

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to which Wojtyła “aligned” himself from the beginning of his period as Archbishop of Kraków (Dziwisz, 2008: 50), Wojtyła—now cardinal—dedicated the completed church in Nowa Huta (Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 190). Today, that church—officially the Sanctuary of the Mother of God of Fátima (Sanktuarium Matki Boz˙ej Fatimskiej) and unofficially “the Ark of the Lord”— is a monument to Catholic triumph over communist religious suppression (e. g. Weigel, 2005 [2001]: 190). Furthermore, the WYD Cross is consistently present and plays an important social and ritual role at WYD events. For example, it is paraded among the thousands of participants assembled and placed on the central podium at the Opening Ceremony by a group of young people from the host country. Placed visibly, close to the altar, the WYD remains there except for when it features in the Way of the Cross, and the Closing Mass. In other words, the WYD Cross is a central material component that helps shape the event design, and in many ways embodies not only WYD, but the concept of the new evangelization: evangelizing the laity so that they, in turn, may evangelize the world. Since the WYD Cross was given to the San Lorenzo group in 1984, it has been replaced due to years of wear and tear. In 1996, a copy assumed the role of the original, making the “WYD Cross” two distinct material objects. While the original can be found at the San Lorenzo Center, where its horizontal bar has been replaced for the cross to be displayed, it is treated and promoted as a relic (Centro San Lorenzo, 2016). Whom the relic is connected to is unclear, but relics are frequently treated as interfacial elements in transrealm interaction. Meanwhile, the replacement seems to have acquired the same status as the original. It was treated the same way during subsequent WYDs. The “WYD Cross” seems to have been made an abstract, transmittable concept created through recurring ritualizations connected to WYD. That said, it is difficult to say how many WYD participants are aware of the replacement oft he original, or whether it would make any difference if they did. In other words, the WYD Cross was originally a singular material item, but the replacement by duplication and its subsequent assumption of the role of the original has made “the WYD Cross” a title and a socially constructed ritual role that may be transferred to new copies as needed. If or when the current WYD Cross is replaced, it will be interesting to see if it, too, will be treated as a relic. The history of the WYD Cross attests to its ritual significance, and the PCL’s release of the summary of its history testifies to a wish for preserving it. Looking at the history of the WYD Cross reminds us that an attempt at a historical approach to the phenomenon must pay attention to WYD’s visual and material culture. Like other religious events, WYD is embedded in material culture. From the perspective of religious interaction, the peregrination of the copy of Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa, the cross and church of Nowa Huta, and the WYD Cross share one fundamental feature: They are mobile interfacial elements with the purpose of inspiring those who would use them for transrealm

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interaction, and for resisting those who would try to stop it. The “peregrinations” of the copies of Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa in Poland and the cross at Nowa Huta had demonstrated for Wojtyła the power of interfacial elements in non-interfacial environments, and their capacity for not only reminding people of their symbolic referents, but also for inviting and inspiring people to interact with superhuman persons. His teacher in this respect was his clerical senior, Stefan Wyszyn´ski, and his compatriots. While the WYD Cross and Icon were symbols of national Polish identity as Catholic, they were also mobile interfacial elements. Thus Jesus and Mary became allies whose agencies were expanded in the human realm through the introduction of specific interfacial elements for interacting with them. Moved into and moving through the public sphere, they could enter people’s subjective religious interfaces. 3.3.4 Charismatic Christian “crusades” Catholicism also had a competitor from within Christianity—Charismatic Protestantism. That competitor, too, had reinvented an old Christian concept fort he purpose of evangelization: crusades. That is what some Charismatic mass events were called, among them German preacher Reinhard Bonnke’s evangelization events in several African countries (Gordon, 2015). Scholar of religion Tamar Gordon and anthropologist Mary Hancock refer to these gatherings as “revivals” and “mass Crusades” (Gordon, 2015: 391), and consider them to be part of a “miracle healing crusade industry” (Gordon, 2015: 390). As pilgrimage within the WYD context became associated with evangelization, so also did crusade lose its military and violent historical connotations and became associated with revivals. There is no question that these “crusades” are far removed from their medieval homonyms, which is perhaps why researchers unquestioningly replicate the word in their publications (Coleman and Hackett, 2015; Cox, 1995)—the disconnection is so obvious that there is little ground for confusion. According to Sabrina Petra Ramet, American “Catholics were […] more inclined than Protestants to experience religion as a communal phenomenon and less likely to feel they had a ‘personal relationship’ with God” (Ramet, 1990: 11). Countless votive offerings say otherwise, and Ramet’s observation is problematic because relationships with superhuman persons may look different in Protestantism and Catholicism. It is interesting to note that a personal relationship with the highestranking superhuman person was an important selling point for Christian religions in the twentieth century. Combined with widespread suspicions of religious hierarchical institutions, Charismatic Protestantism was in a position of leverage in religious competition against a politically involved Catholic hierarchy. John Paul II’s speeches at WYDs encourage personal relationships with superhuman persons, which can be seen as an influence from or absorption of Protestant trends. That point also

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challenges Ramet’s conclusion that the “central values of both Catholicism and communism have proven impervious to change” (Ramet, 1990: 26). While such a statement is unnuanced, WYDs seen through the lens of religious interaction becomes visible as an arena and vehicle for change. An event that both examplifies change, encapsulates it, and promotes it becomes an embodiment of changing Catholicism—a Catholicism one with a global perspective that looks to the future rather than exalt nostalgia. Charismatic Christianity, with its emphasis on the gifts and manifestations of the Holy Spirit, made the human mind and body an interfacial element to the superhuman realm—available everywhere and at any time. Catholicism needed a religious interface that could compete on the global arena, and so the effectivization of the canonization process would prove invaluable in that regard. While Charismatic “crusades” were held all over the world (Cox, 1995: Preface, para. 3; Introduction, para. 21, Kindle edition), John Paul II’s beatifications and canonizations celebrated saints in countries and ethnic groups around the world whose saints had not previously been recognized, at least not officially (Barro and McCleary, 2011: 9–13, 46; cf. O’Malley, 2010: 315). Both the living bodies of Charismatics and the dead bodies of Catholics offered miracles—events that claimed superhuman intervention and transrealm interaction as bi-directional. The “miracle crusades” of Charismatic preachers demonstrated that people all over the world were indeed receptive to miracles—a focus that had also gained in momentum in Catholicism after John Paul II took the See of Peter in 1978. With the release of the new Code of Canon Law in 1983 and its reform of the canonization process, the pope and the Congregation for the Causes of Saints were free to “mass-produce” saints like never before: The reform cut down the total number of required approved miracles from four to two—one for beatification, another for full canonization—and severely halted the role of the so-called “Devil’s Advocate” (Bennett, 2011: 443). John Paul II’s resulting 482 canonizations and over 1,300 beatifications inspired some to call the Vatican a “saint factory” (Bennett, 2011: 441; O’Malley, 2010: 315). From a religious interaction perspective, John Paul II’s pontificate saw an influx in populating the superhuman realm with new superhuman persons and new interfacial elements to support transrealm interaction with them. Competition over people between Catholicism and Charismatic Christianity, while also political, can be seen as a competition between two institutional religious interfaces that derived their legitimacy from different histories, narratives, and authorities. With these developments in mind, it is perhaps not surprising that Ulf and Birgitta Ekman, a leading couple in Nordic Charismatic Christianity, converted to Catholicism in 2014. While the two describe their conversion as a personal journey (Ekman and Ekman, 2016 [2015]), we should not disregard that Catholic and Charismatic Christians have made ecumenical strides towards

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one another in the past few decades. Ulf Ekman took John Paul II as his patron saint, while Birgitta Ekman took the Virgin Mary as hers (Dagen.se, 2015). Returning to WYD, if outside influences are as likely as I contend to have contributed to its invention, why are they not mentioned in the official Catholic narrative about WYD? For one, they did not fit the agenda for promoting the cause for canonizing John Paul II; the more WYDs could be attributed to his agency alone, the better for that cause, and the higher the legitimacy could be placed upon his pontificate and the authority invested in him post-mortem. When Pope Francis chose to exempt John XXIII from a second miracle and thus rush his canonization so he and John Paul II could be made saints simultaneously, the authority that sainthood would have invested in John Paul II was given a counterweight and balanced out. Considering the parallels of ambition for WYD and Charismatic “crusades,” we might consider that WYDs could also be imagined as a “revival crusade”, were it not for what political scientist Mark Gibney has called the “Age of Apology” under John Paul II (Gibney, 2009). John Paul II made several public apologies on behalf of the Catholic Church for historical wrongs committed against African slaves, Jews, Australian Aborigines, and other ethnic groups, women, scientists, Protestants and Orthodox Christians, and victims of sexual abuse. Because the apologies were made in the 1990s, Gibney considers them the result of the pope’s “millennial program of apologies derived importantly from the ecumenical and reforming impulse of the Second Vatican Council” (Gibney, 2009: 262). In this context, any reference to WYDs as “crusades” or pure evangelization events would have been unthinkable because it would directly contradict and counteract the ecumenical and apologetic, premillennial efforts of John Paul II. Pilgrimage, on the other hand, fit the concept of the new evangelization perfectly; it focused on mobilizing existing Catholics for making Catholicism visible and claiming space as Catholics in non-violent ways. WYD retained some of its initially strong associations to pilgrimage while others faded. WYD’s evangelization aspect would gain impetus as plans were made to celebrate the event in the United States. To the papacy, the United States had long been viewed as the home of modern secularism and liberal capitalism, where Catholics were a religious minority and none of the candidate cities could boast pilgrimage sites of national or international renown. WYD may have been John Paul II’s invention, but the idea itself likely resulted from a coalescence of factors that came together in his personal history and pontificate. The Catholic Church was entrenched in rivalry over youth with communism and Charismatic Christianity, both of which had long since established their own ways of engaging people en masse in large gatherings. If WYD got its event format from WYF, WYD got its focus from John Paul II’s decades long competition over young people’s loyalties. WYD also gave Catholicism a new edge against Charismatic Christianity with a charismatic leader at the center and a renewed evangelization focus. WYD

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seems for a large part to be a Catholic version of the WYF with interfacial elements that could socialize young people into transrealm interaction with superhuman persons as defined by the magisterium.

3.4 Conclusion This chapter has examined the origins of WYD along three historical trajectories: Applications of pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage, acknowledged influences for the emergence of WYD in the official narrative, and influences that have so far remained obscure. The first section concluded that the proto-WYDs of 1984 and 1985 took place in a multi-layered context rife with associations to pilgrimage as conventionally practiced. As WYD was institutionalized as an event in its own right, it could be relocated to other places—Buenos Aires, Santiago de Compostela, and Cze˛stochowa. As WYD moved out of Rome to other officially sanctioned and popular pilgrimage sites, the links between WYD and pilgrimage were reinforced spatially, even as its links to temporal pilgrimage occasions were weakened and broken. WYD as a pilgrimage became linked to visiting pilgrimage destinations and to the new evangelization. John Paul II consecrated the youth and the world to Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa at WYD 1991, which closed a chapter in the global Catholic narrative and opened a new one. With the Iron Curtain fallen and the Soviet Union nearing dissolution, WYD 1991 was a Catholic declaration of triumph over anti-religious suppression. While the official narrative of WYD tends to emphasize John Paul II’s role as its entrepreneur, his role and motivations cannot be fully understood out of context. The official narrative acknowledges influences from intra-Catholic currents like the new evangelization, the revivification of pilgrimage practices, and the United Nations, which was considered an ally for achieving John Paul II’s vision of the New Millennium as a time for world peace. However, comparing WYD to its older, communist counterpart WYF reveals intriguing similarities that make it a probable inspiration for WYD, particularly considering Wojtyła’s Polish past and his long-time work with youth ministry. As WYD would incorporate tools for evangelization that were tied to pilgrimage, the events can thus be seen as a response to communist efforts to engage and influence youth. This because communism was its ideological main contender for world influence throughout the Cold War. Simultaneously, Catholicism was losing ground to Charismatic Protestantism, which also employed large-scale events that promised miracles as part of their recruitment strategies. John Paul II’s response was a reform of the canonization process that led to a stark increase in the number of saints and blesseds, which were based on miraculous accounts and thus also embodied promises of miracles. Thus, the wider Catholic religious interface to the

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superhuman realm was expanded by the proliferation of new interfacial elements. In this perspective, John Paul II was a religious interface engineer, opening apertures to the superhuman realm, gathering young people before them, and performing transrealm interaction with them in public. Showing how new places, people, and objects can inherit interfacial potential from existing places, people, and objects provides paths for analyzing how new destinations can be socially constructed as pilgrimage targets, and the term pilgrimage itself gain new connotations. So far, all WYD host cities had been associated with officially sanctioned and popular pilgrimage sites and thus strengthened WYD’s image as a pilgrimage. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union later in 1991, the Catholic Church could turn to battle its next foe: liberal capitalism, western individualism, and consumerism. The time had come to bring WYD to the high seat of that competitor—to the United States.

4. Changing Pilgrimage: World Youth Day 1993, Denver

Under a vast, cloudy sky framed by the Rocky Mountains to the west, I stepped off the bus and made my way down the blacktop road to a sizable stadium known as the Sports Authority Field at Mile High (figure 4.1). Home to local sports teams, the Denver Broncos and the Colorado Rapids, this structure replaced Mile High Stadium in the early 2000s. In the 1990s, however, the stadium was a versatile venue. Among other things, it hosted some of the decade’s most iconic bands, including U2, Guns N’ Roses, and Metallica, and two main events at WYD 1993: the Welcoming Ceremony for Pope John Paul II and the Way of the Cross. Demolished in the winter of 2002, the site now serves as a parking lot to its successor.1 Leading up the stairs to the entrance level, I found galloping bronze broncos, frozen in motion as they faced a chalk-white stallion rearing triumphantly atop the stadium—the symbol of the American football team the Denver Broncos.2 At WYD 1993, John Paul II visited Mile High Stadium twice. Late in the afternoon of August 12, he was flown in by helicopter. Several participants later described his helicopter appearance as the most memorable moment of WYD 1993 (AAD24). The enthusiasm with which young people greeted the pope reminded Time Magazine authors of welcomes given to superstars: “Seventythree-year-old superstars are rare. Seventy-three-year-old superstars who can draw tens of thousands of youngsters from 70 countries to a jamboree in Denver are rarer still,” wrote Alain L. Sanders and reported how the crowd had shouted “John Paul Two, we love you!” and the pope had responded “America, you are beautiful” (Sanders, 1993).3 Photographs show how some teenagers 1 A short history of Denver’s sports stadiums can be found in (Barber 2016). The bronze placard accompanying the horse sculptures (mysteriously missing two bronze fastening bolts) identifies the sculptor as Sergio Benvenuti, dates its finish to 2001, and its location to Florence, Italy, sponsored by Pat Bowlen and the Bowlen family as a gift to the “people of Colorado.” 2 According to the New Oxford American Dictionary, a bronco is a “a wild or half-tamed horse, especially of the western US.” The “West” in a U.S. context recalls the country’s colonialization, and brings to mind the continuing socio-economic oppression of Native American peoples. 3 Joanna Wilkon´ska reports an interesting moment at a meeting with young people during John Paul II’s last visit to Poland in 2002, after WYD that year in Toronto. Waiting for the pope to meet them, people shouted “Cardinals, release the Pope! Cardinals, release the Pope!” At that point, reports Wilkon´ska, “Someone at the back of the square exlaimed: ‘The Pope is having supper!’” to which others responded “Smacznego! Smacznego!”—the Polish equivalent of “Bon appetit.” When he appeared, John Paul II asked the people: “Were you in Toronto?” and answered himself:

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Figure 4.1: The Sports Authority Field at Mile High with the site of Mile High Stadium, now parking lot, on the left. Author’s photograph (2015).

cheered while others burst into tears as they hugged him, shook his hand, and met his gaze. In Chapter 3, we saw a few examples of how emotionally charged these moments can be for some of those who experience them, and how the pope can function as an interfacial element. In Chapter 2, I described religious immersion as a state of emotionally charged involvement in transrealm interaction. I have interviewed three people who participated at WYD 1993 in Denver. One was Catholic priest Monsignor Edward Buelt, who was primus motor of the event and secretary to James Francis Stafford, the Archbishop of Denver at the time. The two others were participants who traveled with their schools. Now grown men, one (Travis) has since become a priest, and the other (Oliver) is a husband and father. The former appears in this chapter, while Oliver appears in Chapters 5 and 6. Combined with archival material, these interviews help to enable a reconstruction of how WYD 1993 was promoted as a pilgrimage by organizers, how well that stuck with participants recounting their memories of the event 22 years later, and the role of the religious interface in that process. The official theme of the event was: “I came that they might have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10: 10). The magisterium’s political ambitions for WYD 1993 were quite clearly to engage young Catholics to resist abortion, euthanasia, and capital punishment. John Paul II urged participants of WYD and Americans in general to struggle for what he called the “culture of life” and “I was!” And those gathered had shouted in response: “Welcome home! We love you!” Then he promised to “tell you about Toronto tomorrow” at the address Franciszkan´ska 3 (Wilkon´ska, 2014: 316, my translation). On that journey, he visited the Sanctuary of Divine Mercy at Łagiewniki, which I will return to later.

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against the “culture of death” (John Paul II, 1993c). In the early 1990s, he saw that “culture of death” manifest in capitalism as much as in communism. By that time, he had repeatedly criticized both systems.4 He had described capitalism in its most extreme forms as “unbridled” and “inhuman” (John Paul II, 1991a: No. 8, 1992b: No. 7), and now Soviet communism lay conquered after the Reagan administration’s offensive and Moscow’s increasing doubt in its own policies (Westad, 2007 [2005]: 364, Conclusion, para. 15, Kindle edition). Consequently, new countries opened to capitalistic influence.5 Among those countries was Poland (King, 2002). For John Paul II, some of the political consequences of that influence led his homeland from one form of the “culture of death” and into another. He had cause for concern. Poland was already tasting the post-Cold War future. During his visit to Poland in June, 1991—two months prior to WYD in Cze˛stochowa—the pope criticized some of the legislative choices the country appeared to be making. O’Malley explains: Once the Communist regime fell in Poland, the pope was dismayed to see his country surrender so quickly to the tawdry enticements of Western materialism and consumerism. His visit there in [June] 1991, though it still held crowds enthralled, was less rapturous, more confrontational than his earlier ones. He was shocked to find in Poland agitation for a liberalized law on abortion (O’Malley, 2010: 319).6

John Paul II’s concept of life was absolutist. It ranged from the possibility of conception to unprovoked death, and human interference was sinful; contraception was denial of possibility for future life, and abortion and euthanasia equal to murder. In the late 1980s, abortion rates in European countries under communism, like Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia, had been almost as high as birth rates (David, 1992: 2). In Romania and the Soviet Union, reported statistics showed a higher number of abortions than births (David, 1992: 2). Among these, Poland had been an exception, with far lower abortion rates compared to birth rates. To John Paul II, abortion became a symptom of an underlying disease of a hostility to life formulated in the encyclical Veritatis Splendor (John Paul II, 1993 g: No. 80). Seeing abortion as murder meant that 4 For examples, see the encyclicals Laborem Exercens (John Paul II, 1981 No. 8), Sollicitudo Rei Socialis (John Paul II, 1987d: No. 20), Centesimus Annus (John Paul II, 1991a: No. 8), and the Apostolic Exhortation Pastores Dabo Vobis (John Paul II, 1992b No. 7). 5 According to Westad, the term “Cold War” was originally a critical term that “in the 1950s came to signal an American concept of warfare against the Soviet Union: aggressive containment without a state of war. The Soviets, on their side, never used the term officially before the Gorbachev era, since they clung to the fiction that their country was ‘peaceful’ and only ‘imperialism’ was aggressive, in a way similar to how US (and European) leaders used the ‘Cold War’ to imply a Soviet threat” (Westad, 2007: 2). 6 Clips of audiovisual recordings of John Paul II’s speeches and homilies during his visit to Poland in June 1991 can be found on various YouTube channels. For example, his speech on the “Commandment of Love”—one in a series of speeches on the Decalogue (YouTube channel: Dorota DorotaG, 2012)

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hundreds of thousands of occurrences amounted to sheer atrocity. While the view was not new—it had been formulated at Vatican II and emphasized in Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae (Paul VI, 1965, Paul VI, 1968)—it would be central to WYD 1993. The event began four days after the publication of Veritatis Splendor, cited above. Needless to say, John Paul II’s views on contraception and abortion especially conflicted with women’s rights movements—within Catholicism as well as without (Staggenborg, 1991: 60), and were unpopular among Americans in general (Jenkins, 2003: 7). The Soviet Union was officially dissolved on December 26, 1991, and John Paul II’s public performances began to focus on countering what he saw as consumerism and hedonism. These were his new main rivals for influence on the global arena. In Centesimus Annus, John Paul II wrote: “We have seen that it is unacceptable to say that the defeat of so-called ‘Real Socialism’ leaves capitalism as the only model of economic organization” (John Paul II, 1991a: No. 35). That statement declared a change in focus—a re-orientation in a new global political and religious context and continued what theologian Christopher J. Walsh has called the “evangelical turn” (Walsh, 1994). He quotes Cardinal Avery Dulles, who named it “one of the most surprising and important developments in the Catholic Church since Vatican II” (Dulles quoted in Walsh, 1994: 79). We should not be surprised that Walsh published this article in 1994, the year after WYD in Denver. No country embodied capitalism and consumerism more fully than the United States, and what symbol better captures the spirit of magisterial Catholicism’s new favorite foe than the bronco—the unruly and unpredictable forces of the free market, of secularism, and religious pluralism? In Denver, as I will show, the pope set out to bridle capitalism with WYD as its arena, pilgrimage as saddle, and the new evangelization as stirrups. That would involve changes both to WYD and what pilgrimage referred to in that context. Employing the framework of religious interaction, I argue that on a deeper level the question of how to make WYD 1993 a pilgrimage was a question of providing a religious interface for its participants.

4.1 Denver: From metropolitan city to pilgrimage site 4.1.1 How World Youth Day in Denver became a pilgrimage Denver’s local media called the summer of 1993 the “summer of violence” (Brown, 2007). Fourteen years later, journalist Fred Brown reflected that the name was not an indicator of increasing counts of murder; the number of homicides had actually decreased from the year prior, down from 95 to 74, and the summer of 1994 saw the number increase again to 81. “So in raw numbers,” Brown wrote, “the ‘summer of violence’ was an exaggeration. In raw fear, it

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wasn’t” (Brown, 2007). The problem was that unlike with most homicides, “people were being killed by strangers.” Furthermore, almost “half of the murders that year – 36 of 74 – were of teenagers” (Brown, 2007). On April 12, 1992 (Palm Sunday and diocesan WYD), the Denver Post featured a cover page announcement that John Paul II would visit Denver the next year (DPL1). The same issue reported how easy it was for teenagers to obtain weapons. Young people were not just in danger, they were also dangerous.7 Scholar of religion Sarah Pike observed retrospectively that the public perception of American youth worsened in the 1990s (Pike, 2011 36–38). Considering the city’s difficulties, and the absence of an officially sanctioned shrine of national or international renown, Denver hardly seemed an obvious host of WYD—a religious festival for young people—at least not compared to previous WYD host cities. Rather, the city’s increasing gang and drug-related activity fit what John Paul II called the “culture of death” (DPL4; (John Paul II, 1991 Nos. 36, 40). Source material from archives and news media rationalize the selection of Denver for WYD simplistically, conveying it as a papal decision. The Denver Post’s cover article on April 12, 1992 announced that the “pope is coming to Denver” (DPL1), which exemplifies how news media recognized WYD 1993 primarily as a papal visit, at least initially. The article quoted the pope’s Angelus at WYD 1992: “I have selected the city of Denver, in the noted Rocky Mountains, in the state of Colorado” (DPL1), which continued: “never included in the itinerary of my earlier apostolic journeys” (John Paul II, 1992c, my translation).8 The decision was presented and consequently interpreted as a singular person’s choice. That impression was reinforced in other places, for example the Archdiocese of Denver’s “Volunteer Orientation” booklet for WYD: The pope himself said he chose Denver simply because of the beautiful Rocky Mountains (he is an avid mountain lover) and because he had never been to Colorado. Others have speculated that many other factors were considered in the decision, including Denver’s hispanic influence, cable industry, central location in the U.S. and between Canada and South America, international airport, youth of the city and church in Denver (AAD10).9

Catholic News Service’s Vatican correspondent John Thavis wrote in response to the news: “The thing to remember is that Czestochowa and Santiago are natural pilgrimage sites in August […] Denver and the rest of the United States 7 One informant had told reporters that one could rent a gun for $50, purchase one for $130, and a “.25-caliber semiautomatic […] for $20 worth of crack cocaine.” Such transactions did not need take more than a few hours (DPL4). A feature article detailed what was called a “gun epidemic” on the national level among youth. 8 The agency signaled in this formulation is not reflected in the recorded manuscript. 9 Speculations regarding Denver’s hispanic population can be found in The New York Times on April 13, 1992 (AAD11), as well as in Thavis’ comment on April 16 (AAD12).

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have no grand pilgrimage tradition like Europe, and no monthlong August holiday” (AAD12). WYD 1993 would also be the “first time the pope will celebrate the youth day rally in a country that is not predominantly Catholic” (AAD12). According to Thavis, “several Vatican officials mentioned the mountains. They are hoping that the clean air, wide-open spaces and mountain peaks will provide a rarefied setting for the pope and strike an environmental chord with youths” (AAD12). Considering the symbolic and potentially political impact of visiting Denver, Thavis also rationalized that the “United States is largely a country of recent immigrants, reflecting worldwide ethnic diversity in a way other nations do not” (AAD12). Religion reporter Virginia Culver wrote, “it was hard for Denver Catholics to restrain their glee yesterday as word spread that Pope John Paul II will visit the city next year” (DPL2). Conversations started immediately regarding how the city would accommodate an estimated 60,000 young people, and concerns were expressed as to how the papal visit would be funded. Some citizens considered governmental funds for a religious event to conflict with the United States Constitution. That was resolved by pointing out that the pope is also a head of state, which consequently legitimized securing governmental funds (DPL2, DPL3). Culver described WYD 1993 as an “international youth gathering,” “World Youth Day Conference,” and “primarily a spiritual event,” but she did not use the words pilgrim(s) or pilgrimage (DPL2).10 To understand why Denver was chosen to host WYD, as well as how and why it was construed as a pilgrimage prior to the event itself, we need to examine some instances of the term being applied to WYD 1993. Doing so requires that we consider several types of sources. In Chapter 3, we saw that by 1991 pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage had become part of papal WYD vocabulary and remained so ahead of WYD 1993. References to pilgrimage began with the papal announcement, from the Angelus at WYD 1992, quoted earlier: I therefore invite all the Christian communities – dioceses, organizations, and movements – to begin a […] profound process of preparation and catechesis of the 10 On the following day, the same newspaper ran three cover stories pertaining to WYD 1993 (DPL5). One of them revealed mixed reactions to the news that John Paul II would visit Denver, quoting a skeptical parishioner who said he thought John Paul II was “trying to socialize the youth into conservative Catholics.” Another, one from the city’s Polish community, reportedly received the news with “great enjoyment” and expectations that the visit would be “spiritually uplifting” (DPL5). Having listened to Archbishop Stafford’s comments on the announcement, Culver quoted Archbishop Stafford: “It’s hard to suppress our joy over such a unique historical event in the archdiocese.” Culver described the reactions among the estimated 1,100 Mass participants that morning, who reportedly “broke into applause as a delighted Stafford, dressed in brilliant red and gold vestments, said: ‘We welcome the world. Denver and Colorado are renowned for their hospitality.’” Young Catholics had also been excited about the news: “Three Denver area youths, chosen by the Denver Archdiocese to represent the city, watched the liturgy. ‘All three of us were ready to scream, but there was really nothing we could do,’ said 21-year-old Jose David Corral” (DPL8). Initial reception of the news, then, was mixed and the range reached from skepticism to enthusiasm.

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young [people], to be lived as a spiritual pilgrimage oriented towards the Denver rally (John Paul II, 1992c, my translation).

As history would later show, John Paul II understood the concept of spiritual pilgrimage quite broadly (seven years later, he used the same term to denote the “cyberpilgrimage” to Ur; John Paul II, 2000: No. 4). At the time, that was not a reference to WYD 1993 itself as a pilgrimage, but rather to the preparation ahead of the event, which we will turn to shortly. The pope also used pilgrimage to refer to WYD 1993 in his Message, given once again on August 15, the Feast of Mary’s Assumption: Following our meetings in Rome, Buenos Aires, Santiago de Compostela and Czestchowa, our pilgrimage through contemporary history continues. The next stop will be Denver, in the heart of the United States, in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado (John Paul II, 1992a No. 1).

Adding Denver to the list of previous WYD locations and enveloping them all in a “pilgrimage through contemporary history” implied they were equal sites in an overarching pilgrimage, as WYDs traveled from one place to another. This general view of WYD as one overarching pilgrimage, however, was not the only capacity in which the pope called WYD 1993 a pilgrimage. Toward the end of the Message, he addressed young American Catholics, saying: You, dear young people of the United States who will be the hosts of the next World Youth Day, have been given the joy of welcoming as a gift of the Spirit this meeting with the many young men and women who will come to your country on pilgrimage from all over the world (John Paul II, 1992a No. 7, italics in original).

Together, these three occurrences of pilgrimage in the papal announcement tie WYD in Denver to three different layers of the term: the preparation was a spiritual pilgrimage; WYDs in general were an overarching, communal “pilgrimage through contemporary history”; and WYD 1993 would itself be a pilgrimage occasion. To some who were familiar with pilgrimage practices tied to the first four host cities, Denver seemed anomalous. Consider the example of Peter Hebblethwaite, a seasoned Catholic journalist and author of several books on Catholicism and the papacy. John Paul II, he said, was “probably the first person to have spoken of a visit to Denver as a pilgrimage” (Hebblethwaite, 1993). Clearly, Hebblethwaite found it puzzling that the pope used the term pilgrimage to describe the upcoming event. He rationalized that WYD 1993 was a papal visit and explained the use of pilgrimage by linking it to John Paul II’s other travels: “He thinks of all of his globe-trotting trips in this way. He sees them as ‘pilgrimages to the heart of the church’” (Hebblethwaite, 1993). Hebblethwaite had a point, but he missed an important piece of the puzzle: John Paul II did not call it “my pilgrimage” but “our pilgrimage.” Using the first person plural, the pope included himself as a pilgrim among other WYD

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participants—just as he had done before with WYDs 1989 and 1991. At earlier times, descriptions of WYDs as pilgrimages had been inconspicuous due to taking place at officially sanctioned pilgrimage locations and, at least initially, during times associated with pilgrimage. From a religious interaction perspective, they were all interfacial places that people had journeyed to for centuries, enticed by mytho-historical miracle stories of superhuman persons’ intervention into people’s lives, initiating interaction with them rather than the other way around. Without a similar interfacial place of significant renown, “pilgrimage to Denver” seemed like a contradiction in terms, and so its realization severed the final of its original ties to conventional pilgrimage. That disconnection sparked curiosity and, as we will see, left slots in the religious interface open. However, the meaning of pilgrimage at WYD carried new connotations— especially about evangelization, but also to life as an on-going pilgrimage. Ahead of WYD 1993, John Paul II emphasized the evangelization aspect. In his Message, he declared that “Christ has made you his ambassadors, the primary evangelizers of your contemporaries” (John Paul II, 1992a No. 6). In fact, he was more explicit about evangelization than ever before: “recognize,” he urged them, “that you are directly involved in the new evangelization, which demands the involvement of all of us” (John Paul II, 1992a No. 6). While the connotations were themselves old, the emphasis was new. They also provided a new multilayered context of associations to pilgrimage connected to time, to day-to-day life, and to history at large. The evangelization aspect was thus also a counterpart to the multi-layered pilgrimage- associated context early WYD had been embedded in. John Paul II had promoted his vision of WYD as an event that combined pilgrimage and evangelization. Others had adopted the same idea. Buelt had watched the broadcast of WYD 1991 in Cze˛stochowa from home. In an interview in April, 2015, he told me it was not a live broadcast (there was an eight-hour delay), but it had made an impact on him: “I remember very clearly sitting in my Lazy-Boy lounger, leaning back, thinking ‘What a mess! Look at all those people! What a mess!’ Not knowing that the next mess would be mine.” He laughed and continued to explain that the visual experience of WYD 1991 afforded him by broadcast led him to tell Archbishop Stafford that this would not be a “simple pastoral visit. This is a much more involved event that will include the pope, but is not about the pope.” As Archbishop of Denver, Stafford expressed interest in hosting WYD, and a complex process began. Buelt described it as a “three-way conversation between the Vatican and the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and the archdiocese,” wherein the archdiocese was “required to submit what was a template of forty pages of questions and answers and documentation […] about why we wanted and why World Youth Day should be hosted here in Denver.”11 It was, in other words, a competition. 11 The National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB) and the United States Catholic Conference

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As indicated by Buelt, the choice of Denver resulted from a long process involving several parties. John Paul II acknowledged this when he answered questions from “young journalists of the Denver Post” through Navarro-Valls: “Denver was chosen because my advisors believed it would be one of the sites best suited for the event” (AAD15).12 The pope and the Pontifical Council for the Laity had initially approached six cities in the United States as potential hosts: Buffalo, New York; Chicago, Illinois; Cleveland, Ohio; Denver, Colorado; Minneapolis-Saint Paul, Minnesota; and Seattle, Washington. None of those cities could boast pilgrimage destinations comparable to previous WYD locations. Several newspapers ran a report from The Associated Press on March 14, 1992, saying that some of the initial candidate cities had simply declined. The Archdiocese of Seattle, for example, did not “have the money and people required to be host of a five-day international youth gathering that would include a papal visit” (Daily Herald, 1992). Chicago had hosted a large-scale papal visit in 1987, and “dropped out” along with Cleveland (Daily Herald, 1992). That left three candidate cities standing: Denver, Buffalo, and Minneapolis-Saint Paul.13 Why was Denver selected? Buelt is probably the person who is best suited to shed light on that question, as he was he was situated in the very center of the event’s Corporate Structure and Organizational Chart: “Reverend Edward Buelt; Assistant Secretary/Treasurer; Archdiocesan Executive Director” (AAD27). He was also the one in charge of the archdiocese’s proposal to the Vatican selection committee. That committee was comprised of a group of delegates who would stay for two days in each of the dioceses up for selection. Buelt shared what he understood to be key to the committee’s decision. Denver was the last of the three candidate cities to receive a visit from the Vatican delegation. According to Buelt, the bishops of Buffalo and Minneapolis-Saint Paul had assigned the task of hosting the Vatican delegation to their respective chambers of commerce. That, in turn, had led to attempts at impressing the delegation by doing “what they might have done to win an NFL Superbowl, or a final for a conference, or an Olympics.” Buelt continued:

(USCC) were originally two separate but linked organs. In 2001, they merged into one organization and took a new name: the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). 12 One of the questions John Paul II responded to, was “Have you ever hit anyone in the head with your incense shaker?” The response was “Incense is burned in a vessel called a ‘censer’ or ‘thurible’; the rising of the incense represents our prayers rising before God. So far I have never hit anyone in the head with a censer” (AAD15). 13 The most common order of the two names of the Twin Cities places “Minneapolis” first and “Saint Paul” second, but the reader will notice that quotes from interviews sometimes switch them around. Apparently, it is also the order most common among Catholics, possibly because the archdiocese is called the “Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis.” I am grateful to theologian Catherine Osborne at the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism for sharing this insight with me.

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They’d wined and dined them in the fanciest restaurants and given them thousands of dollars’ worth of gifts, made sure they’d met the conosciuti—the VIPs of the city, the governor, the mayor, the key business players […] We didn’t do any of that.

Buelt and the Archdiocese of Denver had taken a markedly different approach: We wanted to present to the Vatican team not why the pope would want to come to Denver, not what Denver could do for the pope in view of the numbers of hotel rooms and conference centers and fancy meals and that sort of thing. But, having had an experience of World Youth Day, why would young people want to come to Denver? Why would a youth group from four thousand parishes in the United States get on a bus, ride three, four, five days across countries, spend a week here, spend the return time home. […] Why would young people want to make a pilgrimage to Denver? So we took the notion of pilgrimage as the central point of their [the Vatican delegation’s] visitation. And we wanted, in a real way, to accomplish for them that when they arrive, we would take them on a sort of pilgrimage.

Although Buelt later mentioned that they also considered why the pope would want to come to Denver, he clearly wanted to communicate that they had focused more on motivating young people to come. The key components of the statement above is making pilgrimage central to the Vatican delegation’s visit by taking them on a “sort of pilgrimage,” and connecting that to how WYD in Denver could be made attractive to young people. Buelt’s choice of words indicates that the kind of pilgrimage he had in mind would not reflect existing conventions regarding what constitutes a pilgrimage. How did Buelt take the Vatican delegation on a pilgrimage during their preliminary visit? “I didn’t go and rent fancy limousines or cars,” he said. Instead, he picked them up at the (now closed) Stapleton International Airport in a school van, which was also convenient due to the airport’s proximity to the parish where he worked. Before driving them to their downtown hotel, he said: The first thing I said to them is, “I know you’ve been traveling today. Have you had the opportunity to celebrate the Eucharist? If not, I’m prepared for you to do so at my church, which is two miles from here.” And they had not celebrated the Eucharist that day, so we went immediately […] And then we took them to their hotel to settle in. Well, apparently, I learned later, they shared with me that in neither Buffalo, nor Saint Paul–Minneapolis had their host committees concerned themselves with their spirituality, with the celebration of the Eucharist, with the celebration of the Mass.

Buelt seems convinced that prioritizing the celebration of the Eucharist impressed the delegates and swayed them to pick Denver as the host city. From the perspective of religious interaction, Buelt was asking the members of the delegation whether they had the opportunity to interact with the highestranking superhuman person through the specific interfacial element of the Eucharistic Host. By offering to facilitate the celebration of the Sacred Liturgy, he provided them with the opportunity to do so. By taking the delegation on a

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“sort of pilgrimage,” he showed them how the desire for WYD 1993 to be a pilgrimage could be realized. Buelt and the Archdiocese of Denver had given the delegation a book about the city’s history and organized a meeting with people that would need to be involved. “So we had to have businessmen and […] representatives of the federal, state, and local government there at this meeting to assure them that we were all on board, but we didn’t do anything fancy.” That conformed to a light form of the ascetic mode that pilgrimage, and pilgrim authenticity, is conventionally linked to (Badone and Roseman, 2004: 2; Reader, 1987). Getting people on board with WYD 1993 as a pilgrimage, said Buelt, was “one of our biggest challenges philosophically and ecclesially.” That challenge was linked to the question of “why” young people and the pope would want to make a pilgrimage to Denver specifically. That, in turn, is a question of both how to legitimate Denver as a pilgrimage destination in the WYD context, and how to motivate people to travel there for the event. With the Vatican delegation, that was accomplished by focusing on the Eucharist, on appealing to young people, and keeping things relatively simple—creating opportunities for transrealm interaction and appealing to the notion of pilgrimage as a light ascetic activity. Linking WYD to modest spending and to religious needs aligned well with John Paul II’s vision for the new millennium as the time when the culture of life and civilization of love would emerge—his antitheses to hedonism and consumerism.14 In the end, Denver was chosen because the archdiocesan organizing team made the Vatican delegation’s visit a “sort of pilgrimage,” which indicated that they had a desire to make WYD 1993 a pilgrimage despite the lack of a popular and officially sanctioned pilgrimage destination. They combined light modesty with a focus on the Eucharist, the first of which signaled their awareness that WYD had been considered a pilgrimage historically, that pilgrimage was an increasingly popular activity among young people, and that the sacraments are central to the new evangelization. With these considerations in mind, Buelt and the Archdiocese of Denver’s efforts to secure WYD 1993 for themselves was as good a fit for the papal WYD agenda as the Pontifical Council for the Laity could hope for.

14 The WYD organizing committee at the Archdiocese of Denver was highly terminologically aware. Consider the example of a glossary given to journalists and reporters (AAD17). Formulated by the archdiocesan WYD committee, it not only defined more or less common Catholic terms like the Eucharist or lectern, but also asked journalists and reporters to refrain from using terms they otherwise might have. For example, the glossary told them to use specific verbs in reference to the Mass and not others. “Celebrate Mass” was preferable to “say Mass,” and “the Pope’s Mass” was to be avoided as well (AAD17). This was important because media attention would be running high—locally, nationally, and internationally.

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4.1.2 Preparing for pilgrimage One of the gatherings undertaken in preparation for WYD 1993 took place in the winter of 1992. Archbishop Stafford met with a group of young people in a gym (JP2C1). The theme of that gathering was pilgrimage, which together with the timing corresponds to the first part of the catechetical preparation. He held a speech on that topic before answering questions from those gathered. “My public piece today is going to be pilgrimage—the meaning of pilgrimage,” he said. First, he spoke about WYD 1991 in Cze˛stochowa: “Many of the young people that came […] tens of thousands of them—came from Russia. And they came with their government’s permission for the first time. And many of them came without proper clothing, and […] proper food” (JP2C1). What WYD participants had done, he explained, was “that they gave them their clothes and […] their food.” Part of pilgrimage was wishing to be closer to God, “and one of the traditional ways of doing that is by walking, another way of doing it is by fasting, and another way is by giving alms,” he said. It is problematic to pin down what was meant by being “closer to God” but, combined with religious interaction, walking, fasting, and alms-giving can be understood as activities meant to induce immersion in the superhuman realm. From that point of view, Stafford’s description of Russians wanting to be “closer to God” as a part of pilgrimage means that seeking immersion in the superhuman realm is part of pilgrimage. Walking, fasting, and alms-giving are also practices that combine asceticism and sacrifice, so it appears that these ties to conventional pilgrimage were affirmed. Strengthening that link bore implications on “what it means for us in Denver to be hosting a pilgrimage, and at the same time, to be on pilgrimage” (JP2C1). “In eight and half months’ time,” he said, they would witness “the largest influx of people that have ever come to a single meeting in Colorado” (JP2C1). Archbishop Stafford explained that unlike previous WYD sites, “we do not have the apostle Peter buried here, as we do in Rome, or the apostle Paul. We do not have the great image—the icon of Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa, which goes back to the early part of the Church’s history” (JP2C1). He continued: “All that we have here is this beautiful country and this wonderful people. And that’s all we need. That’s all we need. We have these beautiful mountains and we have these beautiful people—the One Holy Catholic Apostolic People” (JP2C1). While Archbishop Stafford stressed that beautiful scenery and people were all that was needed to attract participants from around the world, it seems clear that he felt Denver lacked something that previous WYD host cities possessed. Articulating that deficiency, he did not focus on centuries-old traveling traditions or official sanction. He focused on apostle relics and a miraculous icon—items of great renown used in transrealm interaction by potentially millions of people every year. But, as we saw in Chapter 2, religious interfaces are malleable. Stafford did not restrain the WYD community to those present,

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but spoke instead as though it represented the entire Catholic Church. That seems to suggest that the WYD community could be an interfacial element to the entire Church—a transrealm community comprised of people living and dead. The Church as a transrealm community was underscored in the Glossary of Liturgical Terms that the Archdiocese of Denver provided for journalists and reporters: “The Church embraces all its members—on earth, in heaven, in purgatory” (AAD17). Officially, saints are deceased people who are recognized by the magisterium as heaven-dwellers. For WYD 1993, the central interfacial elements would not be items such as the relics of an apostle or a miraculous Marian icon, but nature and the WYD community. Describing that community, Stafford said: There will be tens of thousands coming from Europe. […] The Church of Los Angeles is taking a whole train! And as more and more people are joining, more and more cars will be added to the train and they will come into [Denver’s] Union Station. Many buses will come in and they will come to the bus [station] and they will all be going—they will all be coming here to Denver, to the Cathedral, to meet you—the hosts and hostesses of our church. On pilgrimage. On pilgrimage (JP2C1).

Archbishop Stafford was evidently excited about the sheer number of people that would descend upon Denver, the international diversity they represented, and the variety in means of transportation that would carry them there. Declaring that they would all come to meet “you”—Denver’s young Catholics —was probably a way to encourage a sense of responsibility and honor, perhaps even awe, towards their future visitors. Stafford underlined that this was a pilgrimage, as indicated by his repetition of the term. At this point, he contrasted pilgrimage in the United States with other continents and drew attention to a local pilgrimage site: We in the United States do not have the custom of pilgrimage as they do in Europe or in Latin America. Some of us have been on pilgrimage to Mother Cabrini shrine. You’ve been up there, in the hills, where Mother Cabrini founded this beautiful, beautiful shrine back in the early part of our century. That’s one of the first places that I visited as archbishop. I went, on foot, up the long, long path, where Mother Cabrini led us to the top, and there I was able to pray the Rosary and also follow the Stations of the Cross (JP2C1).

In the previous quote, references to large groups of people traveling by trains and airplanes expressed anticipation for the festival ahead, but once Archbishop Stafford talked about his own pilgrimage to the Mother Cabrini shrine, it appears it was important to underline that he had walked there.15 15 It seems pecular that the Mother Cabrini shrine did not feature prominently at WYD 1993. None of the pope’s speeches mentioned her and she was not among the saints chosen for the event. She was the first American saint to be canonized, and as an Italian-American missionary, she might have served as a fitting rolemodel for young Catholics (Rothman, 2016). According to Google

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It appears that the notion of WYD in Denver as a pilgrimage took on among other bishops who planned for their dioceses to arrange travel groups. For example, when a journalist asked Adam Joseph Maida, then Archbishop of Detroit “what kind of trip to Denver” he envisioned, he replied that, the “journey I’ll be making with our young people to Denver will be a pilgrimage, not a tour full of fun and frolic” (Michigan Catholic, 1992). Let us consider another example, a quotation from William H. Keeler, then Archbishop of Baltimore and President of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB).16 It is a 1990’s pilgrimage, with sneakers replacing sandals and modern transportation replacing camel and horse. I expect many young people will come by foot and bike. Whatever way they travel, young people will encounter God in the near timeless mountains (World Youth Day Inc., 1992: 5).

Despite repeated mentions of beautiful scenery and mountains, the Rocky Mountains were not included in WYD activities, although John Paul did visit them during his stay. Historically, nature-themed travels have complicated the distinctions between tourism and pilgrimage, and the Rocky Mountains are no exception. While the Rocky Mountains’ many trails are often visited for recreational purposes, they also encompass destinations linked to mythohistorical accounts of interactions with superhuman persons. One example is the Mount of the Holy Cross, which historian Ferenc M. Szasz described as one of Colorado’s “‘lost’ national monuments” in 1977 (Szasz, 1977).17 Today, a Maps, her shrine at Golden lies roughly 16 miles west of the Denver Civic Center. With today’s infrastructure, that would mean roughly six hours of walking, not much more than from the Civic Center to the Cherry Creek State Park. It would likely have incurred greater costs in terms of logistics, however, considering traffic along the road, and the uneven terrain might have proved more challenging for hosting hundreds of thousands of people. Besides, it would far more easily have led travelers through the most crime-ridden areas in the western city center, so we might reasonably speculate that logistics and security concerns influenced the decision. Another factor may have been that Cabrini was not “American enough” as she was born in Italy (cf. Cummings, 2013), but so was Frassati, who was one of WYD 1993’s patron saints. 16 USCC and NCCB were combined into the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) in 2001. 17 Szasz writes: “snow gathers in the crevices of its [Mount of the Holy Cross’] eastern face to form the outline of a magnificent Latin Cross. Local legend has credited early Spanish missionaries with being the first white men to see the cross, but precise identification of the mountain did not occur until after the Civil War” (Szasz, 1977: 141). After World War I, the Catholic priest Joseph Carrigan, “suggested that Catholics stage an annual pilgrimage to a nearby area having a good view of the cross. […] In the fall of 1919, The Mount of the Holy Cross Association was formed in nearby Redcliff to further Father Carrigan’s ideas. This group widened the appeal to include all Christian denominations and hoped to stage an annual pilgrimage to Holy Cross that would become the greatest religious event in American life” (Szasz, 1977: 141–142). Despite an “initial wave of enthusiasm” for organized pilgrimages to the viewing site, trek attendance “dropped off steadily and some — such as that in 1935 — had to be abandoned because of the snow […] Of all the reasons for the decline in visitors, however, the most important involved alleged deterioration

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Lutheran church organizes pilgrimage hikes to view the place (Mt of the Holy Cross Lutheran Church, 2017). The Mount of the Holy Cross was not mentioned by John Paul II, nor have I found any sources to indicate it played a role in the promotion of the event or any of the legitimization strategies for WYD 1993 as a pilgrimage. Whereas Maida’s concept of pilgrimage at the time conveyed a somber mood and an ascetic temperament, Keeler’s statement nostalgically called to mind the romantic image of the “pilgrims of old.” It appears that what kind of pilgrimage WYD 1993 would be was open to interpretation. On July 31, 1993, Archbishop Stafford issued a formal letter of invitation to all the “sisters and brothers in Christ” of his diocese to participate in the Closing Mass on August 15, 1993. He explicitly asked them to show up in person as opposed to following the event on television which, he purported, “would be a mistake.” Joining the pope in the celebration of the Eucharist would be “a privilege which may not be repeated for us in the Rocky Mountains region,” he stated, urging them “not to miss this extraordinary event in the history of our Church” (AAD29). Although the letter mentions both the WYD theme (“I came that they might have life, and have it abundantly” [John 10:10]), as well as the cultural and international diversity of the gathering, Archbishop Stafford’s focus was very clearly centered on being present with the pope; it is this theme that permeates the letter in its entirety. Drawing on some of the strongest imperatives for papal legitimacy and authority, Stafford reminded local Catholics that the pope was “Peter in the person of his successor, the Bishop of Rome.” The letter also draws on the Marian theme of the date of August 15, invoking the metaphor of Pentecost in stating that “believers from throughout the world […] will give thanks to God in Christ for Mary. ‘We shall embody the unity of the universal Church, gathered in the power of the very same Spirit who came upon the apostolic Church in the Upper Room.’”18 Finally, the letter assures the reader/listener that their “presence at the celebration of this Eucharist on the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary will be important as a sign of our solidarity with the Chief Shepherd of the universal Church,” and pulls all the attempts at motivating people to show up into a single sentence: “I look forward to sharing an unprecedented moment of grace with you on Mary’s feast.” Interestingly, Stafford’s general invitation letter did not include the terms pilgrim(s) or pilgrimage but focused on the WYD Closing Mass as a papal public event. It appears that it was the WYD participants who were considered to be pilgrims— in the cross itself” (Szasz, 1977: 142, 143). The Mount of the Holy Cross was eventually “declassified” as a national monument and “[f]ew looked for God’s hand in nature with the same surety as had earlier generations. For example, when Thomas C. Vint of the Park Service’s Branch of Plans and Design viewed the cross in 1935, he saw not the hand of God but simply a ‘freak formation’ unworthy of monument status” (Szasz, 1977: 144). 18 In Orthodox and Catholic versions of the Pentecost narrative, the Virgin Mary was with Jesus’ disciples in the “Upper Room” when the Holy Spirit descended upon them.

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not members of the host diocese who might otherwise show up for Closing Mass anyway. Nevertheless, the Closing Mass was WYD 1993’s crescendo. One primer declared that “[a]ll WYD events build toward the climax of the Mass on Sunday. The Prayer Vigil on Saturday evening holds a special place since it is preparatory to the Sunday Mass. In a sense, we gather to pray in preparation for the resurrection to be experienced the next day, the Day of the Lord” (AAD14: 89). The parallels to the event design of Holy Week in Rome is striking, and appears to have been reinforced after the transnational events were disconnected from the calendaric Holy Week and Palm Sunday. However, it also plays on the cycles of night and day, darkness and light, and human participation in those cycles by sleeping and waking. As the WYD program shows, catechetical events were held on three out of five days. According to Buelt, those three days with catechetical events made Denver the “first catechetical World Youth Day.” Everyone took part in it and as opposed to what happens in Europe, where a lot of young people get on a train Friday night, sleep on the train, walk to the site Saturday, are there Saturday night, go to the Mass Sunday morning, get on the train, [and] they’re back in school or work Monday morning. And wonderful for them! So, Denver’s was a catechetical World Youth Day. We really engaged young people in learning, expressing, and explaining, and arguing, and sharing their faith in that sense. I think, in all honesty, I’ve become disappointed with World Youth Days subsequent to that because Denver made them so popular. And they are so popular in Europe now that I see them becoming primarily weekend party events. I’m not judging anyone’s [motivation and] young people in Europe might be very engaged in their faith, but it just becomes a weekend experience. “Let’s go, let’s hang out […] yeah, let’s have Mass with the pope,” [and then] go home.

Considering that the Catechism of the Catholic Church had been released in 1992, the emphasis is not surprising. Catechesis was an important part of WYD 1993 proper, but it was also part of the preparation phase before the event. That means we need to look at catechetical preparation material. The preparation material developed by and for the Archdiocese of Denver spans three volumes of 99, 135, and 65 pages respectively. The booklets are important because they tell us something about how the archdiocesan organizers wanted young people in the archdiocese to conceive of and approach the event their city would be hosting. What we are in its own words, “the catechetical materials and lesson plans have been designed to provide basic instructional outlines for use in Catholic schools” (AAD2: 33). What we are looking for especially in these sources are instructions for teachers that relate to the terms pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage, as well as how they are connected with potential interfacial elements like the Eucharist, relics, and icons. Together with life, the terms pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage appear often in all three of the booklets (AAD2, AAD3, AAD4), but due to pilgrimage being a

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special focus in the first booklet, I will concentrate on its examples. On the very first pages, “catechetical journey” and “spiritual pilgrimage” are described as the two means by which WYD goes about “achieving its ends” (AAD2: 4): for young people to “deepen their knowledge of Christ and respond to Him by going forth and bringing His ‘good news to the world’” (AAD2: 4). From a religious interaction point of view, the ends were transrealm interaction with global evangelization as a consequence. How would “spiritual pilgrimage” and “catechetical journey” help achieve that? As we will see moving forward, the term pilgrimage is an important key to answering that question, and religious interaction is helpful for understanding why it is. 4.1.3 Life and pilgrimage Consider, for example, the three-fold content of the preparation period prior to WYD as a “spiritual pilgrimage” and “catechetical journey”: (a) the examination of life and its messages; (b) the discovery of Jesus as the true answer to life; (c) the realization of the Sacraments and the Church as encounters with Christ and His grace (AAD2: 4, italics added).

Looking at the two first items, we might be drawn to emphasize meaningmaking processes, ritual, ritualization, and ritual criticism. The lofty theological goal of discovering Jesus as “the true answer to life” seems obscure and open to wide interpretation until we view it from the perspective of religious interaction, in the context of WYD as a new evangelization event where the sacraments are of central importance. One initiative that brought life, community, and transrealm interaction together was a banner that would “travel throughout the Archdiocesan Reconciliation Services,” where WYDthemed Confession services would be held during the two first preparation periods (AAD2: 84); “the Banner focuses on the Tree of Life” and would… …appear without leaves and by the finish of the last Reconciliation Service, it will more graphically portray life to the full. Each participant of the Reconciliation Services will be given a leaf. After prayer and penance, each person will write their name on their leaf and attach it to the banner (AAD2: 85).

In Genesis (3:22), the Tree of Life appears as the tree whose fruit gives eternal life, and it is common in Christian theology to equate the Tree of Life with Jesus on the cross.19 In Catholic teaching, Jesus on the Cross is Jesus in the Eucharist, 19 “See! The man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil! Now, what if he also reaches out his hand to take fruit from the tree of life, and eats of it and lives forever?” (NABRE). The Tree of Life also appears in Proverbs (3: 18, 11: 30, 13: 12, 15: 4) and the Book of Revelation (2: 7, 22: 14, 22:

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and in order to gain access to the Eucharist, magisterial normativity prescribes going to Confession after having committed an “actual” or “mortal” sin. In the context of the WYD preparation periods, life comes to mean participation in the sacraments—especially Confession and Communion—and so life is construed as transrealm interaction, and the more immersed the students become, the better.20 The “spiritual aspect of the catechetical journey” involved “new life” which “radiates into every ambit of human life, both individual and societal” (AAD2: 17). Receiving “new life” meant becoming a “person ‘begotten from above’” who “thus becomes able to ‘see the Kingdom of God” and “[l]ive faithfully in the love of Christ” (AAD2: 17). While the three points may seem separate, they were all “geared towards the development of a close encounter with Christ and His Church so that our young people open themselves up to all the youth of the world as truly committed Catholic hosts” (AAD2: 4). The goal of WYD, then, was to engage young Catholics in transrealm interaction with Jesus, particularly through the Sacraments and the Church as interfacial elements. We will see examples of how this works in practice in Chapters 5 and 6. The catechetical material divides the preparation period into three “time blocks”: Advent, Lent, and from Pentecost to WYD (AAD2: 5). Each of these would be permeated with the theme of life—“the experience of life; Jesus as Lord of Life and the sacraments/spiritual life as the means of touching this Jesus” (AAD2: 5). Transrealm interaction here was described in material and even tactile terms. “Interwoven with each ‘time block,’” the volume stated, “is a particular aspect of the Pope’s message to World Youth Day” (AAD2: 5), which meant that John Paul II’s message would have a direct impact on the catechetical preparations for WYD 1993. The three aspects were “[l]ove of life and meeting Jesus as Lord of life from the perspective of the ‘New Advent’ as we approach the Third Millennium” (AAD2: 5), “love of life and meeting Jesus as Lord of Life from the experience of Christian living” (AAD3: 3), and “love of life and meeting Jesus as Lord of life in His Church with her heroines and heroes – the Saints” (AAD4: 3). We will look closer at the three shortly, but we should note that all three preparatory themes focus on “love of life” and “meeting Jesus” first and foremost, the latter of which indicates transrealm interaction as encounter with the highest-ranking and institutionally most central superhuman person. Transrealm interaction with Jesus as “Lord of life” was supposed to enhance young people’s “love of

19). While the Tree of Life has sprouted diverse interpretations in Judaic and Christian theology, the latter often connects the Tree to Jesus on the cross, as per the description of Jesus’ execution attributed to the Saint Paul: “Christ ransomed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written, ‘Cursed be everyone who hangs on a tree’” (Gal 3: 13, NABRE). 20 “New Life in Christ” is achieved by Christ “by pouring out His Spirit, the giver of life, in the Sacraments: 1. In Baptism; 2. In Penance; 3. In Eucharist” (AAD2: 17).

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life,” which means that the promotion of transrealm interaction was goaloriented. During the preparation period of Advent, volume I states that “the concept of World Youth Day is explored as is the idea of pilgrimage.” It would move on to emphasize “life to the full” found in “‘secular’ society. These are compared and contrasted with what Christ and His Church teaches about the issue” (AAD2: 5). The Advent season of preparation involved seven lessons. The goal of Lesson I was for students to “understand and be able to explain the concepts of Advent and pilgrimage as related to Christmas and World Youth Day ‘93” (AAD2: 36). Through word play, Advent and adventure were made distinct but connected themes. The first related to the time before Christmas, and the other to adventure and adventurers. Instructors were asked to have students look these words up in a dictionary, as well as to “[f]ind the meaning of pilgrim; pilgrimage” (AAD2: 36). Next were two follow-up points: “5. How does pilgrim relate to adventurer?” and “6. Relate pilgrimage/adventure to being Christian; discuss the idea of our daily and ultimate destination (meeting Jesus as Lord of Life)” (AAD2: 36). The last point on the list was “7. Discuss what Pope John Paul II means by pilgrimage” in a passage from the Message for WYD 1993. The passage is one we have seen earlier in this chapter, regarding “this meeting with the many young men and women who will come to your country on pilgrimage from all over the world” (AAD2: 37). The themes of the two next lessons were life and the sacraments respectively, with the goals for students to “understand and be able to apply in a practical way the meaning of ‘life to the full’” and to “understand what sacraments are and their importance to personal spiritual development and attainment of fullness/abundance of life” (AAD2: 38, 39). Next up were the two sacraments of baptism and confirmation (AAD2: 40, 41). Lesson VI concerned Our Lady of the New Advent. The goal was for students to “understand and be able to explain the meaning of the symbolism in the icon of ‘Our Lady of the New Advent’” (AAD2: 42). Group leaders were instructed to “Discuss connections between ‘Our Lady of the New Advent’ and the idea of fullness/abundance of life” using passages from” the papal Message (AAD2: 42–43). Suggestions on how to teach young people differed according to two age groups: pre-kindergarten through sixth grade, and seventh grade and up. For the youngest group, who were not eligible for participation at the event, it was advised that the children were given “a sense of ownership of this great event” by showing them videos about John Paul II and past WYDs (AAD2: 46); stressing the graces “to be received through this visit of the Holy Father” as the Successor to Saint Peter, and “the graces which will flow from this gathering of young people representing nations and cultures united in Christ Jesus” (AAD2: 46). The children were supposed to be led to think that “WYD is a holy time and Denver is a holy place” (AAD2: 46). Doing so could be achieved by taking a field trip, not to the Mother Cabrini shrine, but to “one of the sites to be used for WYD events or to a local parish named for a shrine in another country” (AAD2:

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46–47). This meant that, for local Catholic students, the preparation period prior to WYD became an occasion for local pilgrimages even for those who would otherwise not be able to attend the event itself. WYD as a holy time” and Denver as a “holy place” were here linked to both transrealm interaction as per visiting a shrine (where potential interfacial elements are located), and to that shrine as a medium of a different nationality and culture. Yet another suggestion was to invite a person “of another culture to share the riches of that culture with the group and discuss how the Church benefits from all cultures and brings all cultures to perfection in the Gospel of Jesus Christ” (AAD2: 47). Finally, children were to be taught the “great needs facing the Church of Denver in hosting this event and the many needs of the pilgrims who will travel here” (AAD2: 47). That involved encouraging children to “pray daily for these needs” as WYD “Prayer Pals.” It was even suggested that each “grade level could pick their own continents” and countries “and pray for the pilgrims from there.” The purpose was to “offer the students a very real identification with this world-wide event and its multi-cultural dimensions, and it will open them to the spirit of Christian pilgrimage and hospitality” (AAD2: 47). In other words, WYD was an occasion for instilling in Catholic children a global perspective and the idea of the Catholic Church as a global community, with international pilgrimage and transnational hospitality being core components. Nowhere in that material is pilgrimage connected to officially sanctioned shrines. Instead, pilgrimage was tied to WYD and repeatedly defined by WYD in the context of this preparation, even in instructions to those who were unable to attend. Seventh-graders and older, however, were “to be encouraged to attend World Youth Day events and to participate as fully as possible” (AAD2: 48). The purpose of preparation for them was to “elicit their youthful enthusiasm and foster in them a deep and true conversion and a dedicated and whole-hearted desire for ‘fullness of life’ in Jesus. The themes of Christian pilgrimage and hospitality are very important” (AAD2: 48). Furthermore, the manual informed youth ministers: “Be sure to emphasize the pilgrimage theme by recalling that we are called to holiness. […] Remind them that we are all pilgrims on this journey to holiness in Christ.” (AAD2: 48). Pilgrimage is not a “dour or boring time,” but an adventure “which demands our best efforts, talents, and treasures” (AAD2: 48). In order to achieve a sense of adventure linked to pilgrimage, ministers were told to “[r]ead and reflect on the gospel passages which reveal the demands of discipleship. Jesus did not sugarcoat his message. The way of the pilgrim is arduous and not without suffering, but it is the path of Jesus” (AAD2: 48). Again, pilgrimage is not so much about the “sacredness” of the destination as it is about the type of journey, one where bible passages are to be read as interfacial elements in transrealm interaction in the present rather than media of a mythical past. The point seems to be that people in the present are able to live the same narratives today by approaching

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them as apertures to the superhuman realm in the present by merging it tot hat mythical past. This was particularly evident in the fourth goal for catechetical preparation for seventh-graders and older young people. Group leaders received instructions to: Reflect upon the pilgrimage themes in the infancy narratives of the Gospels. Invite the students to place themselves into the passages as one of the characters and to meditate on the story from within. Consider: the youthful age of the Virgin Mother; the great acts of faith of Mary, Joseph, the shepherds, and the Magi. Discuss: the riskiness of faith; the need to let go; to trust and act; the need for prayer as the defining act of one’s life (AAD2: 48).

As discussed in Chapter 2, prayer is a fundamental form of transrealm interaction, so to make prayer a “defining act of one’s life” is to make transrealm interaction a pivotal concern in everyday living. It means seeking immersion in the superhuman realm, precisely by treating bible passages as more than sources to events that took place in a distant past and using them instead to interact with superhuman persons in the present. Inviting people to “place themselves into the passages as one of the characters” is an invitation to religious immersion by employing bible passages as interfacial elements. As teachers were told to discuss “the role of May as model disciple, as Mother of all who live in Christ, and as fellow pilgrim with us” (AAD2: 48), transrealm interaction was to be shown to be relevant to students’ lives in the “here and now.” “The Catechetical Aspect of the Journey” is organized into three sections: “The Human Experience,” “The Difficulties of the Pilgrimage,” and “New Life in Christ” (AAD2: 16). The first section is further divided into anthropological and theological perspectives, but the two are deeply intermingled. The “anthropological perspective” sub-section states, for example, that “Human beings are called to become disciples of that Other One who infinitely transcends them” (AAD2: 16). In Chapter 2, the term transcendence was discussed, and one of its interpretations was a quality of a superhuman person as “existing above and independently of the material world” (Smith et al., 1995: 1086). In this context, there are more than descriptions of “divine attributes”; they are instructions to those working in youth ministry on how to interpret the event ahead of time— instructions with a magisterial seal of approval. These instructions charged the concept of pilgrimage not with a spatial journey so much as a temporal one—a period in time dedicated to the necessity of transrealm interaction as defined by the magisterium. That period was intended to increase immersion in the superhuman realm. Consider the “theological perspective”: “Life is marked by sin and threatened by death, despite the desire for good,” and the “Difficulties of the Pilgrimage”: “Deceptive spirituality,” “‘fleeting moment’ philosophy,” and “the ‘quest for success’ approach” (AAD2: 16). From a religious interaction

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perspective, spirituality, like religion, can mean transrealm interaction, and adding the term deceptive derogates interaction with a different superhuman realm, which is supported by the sub-headline “The deceitful prophets and false teachers of how to live.” As Wagner puts it, “there are so many” virtual realms “that it seems impossible that they all be ‘sacreds’” (Wagner, 2012: 85). Nor is that the intention of all religious actors. As competitors in a global religious “marketplace,” embracing all postulated superhuman realms as equally legitimate goes against promoting one’s own as special, unique, and of particular relevance to potential “buyers.” Religious actors that do may yet make such inclusiveness a hallmark of their own religious “brand,” and so distinguish themselves from less inclusive ones. From the perspective of religious interaction, “Difficulties of the Pilgrimage” list potential distractions from the superhuman realm that the magisterium seeks for young people to become immersed in. It might be that they are potential distractions from religious immersion regardless of what superhuman realm is being promoted. The “New Life in Christ” section provides the preferred alternative, and declares Christ as “the only one who can satisfy the expectations that He Himself has placed in our hearts” (AAD2: 16). This proposed uniqueness is the selling point for transrealm interaction with this superhuman person, or these superhuman persons belonging to this superhuman realm, and the best interface for interacting with them can be found in our organization. 4.1.4 Event design Like all large-scale events, WYD 1993 was costly, with an elaborate event design.21 It lasted five days, August 11–15, and thereby continued the length and calendaric timing established in 1989 and continued in 1991. The event theme emphasized one interpretation of Jesus’ mission: “I came that they 21 Budgetary developments demonstrate how increase in anticipated numbers of participants impacted cost levels. A media guide I read at the Archdiocese of Denver’s archives revealed some of the plans for how increased costs would be accommodated: “Volunteer services, in-kind donations and people’s generosity will enable World Youth Day to offer a program estimated to cost $25 million for about a quarter of that […] The U.S. bishops approved a $4.5 million budget for the event last June when attendance was estimated to be 60,000. When participation went over 100,000 the World Youth Day Board of Directors proposed that the bishops consider raising that figure to $6.5 million” (AAD7). By July 5—a month ahead of the event, the Houston Chronicle reported an expected 160,000 participants and 300,000 for the Closing Mass (AAD8; AAD19). The new budget was approved (AAD8). In May 1993, the number of registered participants had surpassed 110,000. As if by comparison, the expenses of the 1998 Winter Olympics were reportedly projected to be $275 million (AAD7)—clearly an attempt to put the expenses of WYD in a broader perspective. On August 14, the day before the Closing Mass, however, the Denver Post reported that registrations had exceeded 186,000 (DPL11). Some 10,000 hoped-for volunteers would help “defray” the expenses, as did another new WYD component: commercialization. Organizers made a deal with the apparel producing company F.A.M.E., who were to produce Tshirts, mugs, decals and various other souvenir items.

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might have life and have it to the full” (John 10: 10), with life as the key term. The event program (table 4.1),22 shows that WYD 1993 replicated a skeleton event design that included an Opening Mass, Welcoming Ceremony for the pope, Saturday night Vigil and a Closing Mass. New elements were also added, however: community service by participants, a strong emphasis on catechesis resulting in three days of catechetical events, and a communal walk to the site of the Vigil and Closing Mass the following morning. The Houston Chronicle wrote that Denver and Colorado wanted to counteract bad publicity from the “summer of violence” and a law that discriminated against gay people (AAD8). Denver locals helped improve their city’s image with donations to WYD—a transnational event (AAD8). Cindy M. Matthews, Assistant Director of Communications at the Archdiocese in Denver, was quoted saying that the Vatican “made it clear” to diocesan WYD organizers “that we couldn’t or should not turn people away.” “We had to make it an event that was affordable for people to come to – even from Third World countries” (AAD8), and locals’ donations helped make that happen.23 The organizers of WYD 1993 also sought to help improve the city’s public image, which would rub off on the Catholic Church. WYD 1993 thus became the first WYD to offer participants opportunities to partake in community service. In total, 3,200 WYD participants were delegated to these projects (AAD20). Community service also had two other purposes: to “give the Denver community an experience of young people making a positive contribution to the community,” and to “help young people understand the call of the gospel as a lifestyle of service and mission to the world and society” (AAD5, emphasis in original). That meant rehabilitating the image of young people as dangerous and in danger, and making community service conducive to religious immersion. A total of eight hours were available during the event program for community service: Thursday August 12 and Friday August 13, between 2 and 6 p.m.24 However, they also overlapped with other events, like the 22 World Youth Day ’93 Schedule of Events. AAD, Box 4, Media Guide 2, pp. 19–20. 23 WYD participants from abroad were more likely to be turned away if they came from countries not listed among those whose citizens were included in the Visa Waiver Pilot Program at the time. Countries included were the United Kingdom, Japan, France, Italy, Germany, The Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, Spain, Austria, New Zealand, Finland, Belgium, Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Luxembourg, San Marino, Andorra, Monaco and Liechtenstein—mostly European and other “developed” countries and none of which were “Third World” countries. Others needed to obtain a temporary visa (AAD16). 24 Community service projects were not free-for-all but limited to a selection of projects connected to organizations. The organizations were Habitat for Humanity which built homes and where WYD participants would help finishing work; Denver Parks & Recreation, which gave opportunities to help maintenance in the city’s parks; The Holiday Project, which involved visiting people in hospitals, nursing homes and rehabilitation centers; SHARE Colorado, a Catholic food sharing charity; RTD – Welton Street Clean-up, where participants would paint storefronts and clean up streets; Canned Food Drive, a project where participants were “invited to bring one can of food to be distributed to food banks in the Denver area” (AAD5).

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thematic events between 3 and 5 p.m. on August 13 and the American bishops’ meetings with their respective diocesan delegations that took place at the same time. Table 4.1 Day

Time

Event

Wednesday 12:00 p. m. Programming begins at Civic Center Park August 11 7:30 p. m. Opening Mass at Civic Center Park 11:30 p. m. Night prayers at housing sites Thursday August 12

early a. m.

Breakfast at housing sites

8.00 a. m.

Reconciliation begins at Catechetical sites

8:30 a. m.

Morning Prayer at Civic Center Park

10:00 a. m. Catechesis 12:00 p. m. Mass at Catechetical sites 1:00 p. m.

Lunch service begins

2:00 p. m.

Community Service Projects

3:00 p. m.

Cultural events, thematic activities, forums and meetings with Bishops

5:00 p. m.

Dinner service begins

5:30 p. m.

Papal welcome at Mile High Stadium

7:30 p. m.

Music Festival continues at Civic Center Park

11:30 p. m. Night prayers at housing sites

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(Continued) Day

Time

Event

Friday August 13

early a. m.

Breakfast at housing sites

8:00 a. m.

Reconciliation begins at Catechetical sites

8:30 a. m.

Morning Prayer at Civic Center Park

10:00 a. m. Catechesis 12:00 p. m. Mass at Catechetical sites 1:00 p. m.

Lunch service begins

2:00 p. m.

Community Service Projects

3:00 p. m.

Cultural events, thematic activities, forums and meetings with Bishops, music festival in Civic Center Park.

5:00 p. m.

Dinner service begins

7:30 p. m.

Evening event: The Way of the Cross – a celebration of peace and reconciliation at Mile High Stadium

11:30 p. m. Night prayers at housing sites Saturday August 14

early a. m.

Breakfast at housing sites

8:00 a. m.

Pilgrims’ Mass at Civic Center Park followed by the pilgrimage to Cherry Creek State Park

9:00 a. m.

Mass for International Youth Forum delegates with the Holy Father

10:00 a. m. Catechetical Masses at Catechetical sites

Sunday August 15

7:00 p. m.

Arrival of the Holy Father at the Vigil

7:15 p. m.

Prayer vigil at Cherry Creek State Park

5:00 a. m.

General public begins to arrive for Mass

6:00 a. m.

Morning prayer

9:30 a. m.

Closing Mass with the Holy Father begins at Cherry Creek State Park

Note: Schedule is subject to change at any time.

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Thematic events were diverse: they reached from speeches and debates to a “Taizé- like prayer experience,” music concerts, testimonies, and “dramatic presentations and brief topical exhortations all with the focus of being called to evangelize peers” (AAD6). Guidelines for participants were given in a document of its own (AAD9). It exhorted participants to stay mindful “that while in Denver your actions represent all Catholic young people. Anyone disrupting an event will be asked to leave.” They were to follow state laws regarding alcohol consumption while “it is our suggestion that all participants refrain from drinking”; to wear shirts and shoes “in all public areas/venues”; “keep noise levels to a minimum in sleeping areas”; and to “be mindful of the citizens of Denver and the state of Colorado: “They are our gracious hosts and should be treated with the utmost kindness and respect” (AAD9). That involved being “attentive to the environment by not littering” (AAD9). That included being “attentive tot he environment by not littering” (AAD9). Chaperones had a “24-hour a day responsibility,” should always know the whereabouts of those in their charge, never attend events the youngest participants were ineligible to attend, make sure participants in their care adhered to the guidelines, and “must accompany” them on the “entire pilgrimage to Cherry Creek State Park for the Saturday Vigil if they choose to walk the route. Unaccompanied groups of minors will not be allowed to make the pilgrimage” (AAD9). The pilgrimage in question here was a communal walk stretching 12 miles from the Denver Civic Center to Cherry Creek State Park, another new event component that would be replicated at subsequent WYDs. Among the things participants were asked to bring were small wooden crosses “to be blessed at the conclusion of the Sunday [Closing] Mass,” and scarves or bandanas, preferably in the colors of WYD 1993 (“magenta, teal and green”) or papal colors (“gold and white”; AAD9). At that event, the pope would “give 12 young people, representatives of the world, a replica of the Holy Year [WYD] Cross as a sign of their commission” (AAD9). In order to help young people find their groups in a crowd, group leaders were advised to “bring a unique banner or flag.” They were also asked to designate song leaders “because movement will be slow […] Song leaders could be particularly helpful during pilgrimages to and from churches and sites” as “[e]veryone will receive the Pilgrims’ Handbook which will have all of the songs that will be used at World Youth Day gatherings” (AAD9). Like proto-WYD 1984 and WYDs 1987 through 1991, WYD 1993 had an official theme song: One Body (Vatican.va, 2000): [Chorus:] We are one body The body of Christ And we do not stand alone. We are one body The body of Christ And He came that we might have life.

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When you eat My Body And you drink My Blood I will live in you And you will live in in my love. At the name of Jesus Every knee shall bend Jesus is the Lord And he will come again. I am the way, the truth, the life I am the final sacrifice I am the way, the truth, the life He who believes in him will have eternal life.

The chorus of One Body lets singers express ecclesial community, combined with a narrative element that nods to the incarnation and defines life as its purpose. The first and third verses are the first examples of all WYD theme songs so far that make participants sing the (somewhat paraphrased) short texts attributed to Jesus in the first person, as though they were carrying his voice. Not only is the Church the “mystical body of Christ,” but the Church as a community, singing these words, is an interfacial element to those who both sing and listen. Through song, the lyrics assume the interfacial capacity of the gathered community. If we understand missionary activity as invitations to transrealm interaction with specific superhuman persons, however diversely described and defined, then singing One Body is a good example of that happening. Less obvious were logistical challenges—two in particular, Buelt told me. Regarding participant accommodations, tent camps were suggested, as well as college campuses, private homes, and affordable hotels (DPL2, DPL3). The greatest logistical challenges, however, were providing participants with food, and organizing infrastructure during the communal walk to Cherry Creek State Park. With regards to food, the decision to work out a contract with McDonald’s was “removed from my purview,” said Buelt, “because my superior—the president of World Youth Day out of Washington—wanted to make a contract […] with McDonald’s. And we just didn’t grasp the reality of how food was to be done.” I am sure the paradox was not lost on either Buelt or many participants: having an event where criticizing capitalism and consumerism was central, and having participants eat McDonald’s food—one of the greatest symbols of global capitalism on the other seems self-contradictory. In any case, the result was that “all of the young people, all they had to eat for six days was McDonald’s and they—especially if they weren’t Americans—they hadn’t been used to hamburgers day after day after day [and] got sick of the food.”25 At later WYDs he said, like 2011 in Madrid and 2013 in Rio de Janeiro 25 One of those interviewed for their memories of WYD 1993 shared that “WYD was a great experience, but I did get sick of eating McDonald’s every day” (AAD24).

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—and I can add 2016 in Kraków—“they invite restaurants all over the metropolitan area to join a kind of club where the young people can [use] these little tickets, go to any restaurant that participates and then the restaurant gets paid back.” The second logistical challenge, said Buelt, was choosing a destination for the communal walk. Lacking a “place really close to the downtown Denver area that provided for a reasonable walking pilgrimage from […] the gathering space” downtown, organizers eventually chose Cherry Creek State Park. So that was 12 miles and on a hot August day. And we were ready, we were prepared, but on a hot August day that’s a long way for people to walk. A number of people bused out, but a number of people walked. […] The next day, August 15, Sunday, was very hot, and five thousand medical incidences occurred that weekend, but many of them were simple dehydrations. And many of them were repeat dehydrations. It was handled well by the medical community […] but the media made a big deal out of five thousand people getting sick at World Youth Day.

The Denver Post reported numbers as high as 6,000 participants needing medical attention, and the county sheriff expressed concern for health risks related to the Closing Mass on August 15 (DPL12). Dehydrations have been a recurring challenge for WYD organizers, as medical research has shown (David et al., 2005 59, Memish et al., 2012 56).26 The communal walk, or pilgrimage walk, to Cherry Creek State Park was a way to incorporate a small-scale, performatively conventional pilgrimage into the larger event design.27 The destination was not a shrine, however, but Cherry Creek State Park, and several routes there were available. It might be tempting for some readers to speculate that only the communal walk was denoted as pilgrimage rather than the event itself, but that would be inaccurate. In addition to the sources already cited, which show that WYD events were called pilgrimages, the official Media Guide described the pilgrimage walk as both 26 On the morning of the canonization ceremony for John XXIII and John Paul II, April 27, 2014, participant observation afforded me the experience of what happens to participants who fail to stay sufficiently hydrated. The crowd was so packed that, at one point, I was able to lift my feet from the ground and let the crowd carry me. Suffice it to say that making my way to the edge of the crowd to contact a volunteer as my condition worsened was not easy. Having reached a volunteer and eventually persuaded her that I was not trying to cut in line, I was led to a member of the Red Cross. Three paramedics carried me inside the nearest Red Cross tent, logged my personal information, gave me two bottles of water and a blanket, and laid me down on a field bed. It was 7 o’clock in the morning, which gave me enough time to recuperate before the ceremony began a couple of hours later. 27 One source had the walk begin at 11:30 a.m. on Saturday preceded by Mass at 10:00 a.m. and short catechesis (AAD14: 88), but another source expected people to start walking at 8:00 a.m and arrive at Cherry Creek State Park at 3 p.m. (AAD18: 6). Judging from my observations at WYD 2016, however, the groups that comprise the WYD community in its entirety start walking at different times and consequently arrive at their destination at different times. Even if they all started at the same time, the logistics of admitting them to the Vigil site could take hours, so these times should be taken with a tablespoon of salt.

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something that would be begun on Saturday morning and that would “continue the pilgrimage”—that is, continue participation in WYD as a whole. At the Vigil, speeches and performances were held, and the Orchestra and Chorus would perform a diverse musical program, including Bernstein’s Candide Overture, three excerpts of Bernstein’s Mass, Mozart’s Ave Verum Corpus, Kumbaya, and Michael Jackson’s We Are the World. The Media Guide states that the “music will include audience participation as much as possible. The goal […] is to set the mood and theme for the vigil with the Holy Father” (AAD14: 89). The next point on the program was the pope’s arrival: “The Holy Father disembarks from his helicopter and takes a car to the backstage area. When the Holy Father then enters the ‘popemobile’ the orchestra begins the Abba Ojcze Fanfare […] As the Popemobile tours the crowd the 1991 Theme Song from Poland, Abba Ojcze (Ah-bah, Oy-chay), will be sung by the Colorado Chorus and Youth Chorale” (AAD14: 89, emphasis in original). The chorus of the WYD 1991 theme song has two possible interpretations in this context: First, the “Father” indicated in “Abba, Father” addresses the highest ranking Christian superhuman person as “father” and “dad.” In that case, the song is an interfacial element in transrealm interaction. Second, however, the timing of the song with the pope’s encounters with young people suggests that the “Father” could also be the “Holy Father”—the pope (and etymologically pope is more akin to Hebrew abba, and the informal English dad, than the more formal father). In that case, the song also becomes a medium within the human realm—a way of greeting the pope in his own language; “Holy Father” in Polish is precisely Ojcze S´wie˛ty. On that note, it is fitting that we turn to the presence and participation of John Paul II. 4.1.5 Papal presence and participation None of John Paul II’s WYD 1993 manuscripts explicitly mentioned capitalism, consumerism, or hedonism. Such heavily laden terms would likely have alienated many listeners, and John Paul II knew his audience. Instead, he criticized the consequences of these systems and currents by noting that in “developed countries, a serious moral crisis is already affecting the lives of many young people, leaving them adrift, often without hope, and conditioned to look only for instant gratification” (John Paul II, 1993 h: No. 3, italics added). “Instant” or “immediate gratification” was the phrase that linked the pope’s arrival speech at Stapleton International Airport to his earlier criticisms of consumerism and hedonism (John Paul II, 1987d: No. 28, John Paul II, 1991 No. 41). He would often contrast these cultural influences with the concept of life and the dignity of the human person. Neither of my two respondents who participated at WYD 1993 say they remember much of what the pope said, but for Travis, his presence made an impact:

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I remember being at Cherry Creek State Park and it was really hot. I was probably dehydrated, you know, just sitting there thinking “OK, here’s this guy in this 100 degree heat. He’s here from Europe. I don’t know anything of what he said, you know. There’s a picture or two of him in the home, but it’s so hot. He must have something very important to say, because he’s wearing layers and layers of clothes. I’m sitting there in a t-shirt and shorts. I’m dying. He’s up there with all [these clothes on]. This must be really important.” That’s probably my favorite one [moment] because it was just this deepening sense of the papacy. I mean Jesus and the Eucharist were one thing, but also “Wow! Here’s the man. Here’s the man right next to Jesus, nowadays in the Church.”

From a religious media perspective, John Paul II appears to Travis as a mediator. From a religious interaction perspective, however, the pope’s presence and Travis’ understanding that this is the “man right next to Jesus, nowadays in the Church” indicates that the pope was also an interfacial element. He was someone who could represent Jesus, although his mediation was not a requirement for transrealm interaction with Jesus. What underscores that interfacial capacity more than anything is the juxtaposition of the Eucharist, an interfacial element par excellence, with the pope as a person. When John Paul II arrived on Thursday August 12, he met with President Bill Clinton at the airport and Regis University, and proceeded to participate in the Papal Welcoming Ceremony.28 Friday August 13, he celebrated Mass with the bishops at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception. He was not personally present at the Way of the Cross that afternoon, but had recorded a message that was played in his absence. Saturday August 14, he presided over the Vigil in Cherry Creek State Park, and celebrated the Closing Mass on Sunday morning, August 15. Afterwards, he visited the Mount Saint Vincent’s Home for Children. During the Welcoming Ceremony at Mile High Stadium, John Paul II declared, “We have come to Denver as pilgrims. We are continuing the journey made by millions of young people in the previous World Youth Days” (John Paul II, 1993e: No. 3). Pilgrims set out for a destination. In our case it is not so much a place or a shrine that we seek to honor. Our is a pilgrimage to a modern city, a symbolic destination: the ‘metropolis’ is the place which determines the life-style and the history of a large part 28 There were really two welcoming ceremonies for the pope: one after he landed at Stapleton International Airport, where he was welcomed by President Clinton and a group of journalists and reporters, and one at Mile High Stadium— which was the Welcoming Ceremony of the WYD community (John Paul II, 1993e; 1993 f). The two welcoming ceremonies reflect his dual role as a head of state on the one hand, and leader of the Catholic Church on the other. The chairs used by Pope John Paul II and President Clinton at Regis University have been adorned with plaques that commemorate their sitting on them on that date, as I observed when I visited that room in April 2015. Some might consider the chair used by the pope to be a relic, commemorate their sitting on them on that date, as I observed when I visited that room in April 2015.

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of the human family at the end of the twentieth century. This modern city of Denver is set in the beautiful natural surroundings of the Rocky Mountains, as if to put the work of human hands in relationship with the work of the Creator. We are therefore searching for the reflection of God not only in the beauty of nature but also in humanity’s achievements and in each individual person (John Paul II, 1993e: No. 3, all italics in original).

In terms of religious interaction, pilgrimage to a modern city meant universalizing the religious interface. Lacking a popular and officially sanctioned pilgrimage site functioning as an interfacial element, the entire human social realm was declared littered with interfacial elements. Each human face could be an aperture to the superhuman realm—specifically to God himself, normatively speaking the superhuman person of the highest authority. This radical expansion of the religious interface to involve all human beings found its resonance in the pope’s homily at McNichols Arena to the representatives of the International Youth Forum, where he stated that the “immense mystery of Love is made present to us through Holy Church’s sacraments, teaching and solidarity with pilgrim humanity” (John Paul II, 1993d: No. 6). Later, he would continue to address WYD participants as pilgrims at the Vigil (John Paul II, 1993a), during his homily for the closing Mass (John Paul II, 1993b: Nos. 1, 2, 5), and at his farewell address at Stapleton International Airport (John Paul II, 1993c: Nos. 1, 2). On August 13, John Paul II celebrated Mass for bishops and priests at the Denver Cathedral (see figure 4.2). He reminded the bishops that Saint Peter and, by extension also his successor, was the “rock on which Christ built his Church from the beginning” (John Paul II, 1993j: No. 1, italics in original), and stated that they were there “to be with the young pilgrims […] Through our ministry the young people present here need to be able to discover, above all, that they are Temples of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in them” (John Paul II, 1993j: No. 2, all italics in original). From the perspective of religious interaction, declaring human persons as temples of God attributes interfacial quality to them; they are themselves apertures to the superhuman realm— indeed to the highest-ranking superhuman person inhabiting it. In the pope’s words, WYD 1993 were “the days in which the light of the Gospel must shine before them with particular brilliance. For they are the Church of today and tomorrow – the Church that rises on the rock of Divine Truth […] The Church of the Third Millennium needs to be firmly planted in the heart of the new generation” (John Paul II, 1993j: No. 2, italics in original). That meant facilitating immersion in transrealm interaction for a large number of people so that they, in turn, could facilitate transrealm interaction for others. After Communion, John Paul II sat down in a chair at the end of the aisle. While musicians played We Are One Body, and Glory, Glory, Hallelujah, people lined up to meet the pope one by one: adults, young people, and children. Holding a stack of rosary packs in his hand—all of which featured the papal

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crest—he gave one to each person who met him. People made a variety of gestures: Some would kneel and kiss his hand, others would kiss him once on each cheek, and yet others would hug him closely. All of them spoke to him. John Paul II, for his part, would smile to them, say some words—often “Bless you.” He also tended to make some form of physical contact: Sometimes he placed his hand on their head, while at other times he would kiss their check and make the sign of the cross on their forehead. Others he would embrace or pat affectionately on the back or shoulder. He made the most affectionate gestures towards young priests and members of religious orders. Some people displayed emotions more obviously than others. One particularly moving scene took place as a woman reached him who appeared to have been crying for a long time. Her eyes were puffy and her face red. While it is difficult to make out what was said from the recording, he seemed to ask her if she had been crying. She cried a bit longer, before he said something that made her smile and laugh. He then made the sign of the cross on her forehead, blessed her, spoke some more to her and kissed her on the forehead. Clearly moved and encouraged by the encounter, she smiled through her tears as she left him (JP2C2). He would also meet people in person in this manner at other occasions during WYD 1993, for example during the Saturday night Vigil at Cherry Creek State Park. The Denver Post reported that “a quarter of a million people – 75,000 more than expected – flooded Cherry Creek State Park” for the Vigil (DPL12). During the Vigil, the pope sat in a high chair under a canopy, a few stairs up from the rest of the podium, while young people from different countries gave testimonies to the participants gathered. Two people from India, a man and a woman, contrasted material poverty in India with spiritual prosperity, and spoke of the challenges of being a member of a religious minority in a multireligious country (JP2C3). Afterwards came two Brazilian men. They, too, spoke of social contrasts and justice. They emphasized the power of evangelization in Latin America, and the need for a “civilization of love” (JP2C3). Afterwards, these and other speakers met John Paul II in person. One of the Brazilian speakers seemed reluctant to stand on the same level as the pope, until John Paul II gestured for him to come all the way up to where he was standing and so he did. Each of them received a rosary, as others had in the Cathedral the day before. In sum, John Paul II’s presence and participation helped to legitimize WYD 1993 in Denver as a pilgrimage. He did so through speech acts where he referred to the event as a pilgrimage and its participants as pilgrims, but especially by imbuing participants with interfacial quality and setting an example through emotionally charged encounters between them and the pope. Thus papal presence facilitated immersion in the superhuman realm, and gave new meaning tot he Catholic concept of pilgrimage.

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Figure 4.2: Mass at Denver’s Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception. Note the copy of Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa on the far right. Author’s photograph (2015).

4.1.6 The World Youth Day community Despite traffic delays and other nuisances for locals, the impact of WYD 1993 on Denver was mostly positive in Buelt’s view, especially on violence in the city: From a spiritual standpoint, from the Tuesday, August 11, where we gathered, the feast of Saint Claire, to the Sunday, August 15, so five days, all major crime in the city and county of Denver ceased. There had not been one single felony committed within those five days.

Consequently, the narrative of WYD in Denver was a stark contrast to the narrative of the “summer of violence”—the dark side of the local context in which WYD had taken place. The moment the pope’s plane took off from Stapleton, that night there was an assault on a police officer at a gay bar. So, the Church, the Holy Spirit, the Holy Father were teaching us a lesson. And if we had the eyes—I don’t think we did or we do—to pick up on that: Why was it that when young people gathered together to celebrate the Lord, to celebrate their faith, to support and respect and to get to know one another globally, that our crime, our violence, our disrespect for one another all stopped. And then picked right back up again as soon as it was over.

This contrasting narrative cast WYD 1993 as an oasis of peace and civility with local as well as global relevance. The event itself had been an intervention by God through the presence of a transnational gathering of young Catholics. In that view, the WYD community—and the pope in particular—had been an

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aperture through which the superhuman realm had seeped into the human realm, an interfacial element through which the Holy Spirit had effectively stopped violence for the duration of the community’s presence.

4.1.7 World Youth Day saints Unlike previous festivals, WYD 1993 had patron saints connected to the event rather than the event location: Italian Pier Giorgio Frassati (1901–1925, whose relics were also available at WYD 2016),29 Native American Kateri Tekakwitha (1656–1680, a Mohawk born in present-day New York State), and the icon Our Lady of the New Advent, created in 1992. Neither Frassati nor Tekakwitha had ties to Denver or even the state of Colorado: Frassati was mainly venerated in Italy, and no recorded shrines to Tekakwitha were in the state. They were relevant because they had died young and the promotion of Tekakwitha was an attempt to accommodate Native American Catholics—a double minority. Our Lady of the New Advent, however, was Colorado’s very own Mary. The role of the Catholic Church in the victimization of Native American peoples during the period of European colonialization was not lost on the Archdiocese of Denver, nor on John Paul II at WYD 1993. One attempt at remedying the relationship between the Catholic Church as an historical institution and Native American Catholics as a double minority came through the promotion of Kateri Tekakwitha, the first Native American saint. Submitted in 1884, the cause for Kateri Tekakwitha’s (1656–1680) canonization did not reach beatification until 1980 by John Paul II, and canonization in 2012 by Benedict XVI (Benedict XVI, 2012, Vatican.va, 2012 38). Nicknamed the “Lily of the Mohawks,” Tekakwitha represented Native American Catholics to whom John Paul II sent a special greeting during the Papal Welcoming Ceremony at Mile High Stadium: “Among you there is one group which I wish to mention with particular esteem: the Native American peoples,” the pope said. “Thank you for bringing the richness and color of your special heritage to the ‘World Youth Day’. May Christ truly be the way, the truth and the life of your peoples!” (John Paul II, 1993e). John Paul II had met with representatives from various Native American peoples in both the U.S. and Canada earlier, in 1987 (John Paul II: 1987e, 1987 f). He was conscious of and sensitive to the political and societal vulnerabilities of ethnic and religious minorities, particularly the two in combination, and so it was unsurprising that he would reach out to them. From a religious interaction point of view, Tekakwitha was a superhuman 29 At WYD 2016 in Kraków, Frassati’s relics were available to the public. Accompanying a group of Catholic woman to the Dominican Basilica of the Holy Trinity, where his coffin was displayed, I learned that Frassati is referred to by some Catholic woman as “Frassati the hottie,” indicating an eroticized aspect to his appeal.

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person of fairly recent official acknowledgment. As John Paul II promoted her veneration at WYD 1993, he effectively encouraged young people to build a relationship with her through transrealm interaction. For that purpose, an image of her was presented at the event—a painting where she looks directly at the viewer. The purpose of producing that painting was for people in attendance to employ it as an interfacial element. As the representative saint of Native American peoples, Tekakwitha was and remains heavily laden with symbolic content. As a Mohawk saint in the religion of the colonizers, Tekakwitha embodies the paradox of the Christian Native American—an ethnic and cultural outsider to the majority of American Christians, and a religious outsider to most other Native Americans (cf. Cummings, 2013). By promoting transrealm interaction with her at WYD 1993, Native American Catholics were made visible on a global stage, and presented with a superhuman person who would be their representative in the superhuman realm. Frassati, for his part, embodied self-sacrifice and asceticism—ideals connected to conventional pilgrimage practices. Although both Tekakwitha and Frassati were important saints at WYD 1993, the most intriguing novelty was a new version of an old and universal Catholic saint: the Virgin Mother Mary. 4.1.8 Our Lady of the New Advent At WYD 1991, the legendary and centuries-old-icon Our Lady of Jasna Góra had been the undisputed central ritual object. As Stafford commented to the young people gathered at the gym for a preparation session, Denver could boast neither the relics of an apostle, nor a miraculous image. Although he had stated that the beautiful natural surroundings and hospitable people of Denver were “all we need,” there was an icon that filled the vacancy left by Our Lady of Jasna Góra. That icon was Our Lady of the New Advent (figure 4.3). Created by Jesuit priest William Hart McNichols that same year,30 the icon is based on the orthodox icon Our Lady of the Sign, albeit with some alterations: the mountains in the background signify the Rocky Mountains, which were also included in an interpretation of the open-air surroundings as a kind of sacred geography. But the most significant part of the icon is its placement of Jesus inside Mary’s womb: In the context of Christians combating women’s rights to abortion among other “life issues,” Jesus here appears as “unborn.” With that in mind, the image seems to ask the rhetorical question: What if Mary had terminated her pregnancy? The obvious answer is that Jesus would not have been born, and salvation would have been forfeit. As we saw earlier, John Paul II extended interfacial quality to all human persons. The theological consequence is quite dire: With Jesus as an embodiment of life itself, that attribute is 30 The McNichols Arena, where John Paul II met with representatives from the International Youth Forum, was named after him.

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Figure 4.3: Our Lady of the New Advent. Print located in the reception of the Archdiocese of Denver (Author’s photograph, 2015).

implicated in all the “unborn,” so every case of abortion represented a denial of Jesus’ birth in the mythical past and consequently of Jesus as savior in the present. Jesus’ birth, however, is seen as the triumph of Mary’s fiat, which in the context of anti-abortion campaigning was a potent image: She is a poor, young, courageous mother who willingly accepts the trials connected to motherhood, but also goes beyond them; she gives birth to Jesus fully aware that he will suffer

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and die, due to her obedience to God (DCRA3). It is a striking example of how a medium, narrativized and employed as an interfacial element, is used to compel people to make choose one course of action and political alignment over another. The icon itself was not presented as superhuman of origin. On May 15, 1991, the Denver Catholic Register introduced the icon to its readers: Imagine an apparition of the Virgin Mary appearing majestically between the mountains and plains of the Church of Northern Colorado over which She reigns as patroness. Imagine our Blessed Mother robed in royal purple and revealing within herself the Christ child holding Colorado’s state flower. That is the image of “Our Lady of the New Advent” (AAD2: 20; DCRA1).

The imperative to “imagine an apparition” does several things. Unlike Our Lady of Luján and Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa, Our Lady of the New Advent is not connected to a narrative of superhuman persons interacting with humans. It is not presented as an interfacial element powered by miracle narratives. Rather, it appeals to readers to use their imagination to create the apparition within their own minds. In this sense, it encourages people to use their minds in an interfacial manner, making Mary appear by visualizing her.31 In the preparation period before WYD 1993, Our Lady of the New Advent functioned as an interfacial element that called young Catholics to “missionary evangelization” to “prepare for the New Millennium” (AAD2: 5). Preparation material asked teachers to “create an atmosphere for and lead a prayer experience with the Icon of Our Lady of the New Advent” and “have the youth share their feelings and experience” afterwards (AAD2: 75). Participants were to be given a Holy Card and “quietly pray and meditate on the icon” for 20–25 minutes (AAD2: 75). Afterwards, teachers were told to have “the youth share their feelings and experience. What was it like praying for that amount of time with one focus? What was your prayer like? How was your time spent? Have the youth share what they saw in the Icon” (AAD2: 75, italics in original). Instructing teachers to distribute Holy Cards with Our Lady of the New Advent and have young people pray by using it means that the icon was promoted as an interfacial element. At the Opening Mass, Archbishop Stafford introduced the icon to those gathered. He did so while stating that if there was any one take-home message he wanted participants to remember, it was that “you, a hundred and seventy thousand young people, are to be the leaders of the new millennium” (UNDA4). “We are only seven years away from the year 2000 in which we

31 When I visited Denver in 2015, a large copy of Our Lady of the New Advent hung in an enclosure in the entrance to the Archdiocese of Denver’s reception area, to the left as I entered the sliding doors. Its location made it easy to miss, which is ironic considering its arguably small impact on the WYD legacy and local devotional culture.

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commemorate the 2000th anniversary of the incarnation of the Eternal Son of God,” he urged them. Here, we have Mary of the New Advent […] carrying Christ within her womb with the Rocky Mountains behind them. Each of you has a copy of this. I hope, dear brothers and sisters, that as you leave on Sunday, you will leave with a greater sense of hope, that you can make a difference in the new century. This fading century has been crueler than all of the others […] Your task is to be leaders of the new century. […] God is entrusting to the Church in the 21st century the task of keeping the spirit of childhood alive in the world. That is your task!

Stafford’s words were met with applause. The reference to all of those gathered having a copy of Our Lady of the New Advent indicates that all participants were given a Holy Card or some other kind of copy of the icon, just like the Catholic school students in the Archdiocese of Denver had months earlier. At the Vigil, young people carried Our Lady of the New Advent in procession to the podium, preceded by flowers. It remained at the podium for the rest of WYD. During Mass the next morning, John Paul II walked in front of the WYD Cross and bowed to it before moving over to incense the icon (HCC1). In a letter from Archbishop Stafford to the priests of the diocese, Stafford asked recipients to pray for the pope and for the pilgrims traveling to Denver for World Youth Day. He ended the letter, saying “Under the protection of Our Lady of the New Advent, we cannot help but succeed” (AAD25). Upon his return to Rome, John Paul II had a telegram sent to Archbishop Stafford where the pope expressed his gratitude for WYD 1993 as a “great ecclesial event”. He seemed confident that “the faith and hope which illumined these past days will continue to kindly [sic] the flame of divine love in the Catholic community of Colorado for years to come,” and ended the letter by commending Stafford, other bishops, and all the faithful “to the loving intercession of Our Lady of the New Advent” (AAD26). In sum, there were attempts to make the Our Lady of the New Advent into interfacial elements for young people before and during WYD 1993, as when organizers encouraged Denver’s young Catholics to interact with Mary by using that icon in prayer. Within that context, the image was imbued with a message that encapsulated some main themes of the new evangelization, and life in particular. In that capacity, it was socially constructed as a medium of a specific message: to advance the “culture of life” and the “civilization of love.” In lieu of an apparition, officials strategically used Our Lady of the New Advent as a medium for a message and an interfacial element for transrealm interaction. That interaction afforded the icon and the message their legitimacy. In that respect, it showed creativity (and the space allowed for it) in negotiating old traditions in the new context of WYD—a creativity we have already seen was extended to notions of pilgrimage.

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4.1.9 The Way of the Cross and the female Jesus controversy Footage from a documentary about WYD 1993, Five Extraordinary Days, recounts how a delegation from Poland passed the WYD Cross to an American delegation. “Since then,” the narrator suggests, “it’s been on tour throughout the United States to rally young people to join in World Youth Day 1993. Today, the cross ends its long, twelve-month journey” (UNDA2). That cross would also play an important role in the Way of the Cross on Friday, August 14, at Mile High Stadium. Unlike most sites where the Way of the Cross is performed, indoors or outdoors, the Stadium did not have anything resembling the stations of the cross. Without those ritual stopping places, it did not by itself provide what the planned practice required. This meant that pieces were missing from the religious interface. The issue was solved by a performance group from Cincinnati called the “Fountain Square Fools.”32 Using a performance group meant providing a temporary, but live and animated depiction of the Via Crucis narrative through visual embodiment, an animated and dynamic religious interface. Moreover, it added to the overall mobility of WYD; performance artists could provide a non-intrusive and temporary interface that would leave no mark, no imprint— except on those present, on TV viewers, and, as in 1993, newspaper readers.33 During the performance, the role of Jesus was played by a woman. This did not go unnoticed and resulted in profuse ritual criticism. One prominent critic was Mother Angelica (1923–2016), a Poor Clare nun who founded the conservative Catholic Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN) in 1981 (Watts, 2005: 35). Mother Angelica had her own bi-weekly show on the channel, where she would often comment on current events. EWTN ran a continuing live coverage of WYD 1993, and when Jesus was portrayed by a woman during the Way of the Cross, Mother Angelica seized the opportunity to make her opinion known. Several copies of that show are now available on YouTube (YouTube channel: Fr. Chris Gernetzke, 2016 [1993]), and her comments would influence and embolden others to voice their criticism as well. Starting out with praise for WYD 1993 as a “tremendous week” where “[w]e’ve seen catholicity in action. We’ve seen spirituality working. We’ve seen an inner power within these children, brought on by their catholicity—by the presence of this holy man that we call the Holy Father” (YouTube channel: Fr. Chris Gernetzke, 2016 [1993]). Yet on this occasion, the praise was short-lived. 32 Letter from Keeler to Most Rev. Agostino Cacciavillan, Apostolic Pro-Nuncio to the United States of America, Washington, D.C., dated September 13, 1993. UNDA, CMCN 51/05 Women for Faith and Family re Catholic Youth Day 1993/1014 [part 1]. 33 It should be noted, however, that the same might have been achieved by creating temporary material objects to accommodate the religious interface of the Way of the Cross.

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John Paul II had not been personally present. “I’m very happy he wasn’t there,” Mother Angelica said. “The stations were beautiful. The prayers were beautiful, but they depicted our Lord there as a woman. Abomination to the Eternal Father” (YouTube channel: Fr. Chris Gernetzke, 2016 [1993]). Mother Angelica went on at some length to criticize what to her eyes was not only a grave ritual error, but also a sin. She read aloud from a letter of statement into the camera, adding comments as she proceeded: “In response to the questions regarding the Stations of the Cross,” mostly made by EWTN, “at Mile High Stadium.” […] Mime is a historical representation. “The organizers never intended the portrayal of the Stations of the Cross to be a historical representation.” What do you think the Stations of the Cross are? It doesn’t matter what you think they are. They are a historical representation of the Passion of Jesus. “Anyone, even a child”—that puts us in our place—“could have played any of the roles.” Can you imagine a woman playing the part of Abraham Lincoln in a mime? (YouTube channel: Fr. Chris Gernetzke, 2016 [1993])

Mother Angelica also appeared to be offended on the pope’s behalf: “I think it was really out of place when this whole place is vibrant with real, true catholicity” (YouTube channel: Fr. Chris Gernetzke, 2016 [1993]). She considered having a female mime artist play the role of Jesus as an intentional statement—one that not only polluted what she considered to be an important soteriological truth, but also a representation of Jesus. To Mother Angelica, this was blasphemy (YouTube channel: Fr. Chris Gernetzke, 2016 [1993]). She lamented the “liberal Church in America,” whom she blamed for the offense. Her criticism reverberated in mail from less prominent critics around the country, on postcards and in letters addressed to Archbishop Stafford. One postcard spoke of outrage and saw the portrayal as an insult to the pope (AAD28). Another proclaimed shame upon Archbishop Stafford, called the mercy of God down upon him, and blamed liberal theologians for what they considered a Church in “disarray” (AAD28). Others spoke of shock, scandal, and blamed feminists for trying to “make God a woman” (AAD28). Some called for a defense of Roman Catholicism over American Catholicism, clearly thinking of the two as opposed (AAD28). Not all of the letters were unilaterally critical, however. Many also added their thanks for WYD in general, saying they were “truly overwhelmed with the wonderful spirit of the Lord which was present everywhere” (AAD28). The controversy clearly demanded a response, and since Archbishop Stafford was responsible, a higher authority stepped in: William H. Keeler, Archbishop of Baltimore and recently elected President of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops. Writing to Agostino Cacciavillan, the apostolic pro-nuncio to the United States, on September 13, 1993, Keeler stated that, “the decision to use mime during the stations of the cross was a joint decision of the planners of World Youth Day and the Pontifical Council

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for the Laity. Neither group, however, had any prior knowledge that the role of Jesus would be taken by a female” (UNDA3). He further emphasized that “the choice of a young woman from among the four mimists sent to Denver by the mime group ‘Fountain Square Fools’ from Cincinnati was not a decision made to advance any ecclesial agenda” (UNDA3). Lastly, he addressed the accusation that the portrayal had been insulting to John Paul II: The Holy Father himself remarked at lunch on Saturday that he had seen the presentation on television and thought it a very helpful adaptation of the medieval miracle play for the instruction of people in the World Youth Day setting (UNDA3).

It remains unknown whether the pope, who was watching a broadcast, could at all have been aware that Jesus was portrayed by a woman. Immediately following these remarks, Keeler added that, had anyone known a female performer was going to portray Jesus, it would have been stopped. It would have been known if the last rehearsal had not been canceled. Keeler wrote that the performance group were very sorry for the controversy that had unfolded, but he also found the descriptions of the performance as “blasphemous, heretical and disrespectful to the pope” as hateful and invalid. He added that the Fountain Square Fools had apologized to those who felt offended and that at this point, perhaps they were the ones who were owed an apology for the distortions and bad publicity they had suffered. In addition, Keeler pointed out that the employment of “inclusive language”—by implication gender-inclusive language—during the Magnificat prayer through addressing God in the second person rather than the male third person, was chosen by the performer. In any case, he wrote, this was a minor issue and not really worth focusing on, seeing as the event in total had been such a great success (UNDA3). The discussion continued, and Keeler received a letter that attacked several of his points, but in one of several documentaries on WYD 1993, the Way of the Cross was described in the following way: “Friday evening, the young people gathered at Mile High Stadium to participate in the Stations of the Cross, a time to reflect on God’s great gifts of peace and reconciliation” (HCC). In other words, the controversy of the “female Jesus” does not appear to have made it into popularized reception history, perhaps because it does not fit the overarching success narrative. It is clear that these instances of ritual criticism are good examples of what Grimes has observed, that “recognising ritual misfires requires attention to the total situation of the speech act, not just to words alone. Assessment requires a consideration of the tradition and social context” (Grimes, 2010: Chapter 9, section 2, para. 5, Kindle edition). But religious interaction and game studies theory can also offer some insight. With regards to gender-inclusive language, speaking to God as “you” rather than “he” or “him” also affords the Magnificat interfacial capacity and invites transrealm interaction. Traditionally called the Canticle of Mary as its contents are words ascribed to her in Luke 1: 46–55, the

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act of performing it places the speaker in the role of Mary. That connection is further enhanced by the second person pronoun which, rendering the text interfacial, can be conducive to immersion. The problem here was that, from Mother Angelica and her fellow critics’ point of view, the rules of depiction were broken and a sacred ritual text was altered. Furthermore, from the perspective of religious interaction, the portrayal of Jesus by a woman distracted critics from the transrealm interaction they had anticipated. They had expected an interfacial element that would conform to how they pictured the superhuman person with whom the mime was meant to faciliate interaction. To critics, a medium that, if male, would have been an interfacial element in interaction with Jesus, became a distortion. That distortion intruded upon a ritual script that rendered the interaction inauthentic and threatening, and thereby had the effect of distracting from it. Judging from the charged vocabulary used to describe critics’ reactions, distraction—or denial of immersion—can also be emotionally charged.

4.2 How Denver defined World Youth Day 4.2.1 Remaking pilgrimage WYD’s event design had changed since its beginning. Until 1993, the WYD event format had only been replicated within the conventional bounds of pilgrimage, locating the festival at established pilgrimage sites. Having been declared, but also established as a tradition in its own right through repetition and replication, WYD became a space for the transmission of magisterial normativity. However, as previously pointed out, magisterial normativity is neither uniform nor static. Magisterial normativity—like the hierarchy itself— is a dynamic product of social construction, where proximity to power is restricted. The restrictions, however, are neither absolute nor stable. They can be, and are, changed and negotiated time and again. In his groundbreaking work on the cognitive science of religion, Religion Explained (2001), Pascal Boyer argues that ideas and beliefs are not transmitted by copying an idea that is communicated; we do not “download” cognitive concepts from one another. Rather, we construct and reconstruct ideas in our own minds based on the relevant information conveyed (Boyer, 2001: 33, 40). Boyer does not, however, discuss the differences between the various media through which information is communicated. That is relevant here because Media studies, text studies, as well as visual and material culture inform us that the type of medium is important. That is relevant here because magisterial normativity is communicated in a great variety of media. One important medium is text, including carefully formulated documents like the 1992 Catechism. The Catechism was produced by an ecclesiastical elite through

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a long-winded editing process. The result was the source of normativity intended for use in catechesis. Catechesis is commonly divided into numerous sessions, including at WYD. In the event program for WYD 1993 (table 4.1), catechesis sessions were referred to as “programming.”34 The magisterium employed a wide variety of media for catechesis at WYD 1993, including verbal and embodied text performances (speeches, chants, prayers) with or without music (songs, WYD theme song, concerts), visual and material depictions (icons, portraits of the pope and saints, mime), which were distributed through further mediatization (radio and television broadcasts, today also social media, smartphone applications). These were not only means of transmitting magisterial normativity, but also shaped the religious interface of WYD 1993. In these and other ways WYD 1993 crafted a religious interface that was mobile rather than stationary, tied to time but not limited to place. The mobile religious interface reinforced WYD as a pilgrimage destination in its own right. In 1993, the event location was construed as a pilgrimage destination by virtue of hosting WYD, rather than WYD being a pilgrimage event by virtue of its location. Denver 1993 thus dramatically shifted the source of WYD’s legitimacy. After Denver, organizers could make any city a WYD pilgrimage destination—whether or not the city possessed a popular and officially sanctioned pilgrimage site, because what counted as pilgrimage had changed.

4.2.2 Legacy WYD 1993 received accolades in local and national US media. Journalist Fred Brown at the Denver Post, for example, called the festival “awe-inspiring.” The events had made Denver “the heart of the global village” (DPL9). Alain L. Sanders at TIME also offered praise: John Paul had arrived on the scene of what some were calling a “Catholic Woodstock,” a four-day youth festival that had drawn more than 180,000 people from all over the world. At the gathering’s first major event, 85,000 rain-drenched, stomping, dancing, handkerchief-waving youths gave the Pope a roaring welcome at Mile High Stadium as he entered in his Popemobile. The celebration choked downtown Denver streets with waves of T shirt-clad teenagers (LIFE IS SHORT, PRAY HARD, read one shirt; I GOT A MILE HIGH WITH THE POPE, said another). A Babel of hymns reverberated through the city. Still, for all their energy, the celebrators maintained a remarkable display of decorum and politeness (Sanders, 1993: 36). 34 The homonymous link between programming as catechesis and programming as methods of “teaching” a computer how to perform a specific task is ironic, particularly considering how cognitive science was based on a computational model of the human mind from the outset.

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Sister Mary Ann Walsh, who had been WYD Director of Communications at Denver 1993, became the director of media relations at the United States Catholic Conference (USCC). Upon Walsh’s death in 2015, the Jesuit America Magazine, where she had often published articles on various topics, wrote that she took up the position at the USCC “after coordinating media for World Youth Day in Denver in 1993, which featured an enormously successful visit by then-Pope John Paul II” (2015). Three years after the event, on August 20, 1996, Archbishop Stafford was named president of the Pontifical Council for the Laity—among other things the body ultimately responsible for the organization of WYDs. Buelt, as Stafford’s secretary, came with him. On August 21, Stafford’s new appointment featured on the cover of Denver Catholic Register with the headline: “Archbishop called to serve world laity” (DCRA2). The same issue ran a lengthy interview with Stafford, and the first question was why he supposed the pope had chosen him “for this particular task, and why now?” Stafford’s response read: I believe World Youth Day ’93 was a watershed experience for the Holy Father, the bishops of the United States and bishops who attended from around the world. I know the pope was struck very forcefully by the living faith of Catholics in Colorado. He told me — and I don’t think I’ve ever heard it mentioned before — that a gathering of young people that size would be impossible were it not for the kind of Gospel witness he found in the Church of northern Colorado. So the perception of the Holy Father was of a Church here in Colorado, of a Catholic people here in Colorado, that was alive and vital and strongly in communion with the See of Peter. He’s never forgotten that. My appointment is first and foremost a recognition of the great faith of the people here in northern Colorado. My own engagement with World Youth Day would never have been a success without the generous liberality of heart […] of the people of this Church (DCRA2).

Stafford went on to praise his predecessor, Cardinal Eduardo Pironio, who had reached the mandatory retirement age (DCRA2), acknowledging that it was during his term as president that “the idea of World Youth Day was developed and inaugurated” and that he “reminded us that we need to have confidence in the young adults and young people of our generation in living out their Catholic faith” (DCRA2). “I don’t think the importance of these World Youth Days can be overestimated,” Stafford said. “Where else on the planet do hundreds of thousands of young adults and youths come together just to celebrate who they are as God’s children? And they do it without drugs, without cynicism, without violence, all in the name of Jesus Christ” (DCRA2). Stafford’s new responsibility at the Pontifical Council for the Laity would stretch much further, to “recognizing and working with the many new private and public associations of the lay faithful in today’s world, including the new lay movements” (DCRA2). More recently, Faggioli called WYDs

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…an unparallelled spotlight for ecclesial movements. Such events were capable of concentrating in the figure of the pope the legitimizing reference of movements and ecclesial groups often in difficult relations (when not in open conflict) with each other and with the local hierarchies, bishops, and episcopal conferences (Faggioli, 2014: Chapter 7, section 1, para. 9, Kindle edition).

Apparently, the controversy over the Way of the Cross and gender-inclusive language during the Magnificat did little to stain the success story of WYD 1993. The pope also seemed to treasure WYD 1993 on a personal level. Buelt shared an anecdote from after the event, when a choir from Denver made a pilgrimage to Rome, specifically to Castel Gandolfo, the pope’s summer residence. Buelt had been present when John Paul II received the choir. The pope had held a speech, and “in that little speech,” Buelt told me, there “was one little paragraph [where] the pope said, paraphrasing, ‘We used to say lux ex oriente. But now, because of Denver, we can also say lux ex occidente.’” He continued: Not that the sun is going to start rising in the west, but there was a new light. And I have been led to believe, and I believe it, [that the pope] left Denver so reinvigorated by World Youth Day, and the young people’s desire and expressions for life and truth that he decided—perhaps even on the way home from Denver—that he was going to write his encyclical, Evangelium Vitae—the “Gospel of Life.”

Buelt had also had a lunch meal with John Paul II “subsequent to World Youth Day, when I was transferred with Archbishop Stafford to the Holy See.” In the pope’s dining room, Buelt explained, “there was a crucifix on one wall, there was a painting of the Blessed Virgin Mary on another, and on the opposite wall was a picture of the Holy Father at World Youth Day in Denver.” Dziwisz, the pope’s personal secretary and now Archbishop of Kraków, had shared with him that WYD 1993 “really reinvigorated, and was kind of a rebirth of the second half of the papacy of John Paul II.” This suggests that WYD in Denver was a turning point for the pope. One could argue that this latter half of his pontificate—after Denver—has come to dominate his legacy and given him a reputation as a “conservative” pope. The legacy of WYD 1993 would also influence later youth festivals. From his new post at the Pontifical Council for the laity, Stafford (and for a time also Buelt) would be involved in the organization of later WYDs—1997 in Paris, 2000 in Rome, and 2002 in Toronto —until he left the post on October 4, 2003 (Vatican.va, 2017; AAD30; AAD31). And so, WYD 1993 in Denver was a chief influence on subsequent WYDs as they became increasingly standardized. Of the new elements in WYD 1993’s event design, community service by participants was one that was not incorporated into the standard event. Catechetical events and communal walk, however, became common. From a pilgrimage perspective, the communal walk, which is still called a “pilgrimage

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walk,” also helps to legitimize WYD as a pilgrimage wherever it takes place. The geographical destination changes with each event, but the function of those destinations remains the same: It is always the site of the Vigil and Mass the following morning. As we will see, those large-scale, transnational Mass celebrations encourage and guide transrealm interaction not only vertically with Jesus through the Eucharist, but also horizontally with the global Church through the WYD community. Towards the end of our conversation, Buelt said he wanted to share another anecdote with me about what WYD as a pilgrimage is all about. He had been a guest at an ordination ceremony and there were a number of young seminarians at the table. These young priests-to-be had been complaining about Pope Francis: They were upset that he wasn’t wearing red shoes. They were upset that he was carrying his own bag. They were upset that he gives interviews as a means of communication. And they were upset with all of the stories that the pope was going to allow divorced people to receive Communion.

Two of these practices— wearing ordinary shoes and giving interviews—were also practiced by John Paul II, but the four components together symbolize a shift from conservative to progressive Catholicism on the papal level. Buelt took issue with the seminarians’ complaints, and had responded with the following: If we have a problem with liberal secularism, the answer is not religious conservatism. The answer is that the Church in some way must become that which it seeks to redeem. What is not assumed is not redeemed. The Church in some way must become more “secularly liberal,” secular in the sense of being in the world and liberal in the sense of working for the other’s freedom. And that’s a fundamental lesson of the Incarnation.

This was what John Paul II had practiced when he donned local traditional garb and native headdresses around the world. When systematized, it is called “inculturation” (Linden, 2009: 237, 243). To Buelt, this was the natural continuation of Christ’s having “become sin.” Quoting Cardinal Avery Dulles, he said, “‘That’s not symbolic.’ […] Christ became sin, went to hell in order to redeem sinners, in order to redeem the dead. And so the point I was making was that in some way we must become more incarnational.” That was what WYD had the capacity to teach, he concluded: We’re engaged, and that’s what pilgrimage does. Then when some say, “We move to this secular city, we move to this old place where this person’s buried, we make us in some way to become that reality, to allow that reality to inform and form us by God’s grace. Precisely so that we can be redeemed, so that we can be agents of freedom and redemption for others. That’s what, if there’s a legacy to World Youth Day in Denver it is this: We want to become you so that we can redeem you.

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From a perspective of religious interaction, what this suggests is quite intriguing: Catholic evangelization means making the transrealm community of the Catholic Church simultaneously immersed in the superhuman realm and the human realm, enveloping the world relationships with ist superhuman persons—God most of all.

4.3 Conclusion With the Cold War ended and communism diminished as a rival for young souls, Charismatic Protestantism and capitalist ideologies remained as Catholicism’s main rivals. As its original purpose was fulfilled, WYD was adapted to a new struggle against those other rivals. At WYD 1993 in Denver, Colorado—a place without officially sanctioned pilgrimage sites—the pilgrimage theme persisted and broadened. Adapting WYD to Denver led to a reimagining of pilgrimage. And since the organizers of WYD 1993 were elevated to leading positions in the Pontifical Council for the Laity, the event would also continue to have influence on the understanding of the ritual and the meaning of pilgrimage. WYD went from being associated with officially sanctioned pilgrimage sites to revolving around community and the pope as unifying elements, and about devotional artifacts and practices available to Catholics globally—like the Eucharistic Host, the sacrament of Confession, the Virgin Mary and the saints. Merged with and shaped by the new evangelization, WYD took on new purposes as it promoted pilgrimage as mobile transrealm interaction, gathering people from around the world in order to reinforce young Catholics’ global perspective, recruit them to the priesthood and religious orders, and to instill in them the mission imperative of global evangelization. After Denver 1993, WYD was a pilgrimage that could be replicated in any city capable of hosting a mass gathering. What tied pilgrimage and evangelization together was a malleable and mobile religious interface that would invite young Catholics to transrealm interaction that might afford them religious immersion. Organizers hoped that stories about experiences of immersion might in turn influence others to join. “WYD” had come to signify an event design that stretched over nearly a full week, involved the pope as a focus, sported a designated theme, presented a new theme song for Christian youth, and involved WYD as both pilgrimage and evangelization. Pilgrimage has long been seen as a form of popular piety that, from a magisterial perspective, needed to be kept under ecclesial control (Reader, 2007). By creating and narrativizing a religious interface in Denver, young Catholics were invited to adopt the religious equivalent of the lusory attitude, and invite others to do the same. Changing pilgrimage at WYD 1993 meant addressing participants as pilgrims and evangelizers, and recruiting them to the new evangelization by making them into interfacial elements between the human

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and the superhuman realms. It was Denver 1993 that made WYDs into pilgrimages regardless of where they took place. Twenty-three years later, WYD 2016 would take place in John Paul II’s city of work and residence over four decades: Kraków.

5. “Bringing the mind to Heaven”: Religious interaction at World Youth Day 2016

The first rule of pilgrimage is “Never complain,” a young priest declared to me and a busload of travelers from the United States as we drove through rural Poland. “Never complain” was also the second rule he stated, in a playful repetition met with laughter. He added three other rules: Use the bathroom whenever we saw one, whether we needed to or not, and use confessionals whenever we saw one—Confession was always needed.1 The last rule he gave was to accept and receive if someone wanted to give us something, and give if someone needed something from us. Pilgrimage was about experience and enjoyment, but also about being part of one’s own prayer. One respondent called it “bringing the mind to heaven”—a statement that will help form the broad scope of religious interaction at WYD 2016. These first days of bus rides to Cze˛stochowa, Katowice, Karmel, Wadowice, and eventually Kraków had a general atmosphere of fun, joy, laughter, playfulness, and anticipation. Exceptions were Mass, prayer times, and our visit to Auschwitz II: Birkenau, which made a noticable impact on several people from my travel group, including some of my respondents. Bus trips were welcome breaks between locations—interrims that allowed for some often much-needed rest and sleep. While awake on the bus, however, my fellow travelers were conversing, joking, and laughing. The youngest travelers gathered at the back of the bus, singing hymns and worship songs accompanied by guitar and harmonica. Towards the middle and front of the bus, people were increasingly silent, reading, listening to music, or caught up in relatively quiet chats with companions seated next to them, reading, and listening to music. The religious Sisters traveling with us spent much of our travel time reading the Bible, while the priests and the group leader took the initiative for the group to pray the Rosary and the Divine Mercy chaplet on most of our bus rides, letting various travelers lead those prayers. Before stopping at locations connected to saints, our travel guides—and sometimes the group leader or a priest—would 1 He repeated that rule once more, playfully underlining its importance. Recounting this episode reminds me of Huizinga’s reflection, that “[t]o our way of thinking, play is the direct opposite of seriousness. […] Examined more closely, however, the contrast between play and seriousness proves to be neither conclusive nor fixed […] Children’s games, football, and chess are played in profound seriousness” (Huizinga, 1938: 5–6). The priest’s humorous declaration of these “five rules of pilgrimage” exemplify that notion: the rules were intended to be taken seriously, and the playfulness with which they were communicated underscored their gravity rather than veiled it.

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share stories regarding those saints, narrativizing the place, contextualizing our visit there, and linking the human and superhuman realms. Most of the locations were connected to John Paul II’s life in some way: Wadowice, for example, is the small town where he grew up, and we attended Mass there with other English-speaking participants in the church across the street from his “Family Home.”2 That house is now a museum that lets visitors walk through rooms that exhibit various stages of the Polish pope’s life—a materialized narrative.3 Each room and each exhibition provided a myriad of media and potential interfacial elements, whether as apertures to the past or transrealm interaction in the present. As we will see moving forward, local sites and universal Catholic rituals were both part of what my respondents considered important about participating in WYD 2016. In this chapter, I seek to identify interfacial elements employed in transrealm interaction at WYD 2016. To recap, religious interaction can be horizontal and vertical. Horizontal interaction goes on between human persons, and vertical interaction between human and superhuman persons. They are far from mutually exclusive, but provide analytical distinctions that will be more helpful in the following analysis than they have been in the previous chapters. Transrealm interaction takes place through interfacial elements, between persons considered to inhabit two different realms. The questions addressed in this chapter are: What interfacial elements can be identified? What roles do they play in the context of WYD? Based on observations and respondents’ self-reports, I argue that the Eucharist, the WYD community, places and objects connected to saint narratives, and the Divine Mercy image were central interfacial elements in the religious interaction at WYD 2016. Among these, the WYD community was simultaneously the most surprising interfacial element and the most highly anticipated sight for my respondents.

2 The name of the church is the Minor Basilica of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Bazylika Mniejsza Ofiarowania Najs´wie˛tszej Maryi Panny). Outside the church stands a bronze statue of John Paul II in papal liturgical garb and holding a crozier. Situated on a rock, the point where the statue’s crozier touches the rock surface is a fountain that yields a small but steady stream of water. It seems to play on the story about Moses in Exodus 17, where he, upon instruction from God, brings forth water for the people by striking the rock with his staff. 3 I had visited the Family Home museum in Wadowice once before, during my first research stay. One of the last rooms in the exhibition is entirely dedicated to WYDs. Poland in 2015.

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5.1 Interfacial elements at World Youth Day 2016 5.1.1 Identifying interfacial elements We begin this section by observing some methodological challenges in identifying interfacial elements from respondents’ statements. Since the framework of religious interaction emerged only after completing my fieldwork, the terms and concepts I use in the chapter developed in the process of interpreting interview material. Looking retrospectively at that material, it is possible to identify objects, people, places and other elements employed in transrealm interaction. As will be apparent moving forward, this is a challenging task. In order to nuance the source material, I have supplemented interview quotes with observations based on my fieldnotes. With regards to the interviews, items interpreted as indicators of horizontal interaction were references to conversations, exchanging items, and exhibiting behaviors synchronized with other people—like when performing scripted responses during Mass. Items that were interpreted as indicators of vertical transrealm interaction were references to prayer—scripted recitations like the Rosary; supplications that were improvised and conversational; references to participation in Mass— especially when mentioning the celebration of the Eucharist or receiving Communion; and references to superhuman persons like saints, such as experiencing a “presence” upon visiting a site connected to a specific saint’s biographical or hagiographies. 5.1.2 The Eucharist One of the first things I asked my interviewees to do was to name three things they considered the most important to them about being Catholic. Ibis is a woman in her twenties whom I interviewed individually. The three things she listed “the Eucharist”; “all of our bishops trace things back to the apostles and […] back to Jesus Christ”; and “the cultural diversity within the Catholic Church.” I asked Ibis to elaborate on what “cultural diversity” meant to her: How we have different rites with different ways of saying the Mass. To embrace the different cultures. […] You know, it’s one Church, but it’s embracing how different cultures pray and do things.

After the Second Vatican Council, the use of vernacular languages largely supplanted Latin in the new, post-conciliar liturgy that largely replaced the Latin-only Tridentine Mass, but there are other variations of the Liturgy that continue to be celebrated in the languages whose names they bear (such as the Greek Rite, the Syriac Rite, the Coptic Rite to name only a few), as well as their

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contents and structures (McBrien and Attridge, 1995: 1118). Unifying the diverse rites in the concept of “the Mass” or “the Liturgy” suggests unity in diversity. To Ibis, the Eucharist and participation in Communion are expressions of that. As for her motivation to come to WYD 2016, she said: I guess visiting holy sites, meeting Catholics from around the world, and then experiencing these beautiful churches I think is pretty cool. And then, I think that more people need to realize how building beautiful architecture is a way of bringing the mind to heaven.

Ibis brings the transnational Catholic community to the fore, along with visiting churches. Her statement that church architecture is capable of “bringing the mind to heaven” indicates that church buildings themselves possess interfacial capacity to her. She would also like more Catholics to realize their potential for immersion in the superhuman realm. What Ibis meant by “bringing the mind to heaven” became more obvious when I asked whether she had made journeys similar to WYD before: Not with a group. My family has traveled to holy sites in the States. […] There’s churches to visit, or shrines and things that we go to, but not—it’s like sights. It’s not religious specifically […] This is—the specific reason is to visit holy saints and things.

For Ibis, there is a qualitative difference between visiting churches, shrines, and other religious sites as sights contra visiting the saints connected to those places. The difference lay in whether the interfacial capacity afforded her by church buildings remained inactive or was activated through transrealm interaction. Ibis signals that difference with the phrase “visit holy saints”; visiting them in a specific location implies visiting someone, which indicates transrealm interaction and relationships with superhuman persons. It does so on two levels: First, it says that saints, while inhabitants of a superhuman realm, can be encountered in certain places in the human realm. Second, visiting such places without engaging in transrealm interaction renders such places mere “sights,” leaving their potential as interfacial spaces unrealized. Moving forward, we will see how my respondents’ relationships with superhuman persons was central to WYD for them. Employing particular interfacial elements for interacting with specific superhuman persons was a major motivational factor for WYD participation. The Eucharist was frequently mentioned in this connection. Among those who mentioned the Eucharist, only two respondents elaborated: Sister Adelaide, a nun in her thirties, and Oliver, a male participant also in his thirties. I interviewed Sister Adelaide as one of several respondents in a group interview that involved five people. Sitting on—and in—our ponchos in Błonia Park under passing clouds that gave off the occasional drizzle, we were waiting for the Papal Welcoming Ceremony to begin. People around us were talking, reading, laughing, singing, dancing, trading items, and seemed to be generally focused on having fun and making time pass. Francis was not the first pope to

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visit Błonia Park, which the Pilgrim Guide called “one of the largest inner-city meadows in Europe” (Archdiocese of Kraków, 2016: 48). In 1979, 1983, 1997, and 2002, John Paul II presided over public events at Błonia, which he visited on all his journeys to Poland—journeys that were called “(papal) pilgrimages” (John Paul II, 1979c, 1983, 1997, 2002). John Paul II performed several beatifications there, indicating Błonia Park as a place of choice for such ceremonies.4 Responding to my question about what was most important to her about being Catholic, Sister Adelaide answered: “Definitely the sacraments,” before adding: “I think, the Eucharist… I’m gonna go with two of the sacraments first —the Eucharist and Confession. And then having the community, because you can’t do it by yourself, right.” She elaborated: “[T]he Eucharist is what sustains us and keeps us—keeps us going. And then Confession gives us the courage and hope we need to go and receive the Eucharist, so… I think those are so key.” Sister Adelaide’s take on the relationship between Confession and Communion is one where Confession provides the confidence needed to receive Communion. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that as a rule, anyone “who is aware of having committed a mortal sin must not receive Holy Communion,” and that children “must go to sacrament of Penance before receiving Holy Communion for the first time” (1457). Combined with a normative requirement of going to Confession before receiving Communion, Sister Adelaide’s experience of confidence from Confession to receive Communion could be seen as placing Confession and Communion in ritual symbiosis. For Sister Adelaide, the Eucharist is a source of nourishment, which is unsurprising considering the quote attributed to Jesus that “my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink” (John 6: 55, NABRE).5 The dogma of transubstantiation teaches that the priest’s scripted performance of the Rite of Consecration, in the context of the Sacred Liturgy, turns the sacramental wine 4 Like the rite of consecrating the Eucharist, beatification ceremonies also transform non-interfacial objects into interfacial elements. Catholics may turn non-interfacial objects into interfacial elements of their own accord—praying at the tomb of or a place visited by somebody they consider a saint, or venerating the body and belongings of such a person. Yet, beatification ceremonies declare officially and categorically the body and belongings of the beatified as relics on an institutional level. This means that the Church, in turn, may promote these objects as relics, and thereby interfacial elements. To the extent that the micro-narratives of John Paul II’s visits to Błonia Park were known to those present, that location would have had a history of non-interfaceto-interface transformations based in religious interaction—horizontal and vertical. 5 This quote also reveals a view of the Eucharist that bears strong resemblance to the opening words of John Paul II’s encyclical Ecclesia de Eucharistia (2003): “The Church draws her life from the Eucharist” (John Paul II, 2003: No. 1). Some have interpreted the Eucharist as nourishment more literally than others. For example, the Portuguese mystic Alexandrina da Costa (1904–1955) reportedly lived on nothing but the Eucharist for sustenance over a period of thirteen years (Johnston, 1979). She was beatified by John Paul II in 2004, which added credibility tot he story and legitimacy to this form of asceticism.

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and wafers into the material Eucharistic hosts of Jesus’ blood and body. The essence of the teaching is that the wine and wafers are Jesus as God incarnate, available for imbibing and ingesting. In that context, drinking and eating is a form of transrealm interaction.6 The Rite is a performance and re-enactment of the Last Supper because the corresponding bible text is read aloud by the priest as part of the Rite. As such, it prepares both priest and people to view the Host as the real presence of Jesus materialized (The Catholic Church, 1993 [1992]: No. 1413; see also Orsi, 2016: Chapter 1, section 1, para. 2–3, Kindle edition).7 In other words, it prepares those in attendance to treat the Hosts as interfacial elements. Thus, the Rite of Consecration is narratively informed, as the interfacial quality of the Hosts are powered by narrativization. But the narrative itself enables interfaciality because of the relationship that people at Mass have with its main character—Jesus. The Rite is also an example of transrealm interaction that transforms noninterfacial elements (wine and wafers) into interfacial elements. When the priest(s) drink the wine and eat the wafer(s), they consume interfacial elements. Likewise when the priests (and assistants) distribute the remaining wafers (and sometimes wine) to the people in attendance. This means that the transrealm interaction that transforms a non-interfacial object into an interfacial element further facilitates religious interaction, facilitates transrealm interaction in three ways. First, it opens a door to a mythical past by narrating it to participants, and making it accessible in the present through ritual enactment. Second, it facilitates interaction with a superhuman person, Jesus/God through the consumption of physical objects. A third form of religious interaction is horizontal and interhuman. It takes place between those who distribute the Host and those who ingest it; they are part of the same community through shared transrealm interaction. Against this backdrop, Sister Adelaide’s description of the Eucharist as nourishing sustenance indicates a lusory attitude that opens the door to religious immersion. In this case, interaction with a superhuman person and with other humans takes the very specific forms of material ingesting and imbibing. The teaching of transubstantiation, along with its ritual enactment as performed by the priest and participants distributing and receiving Communion, amounts to a multi-layered social process of creating interfacial

6 With Vatican II’s reform of the Liturgy, encapsulated in the document Sacrosanctum Concilium (Paul VI, 1963: Chapters III–IV), the teaching became more accessible because the Mass is now far more often celebrated in vernacular languages than in Latin. 7 The dogma of transubstantiation ultimately rests on a specific but complex literalist traditional interpretation of John 6: 53–56, as well as Mark 14: 22–24 and Luke 22: 19–20. In John 6: 55, Jesus is reported to have said: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you; he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. 56 He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him” (RSV).

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elements. When employed in transrealm interaction it is conducive to religious immersion. Immersion does not always follow, however, as Oliver knew. I interviewed Oliver individually while we were sitting on a vast field outside Kraków city center. The field was dubbed “Campus Mercy” for the occasion, and we could hear announcements over the speaker system that the number of people present had passed one million, with sections A and B consequently closing. The sun was setting, and we were surrounded by people and their tents, flags, backpacks, ration bags, sleeping bags, and inflatable mattresses. That morning we had walked eighteen miles from the city center under the hot summer sun along a highway closed for traffic. In the WYD program, the walk to Campus Mercy was dubbed “Pilgrimage to the Vigil site” (Krakow2016.com, 2016). On the way, we waved and shouted greetings to locals who were watching this parade of young Catholics from the windows of their homes, often sporting papal flags in gold and white alongside the Polish national flag in red and white, and the city flag of Kraków in blue and white.8 Once out of the city center, priests and travel leaders led the group in praying the Rosary and the Divine Mercy Chaplet. At other times, the group sang songs to keep up morale, most of them playful rather than hymns or otherwise worship-related. Both were welcome distractions the discomfort of walking such a long distance in the summer heat. Bathrooms were few and far between on the road, so the priest’s exhortation to use a bathroom whenever we saw one was followed. It was also challenging to stay sufficiently hydrated and nourished even for me, who had packed over two liters of water along with the lunch pack we received at the hotel. Close to the entrance to Campus Mercy, volunteers distributed bags full of food and toiletries from the back of large trucks, and large stacks with bottles of still and sparkling water were distributed around the field. By evening, the weather was more temperate. Having received sufficient refreshments to feel rejuvenated, I could resume interviews. Speaking to Oliver, he shared that he felt “very blessed that I’m in this Church.” He elaborated: It’s one of those things where so many people are kinda born into it and don’t know how awesome and amazing it is. […] Whereas me—I’m like, I’ve been given this gift almost of kind of an understanding of what this faith is about. More so than just a cultural Catholic where they go through the motions, they go to Mass, but they don’t really care and, you know, they’re there because they want nice music, or they like the nice preaching instead of going because they have a relationship with Jesus Christ—in the Eucharist.

Oliver’s statements on the Eucharist entwined with the theme of community, not unlike what Sister Adelaide had shared. Here, I wish to draw attention to two things: First, he understood his faith as a gift, which indicates interactive exchange. The giver in this case remains unidentified, but it seems reasonable to assume that Oliver considers God himself to be the giver. In that case, Oliver 8 Red, blue, white, and gold/yellow were also the thematic colors of WYD 2016.

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interpreted his faith as the outcome of interaction with the highest-ranking superhuman person in the superhuman realm he engages. Second, he differentiated between two groups of Catholics: those who have a relationship with Jesus specifically in the Eucharist, and those who do not. In Chapter 2, we followed Hinde’s definition of a relationship as a series of interactions which, applied to this quote, means that those who have a relationship with Jesus in the Eucharist are those who interact with him by means of the Host. For the nonordinated, interaction with Jesus in the Host typically takes two forms: ingestion during Communion, and gazing during Adoration. The group of Catholics that Oliver identified with are those who employ the Host in that manner. Conversely, he distanced himself from “cultural Catholics,” by which he understood those who go to Mass for other reasons than interaction with Jesus through this specific interfacial element. They may receive the Eucharist, but unless they also use it for interaction with Jesus, they are, to Oliver, “cultural Catholics.” This group is characterized by “going through the motions,” by performing the same outward acts, but in Oliver’s view they “don’t really care.” In this case, transrealm interaction by means of a specific interfacial element defined religious identity. Ritual synchronicity was not sufficient to generate a sense of community. In Oliver’s view, cultural Catholics might go to Mass to enjoy the music or listen to a priest whose preaching they appreciate. Oliver considered both to be possible motivators for participation, but he presented his own relationship to music and preaching during Mass quite differently: “I have a relationship with Jesus, and, I don’t care if the preaching is bad and the music is bad, you know. I’m there for Him.” “Cultural Catholics” came to Mass for something, but Oliver came for someone. “They” did not care about interacting with Jesus in the Eucharist, and he did not care about the elements he suspected drew them. Importantly, Oliver presented his interaction with Jesus as so important that other elements of the Liturgy lost their relevance and their potential for distraction. Oliver’s focus indicates more than a lusory attitude—it implies religious immersion, presenting itself as so absorbing that the enacting person gains the ability to cancel out distractions (cf. Bidarra, 2013). That lusory attitude and the relationships set “cultural Catholics” apart from the group of Catholics Oliver identified with. Wagner has argued that immersion in biblical narratives make “that [other] world complete and real to us” (Wagner, 2012: 52), not unlike what Mason Wagner has argued that immersion in biblical narratives make “that [other]” claims for prayer (2015), as discussed in Chapter 2. As I have shown is the case with the Rite of Consecration, bible texts inform the transformation of a noninterfacial object into a means of interaction with a superhuman person. Mythical narrativization, then, sets some people, places, and objects apart, activating their interfacial capacity for those who embrace a lusory attitude toward the superhuman realm. Wagner might have called transrealm interaction through narrativized interfacial elements the “ritual-game-story

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thing” (Wagner, 2012: 56). Certainly, ritual, narrative, and game, whether separate or combined, are all fruitful lenses for studying a variety of religious phenomena, but I think it can be explained in a simpler way than the combination of these complex categories suggest. Oliver’s high level of immersion at Mass comes from something very specific: his relationship with Jesus and the lusory anticipation of interacting with him through the Host as the interfacial element par excellence. Besides, Oliver’s immersion was not into a mythical past as constructed by mediation of biblical narrative. Even though the interfacial quality of the Eucharist is activated by narrativization that references the Last Supper, Oliver was immersed in a transrealm present, brought about by interaction through an interfacial element with a superhuman person. If any particular narrative contributed to Oliver’s immersion during Mass, it seems that it would have been a personal narrative regarding his relationship with Jesus. That point was given further emphasis when Oliver, by way of conclusion, landed on the following three components as most important to him about being Catholic: I guess it’s just to know Him [Jesus], to love Him, to serve Him. That’s three things already, but I also have to do the same for my family. You know, so my vocation now, as a married guy with kids, is to help them to obtain that as well—to come to that understanding.

The transitive the verbs Oliver employed—know, love, serve—may be a paraphrase of the Baltimore Catechism, where to “know Him, to love Him, and to serve Him in this world” is the answer to the question “Why did God make you?” (Third Plenary Council of Baltimore, 1891). While the wording underscores the intimate relational qualities of his relationship with Jesus, it also envelops that relationship in magisterial normativity and authority. Oliver wished to inspire his family to replicate his relationship with Jesus through the same interfacial element—an ideal that corresponds to the new evangelization and reflects the developing interconnections between the areas of “laity” and “family” within Catholicism (Faggioli, 2014 [2008]: Chapter 10, section 6, Kindle edition). Granted, Catholicism promotes many potentially interfacial elements for interacting with Jesus—texts, images, relics, the Eucharist, and priests to name a few. Magisterial teaching, however, consistently presents the Eucharist as the most vital, the most complete, and the most important. According to historian and theologian John W. O’Malley, “frequent reception of the Eucharist [was made] the norm for Catholic piety” in the early twentieth century, at a time when “most Catholics received the Eucharist only once, twice, or a few more times per year” (O’Malley, 2008: Chapter 2, section 4, para. 30–31, Kindle edition). The high status of the Eucharist among the Sacraments within Catholicism is intricately intertwined with the power to define and control the distribution of Communion. Controlling access to the Eucharist corresponds

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to controlling the magisterially sanctioned highest form of interaction. Apart from Christ relics, no other interfacial element for interacting with Jesus is as heavily controlled by rules for participation. Rules are one common feature between games and religion. They help define and distinguish communities as one group of people relates to one set of rules, and another group relates to another. Whether specific individuals within that group agree upon those rules, contest them, or to what degree they follow or break them is less important than the fact that they are considered relevant for the lived social realities of those in the group. As Leibovitz puts it, it is the “playful elements” of religion that “made religion so prevalent, and precisely the religious undertones that […] made games so indispensable to the evolution of culture” (Leibovitz, 2013: Introduction, section 1, para. 5, Kindle edition). The history of the study of religion(s) has taught us to exercise caution in ascribing cause for when and how religion first emerged (which is entirely dependent upon how we define of religion anyway). Leibovitz’ argument—while not hit directly by such criticism—comes close enough. The point is nevertheless that religious ritual, in this case the Mass, as well as games, are governed by socially constructed rules. Beside the rules that govern embodied actions according to the liturgical script of Mass celebrations, another rule was present for Oliver—one that made interaction with a specified superhuman person the only proper motivation for going to Mass. Consequently, Oliver’s sense of community was narrowed; it was not based on synchronized ritual enactment of a liturgical script but on whether and how people interact with what is for him the most important inhabitant of the superhuman realm. According to magisterial teaching, certain conditions bar people from enacting Communion and thus from the community of enactment and interaction. Such conditions usually pertain to the commitment of an act or set of acts that constitute a “deadly” or “mortal sin.” Such acts disqualify people from partaking in Communion. In Catholicism, such sins can only be absolved through Confession. 5.1.3 Confession As we saw in the beginning of this chapter, my fellow travelers were encouraged to go to Confession as often as possible. Confession has many names. It is described as the “Sacrament of Confession,” the “Sacrament of Penance,” “Sacrament of Reconciliation,” and “Sacrament of Forgiveness,” and any combination of the four. Confession has some therapeutic aspects (Hymer, 1995), and it is part of the magisterial rule system, but it can also be approached as a form of religious interaction. The practice rests on the doctrine that actions classified as sin separate humans from God, that the priest acting in Christ’s stead may provide absolution—God’s forgiveness—and thus bring about

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reconciliation. There is only one condition: that those actions are made known to the priest in the context of Confession. Magisterial normativity permeates the relationship between the Eucharist and Confession, partly because it is a ritual enacted by two parties—the person going to Confession (the penitent), and the priest who hears Confession (the confessor). In the Code of Canon Law, the confidentiality of Confession (called the Seal of Confession) is absolute and, when broken, incurs excommunication for the priest. Magisterial normativity, while upholding the exclusive powers of the priest, also serves to protect the privacy of those who go to Confession.9 The former is especially evident in claims to control the distribution of the sacrament and the conditions upon which such distribution rests. The magisterial claim connected to actions classified as mortal or deadly sins is that such actions disqualify people from interacting with God in the Eucharist. Access to that interaction is only salvageable through Confession from a magisterial point of view. Confession then, establishes an additional form of religious interaction as a criterion for regaining access to Communion, specifically horizontal interaction with and transrealm interaction through the confessor priest as an interfacial element. That process comes into view as we consider the teaching that the confessor priest absolving the penitent acts in persona Christi (Capitis)— literally in the role of Christ (The Catholic Church, 1993 [1992]: No. 1548).10 As such, the priest’s function is not merely to be a mediator between God and the penitent and a means for regaining access to the Eucharist; the priest also constitutes an interfacial element for interacting with God when a person is normatively barred from receiving the Host. The priest also acts on behalf of the local church and universal Church as communities. Through absolution, he (re-) establishes an individual’s eligibility for participating in the most communitydefining part of the Mass: receiving Communion.11 In recent years, accessibility has expanded as preparation for Confession has become available in new ways, such as through the smartphone applications The Confession App, Confession, Laudate, Penance Project, or Sindr (Catholic Apptitude, 2014). Confession apps typically aid in performing the sacrament by locating confessionals, as well as encouraging and helping penitents prepare (TheGuardian.com, 2016). The app Confession for Android, for example, states that “This app is intended to be used during the Sacrament of Reconciliation 9 According to Canon Law no. 983 §1, the Seal of Confession “is inviolable; therefore it is absolutely forbidden for a confessor to betray in any way a penitent in words or in any manner and for any reason.” According to Canon 1388 §1, a priest who “directly violates the sacramental seal incurs a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See”; that is, such a priest is subject to automatic excommunication. 10 In the Catechism, the term Capitis (“the head [of the Church]”) is added to the expression. 11 The social dimension of the relationship between sin and Confession is also present in postVatican II teachings, where “sin is presented as an offense against both God and the community” (McBrien and Attridge, 1995: 345).

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with a Catholic priest only. This is not a substitute for a valid confession.”12 Were these apps made to be potential substitutes for going to Confession, they would have made a significant change to the religious interface, but instead they aid users in making Confession according to the existing norm. Confession has also been subject to innovations in the WYD context. Since WYD 2011 in Madrid, the pope also hears Confession at WYD. Begun by Pope Benedict XVI, this tradition was continued by Pope Francis in Rio de Janeiro and Kraków (Allen, 2013; Vatican Radio, 2016; Wooden, 2011). To my knowledge, none of my respondents or any of the others in my travel group had the pope hear their Confession at WYD 2016. However, one respondent, who will remain unconnected to any alias to protect their identity, disclosed in an interview that they met a cardinal they looked up to in an informal context and asked if it would be possible for this cardinal to hear their Confession. The cardinal, agreed to my respondent’s request which, as was obvious from how they told the story, made my respondent quite excited. Clearly, Confession can provide a way for lay Catholics to interact with higher-ranking individuals that they might otherwise not easily approach. The Eucharist and Confession are central both to the new evangelization and at WYD. Mass is celebrated at the events’ opening and closing ceremonies, and Confession is available at temporarily erected confessionals (figure 5.1). Insofar as WYD is a platform for recruiting young Catholics to the priesthood and religious orders, emphases on the Eucharist and Confession serve to provide the priesthood with visibility by highlighting tasks exclusively available to the ordained. That visibility also advertises the priesthood as an available role and path of life to male participants. From a ludic point of view, Leibovitz considers religion to be a game because it is, among other things, “rule-based but tolerant of deviation” (Leibovitz, 2013: Introduction, section 1, para. 5, Kindle edition). Although Leibovitz’ focus on rules may go against the grain of a definition of religion as interaction, following that sentiment displays Catholicism’s tolerance of deviation as encapsulated in the Sacrament of Confession: It requalifies individual Catholics to receive Communion and renews their eligibility for participation. We may also draw parallels to the concept of quests and quest chains or its synonym quest lines—a set of actions that need to be completed in order to unlock a new set of actions. Quests and quest chains are widespread in roleplaying and digital games. For example, in order to gain access to many of the dungeons in the massively multiplayer online digital role-playing game World of Warcraft, the player’s avatar must speak to an NPC (non-playable character) 12 Such apps have received some attention in various news media, including Time Magazine (Solomon, 2016). Despite these innovations, research on contemporary practices among Catholics related to Confession is surprisingly scarce. One qualitative study among ageing priests in the United States, found that the sacrament provided a means for reflecting on one’s life (Kane, 2015: 295).

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in order to receive a quest, and have the player’s character speak to other NPCs and/or kill a number of monsters or collect items from various places. Only after completing the prescribed tasks may the player return to the quest giver to receive rewards and access new challenges. Returning to Confession with this perspective, committing an act classified as a mortal sin activates Confession as a quest that must be completed in order to proceed to Communion; that is, given the magisterial normative script. The difference between a quest line and the norms for receiving Communion, is that the latter script is easier to “cheat”; if the priest distributing Communion is unaware of a person’s mortal sin, that person may yet obtain the goal they would otherwise be barred from achieving. The priest is the authority invested with the power to re-qualify a disqualified player for transrealm interaction by means of the Host. A lusory attitude on the part of someone going to Confession enables the priest as an interfacial element in two respects: between a human individual and a superhuman person, and between a human individual and their religious community. The function of being an interfacial element to the wider religious community is not exclusive to ordained priests, as we will now see.

Figure 5.1: Temporary confessionals on the lawn outside the Divine Mercy Sanctuary at Łagiewniki, south of Kraków city center. Author’s photograph (2016).

5.1.4 The World Youth Day community and the universal Catholic Church It was early morning after a hurried breakfast. We were waiting in a long line outside Tauron Arena—a multi-purpose convention center renamed “Mercy Centre” for the event, where Mass was to be celebrated followed by catechesis

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sessions in English.13 Prior to the Mass celebration, screens above the main stage inside the arena showed each speaker as moved around on stage, but the display changed during Mass to showing main altar and two side altars from a church at the Sanctuary of the Divine Mercy where the Divine Mercy image hangs above a side altar (figure 5.2). By bringing the image of a church into the arena, the venue was turned into a more church-like setting for Mass, accomplished by the screen functioning as an interfacial element to a church in another place. Some of the interfacial elements of that church were made accessible from the arena. Employing the religious interface available at another location through live streaming did not materially transport the church into the arena, but it visually translocated defining pieces of its religious interface. Thus, a place that might otherwise have been considered “secular” or “profane,” was made more readily suitable for religious interaction. The streamed video from the church on the big screen in the arena translocated the church space, and joined it to the arena space by placing the altar in the joined church-arena space that parallelled the placement of the altar in the videostream from the church. In this sense, one could say that the religious interface of that church was available in two places at once: immediate in the church, and remotely in the Arena.

Figure 5.2: Mass at Tauron Arena (”Mercy Centre”). The Divine Mercy image can be seen displayed at the left of the main altar on the middle screen, with a painting of Saint Faustina on the wall to the left. Note also the banners featuring photos of John Paul II and Saint Faustina, hanging to the right of the main stage. Author’s photograph (2016).

13 The “Mercy Centre” was hosted and sponsored by the Knights of Columbus, a large conservative Catholic organization based in the United States. Their emblem could be seen in conjunction with the “Mercy Centre” title throughout the arena (Knights of Columbus, 2016).

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The two side-screens, to the left and right of the center screen, showed speakers, musicians, and people in the assembly. They mediated the presence of those too far from view for the individual participant, and providing those far from the stage with a visual rendition to accompany what they were hearing. Conversely, the video streaming of that church’s religious interface into the arena expanded its capacity for people in attendance to 22,000 (Tauron Arena Kraków, 2017). Returning to the line where we were waiting to be let in, my respondents and I were still ignorant of what awaited inside. The situation presented a good opportunity for interviews, which in this case resulted in a group interview with four Catholic women in their twenties. Having asked my usual question about what was most important to them about being Catholic, Victoria suggested (and the group agreed) that universality was one of those three. I asked her to elaborate: I guess it just means a global church and, the hierarchy, everyone agrees on what is dogma. We all accept it, and we’re all on board with that. I guess it kind of goes along with the tradition of the Church. It’s apostolic tradition or whatever. That’s my take.

The other respondents expressed agreement that universality was among the most important, along with the Eucharist and “tradition.” Victoria framed universality in terms of three elements: the church being a global community, agreement with and acceptance of dogma, and the notion of apostolic tradition. In other words, conformity to dogma legitimized as apostolic tradition constitutes universality. The global aspect, however, also took other forms. That became apparent when I proceeded to ask each of them why they had decided to participate at WYD. Aria said: I was very intrigued. […] I’m just like “I love travel, I love my faith,” like “What’s… What else is there to find out about this? Sign me up.” So I was just very intrigued [by] the fact that it’s people from around the world meeting.

Among the motivations Aria named, we find a love of travel and faith in combination, but also the enticement of experiencing a global religious community. It was this aspect that Victoria followed up to describe her own motivation: Yeah. I guess that’s the thing for me. […] I like experiencing how global and universal the Church is. You can see flags from every country. High-five Catholics from around the world, like what the heck is that? Why would we have the opportunity to do this?

Victoria anchored her experience of the Church as a global community in visual and tactile impressions, in seeing flags from “every country,” and highfiving other participants from “around the world.” At WYD 2016, “every country” and “around the world” meant the 185 countries that were

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represented (Polish Press Agency and Catholic News Agency Poland, 2016).14 Furthermore, Victoria added a sense of blessing and privilege. Participating at WYD is an opportunity that is not, ironically perhaps, universally available. Inspired by Victoria’s response, Aria shared an anecdote from an anglophone Mass celebration in the chapel of Our Lady of Jasna Góra at the Pauline Monastery of Cze˛stochowa: “[T]here were people from Australia standing next to me when we were at Mass at Cze˛stochowa and it was just like […] one of the most significant moments so far.” I asked her what it was about this moment that made it significant to her: Just realizing that, “Hey, we’re saying this Mass. [An American bishop] is saying Mass, but their [Australian] bishop is up there as well, but we’re all still responding in the same way. We’re all sharing that faith. We’re all making that deep connection with that place and our faith, all at the same time. And it was just very profound in that it was “Wow, this is… This is really what we came here for.”

The “we” Aria employs referred to the ritual community at an anglophone Mass, but the experience of synchronized movements with a group from a different continent led her to conclude that they were all part of the same community. They shared a faith, a connection to the location, and synchronized ritual responses. They were all involved in the same embodied expressions of religious interaction, employing the same religious interface available at a given location. Aria’s statement that “[t]his is really what we came here for,” affirms the centrality of her self-reported motivation to come to WYD in order to experience the Church as a global community. At that point in the interview, Sophia joined the conversation: I think along the lines of what [Victoria] was saying, about just getting an idea of how universal it is. Because I know, at least for me personally, it’s really easy to get caught up in your day-to-day with your faith, you know? And you get caught up in, you know, just your own community, which is beautiful, but, if we’re supposed to be a universal church, I think it’s important to grasp that concept a bit more. And so, I think for me, just being able to come and just experience that more tangibly, or see that more visibly, was very important. […] And it just gives you a greater perspective on what you’re a part of.

Like Victoria before her, Sophia called attention to the sensory stimuli connected to the community experience of WYD, seeing universality as a more tangible and visible experience at the events. She also contrasted the experience of her local community with the normative notion, indicated by “supposed to,” that her “we”—which is also a global “we”—is the “we” of the universal Catholic Church. By describing the prospect of that experience as “very important” in the context of the interview question, she connected it to her motivation for participating. 14 The range of countries represented usually range from 160–170 (Jackowski et al., 2016).

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Nathaniel, a young man whom I interviewed individually, expressed similar notions: The three things most important about being Catholic to me […] being universal is one of them. Caring for others and… loyalty. Loyalty not just to your faith, but to everybody. Universal—I mean, the word Catholic means “universal” in Greek.

Nathaniel’s take on universality differed from that of Aria, Sophia, and Victoria: “Being universal means accepting everything and everybody, not just, you know, not just other Catholics, but it’s everybody. It’s inclusive to anyone who wants to join in,” he explained. For Nathaniel, then, universality does not stop at the boundaries between Catholics and non-Catholics; it does not require a sense of shared faith. Later, I asked what he considered the least and most enjoyable experiences at WYD so far. Let’s just go to the least first, because that one’s a little bit easier to pinpoint. It would be waiting for certain things. You know, I had to wait in line in—just getting a piece of pizza or whatever—and everybody pushes up against it and then it’s really uncomfortable and you can’t move.

On the other hand, he chose the following to describe his most enjoyable experience: Unity is very meaningful because you see that universality of the Catholic Church and those who want to learn about it, or whatever reason they’re there for. And it’s all peaceful. So, seeing that as a gift, is probably the most meaningful. […] It’s just a beautiful thing. […] That’s very meaningful—very proper, very right.

Nathaniel also pointed to unity as an aspect of universality, which reflected Aria’s earlier statement. His story about standing in line while waiting for a pizza slice contrasts two different experiences related to being one participant among many: While the second is focused on unity and universality, the first gives an example of a frustrating situation where community is not manifested —where horizontal religious interaction does not come into play. To Aria, Sophia, and Victoria, universality largely meant doctrinal unity and synchronized ritual enactment, while Nathaniel expressed an understanding of universality that included non-Catholics as well. Among my respondents, Nathaniel’s response differed in that it provided nuance to the more dominant theme of the WYD community as an expression of universality. Such nuance is important because it shows that the following discussion is not applicable to all participants, nor to all situations in which the sheer mass of people present is prominent. Instead, the following discussion is relevant to situations and experiences where the WYD community is subjectively taken to represent the universal Catholic Church. When the condition is met, it opens up the potential for approaching the WYD community itself as an interfacial element. By approaching the WYD community as an interfacial element, we can see that it is treated as present in the human and superhuman realms

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simultaneously. National flags and the groups carrying them may be analyzed as symbols or media, but they also strengthen the larger community’s interfacial capacity as they make visible the international diversity present. From a digital game studies perspective, the visual “graphics” of the WYD community are more helpful in generating the experience of being part of a global community than local communities at home. In local parishes ethnic, linguistic, and cultural diversity is usually more limited, and the community is too small to be realistically immersive in a global religious community. One perspective of particular relevance is Benedict Anderson’s idea of imagined communities (Anderson, 2006 [1983]). Anderson used the concept in an anthropological analysis of nations as socially constructed entities. Some scholars have employed the concept for analyzing imagined communities in religious contexts, including the Catholic Church (e. g. Ryall, 2001). Anderson defines imagined communities as communities where “members […] will never know most of their fellow-members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion” (Anderson, 2006 [1983]: 5). Each WYD participant does not personally meet most of the other people present at the event, far less all the Catholics in the world. Yet, they have the chance to meet a higher number of people with a higher level of diversity than what would be possible in their home parish. Even if they do not meet them, they see, hear, and possibly feel the presence of far more people than they would at home. Each WYD-participant contributes to the image of an enormous, transnational community. Through the visual display of many flags, the audial impression made by various languages spoken, and the high number of participants, WYD becomes the living image of the Catholic Church in its entirety (Skjoldli, 2017). Another point can be made with reference to Ronald Grimes’ take on community in Ritual Criticism (2010). He quotes a Catholic from among his respondents: “It (the liturgy) is highly familiar and easily ignored. Everyone never does everything together. We kind of have to do this because if we don’t, we’re not” (Grimes, 2010: 25). The experience of community at WYD is not only rooted in the visual aspect of material culture; songs, high-fives, and synchronized ritual responses anchor the experience of community in audial and tactile aspects as well. These different material aspects refer back to the respondents themselves as participants and their experiences of being part of a greater whole. In other words, the experience of community is anchored in each participant’s embodied interaction horizontally—with each other, and vertically—with superhuman persons (Skjoldli, 2017). 5.1.5 Pope Francis—an interfacial element? ¡Esta es la juventud del papa! (“This is the youth of the pope!”) is a rhythmic Spanish chant that could be heard intermittently throughout WYD 2016,

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especially upon Pope Francis’ arrival for various events. It is a greeting from young Catholics to the pope, one that loudly proclaims their belonging to him, and non-Spanish speakers often also join in. Such chants, along with ¡Viva el papa! (“Long live the pope”) ¡Papa Francesco! (“Pope Francis!”) or ¡Benedetto! (“Benedict!”) are not limited to the WYD setting. On the contrary, I have often heard them chanted at papal Sunday angeluses and during general audiences on Wednesdays in Saint Peter’s Square, not least during the vigil and canonization ceremony of John XXIII and John Paul II. So far, I have not heard similar chants in English. Polish Catholics, however, often sing Barka (“The Barge”) at such occasions. The song has a calm, slightly melancholic melody and is reported to have been John Paul II’s favorite song. Considering the prevalence of chants and their media appeal, it is no wonder that journalists and several researchers have assumed the pope to be a, if not the, main attraction at WYD. My source material paints a more nuanced picture. As we saw earlier, John Paul II was an interfacial person to some while he lived, for example at WYD 2002, and gained further interfacial capacity after his death. Among my respondents, however, and despite his popularity, Pope Francis does not seem to work as an interfacial person in the same way, or perhaps simply not to the same extent as his Polish predecessor. This could suggest that papal presence as a motivator for participating at WYD varies not only with the participants, but with the current pope and their relationships to him. Ibis, for example, explained that this was her first visit to another country, which made her think of participating as a “win-win.” She also considered WYD a good time for spiritual renewal, due to the opportunities to “go to Mass every day, and visit these holy sites.” Unprompted, she said regarding Pope Francis’ presence: If I see the pope, you know, I thought “Hey, that would be a plus,” but I guess my main reason for coming isn’t to see the pope, but to see other Catholics from around the world, and just be able to have a lot of consecutive days where you’re just filled with prayer and you know, that kind of stuff.

Nonetheless, Ibis considered seeing the pope as a likely main motivation for other participants: “I [know people] who were like ‘I’ll finally see the pope!’ and I’m like, ‘Well, there’s a lot of people here,’” she laughed. It should be noted, however, that Ibis had already seen the pope once before on that trip. On the same day as the interview, we were in the lobby, waiting to leave for one of the main events. Suddenly, a rumor spread that the pope would soon pass the street outside our hotel in his car, likely due to the numerous police cars passing. Most of those who had gathered ran out of the hotel lobby to see him, and their disappointment was notable when they discovered that they had been mistaken (Skjoldli, 2017: 62). Popularity, however, does not by itself imply interfacial capacity. For that we need indications of transrealm interaction by means of the pope.

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It seems that Ibis did not consider seeing the pope a good enough motivational factor for attending WYD—unlike attending Mass, venerating saints, and visiting places connected to them—all of which are encouraged by the clergy and WYD organizers. There was another pope who seemed to be a more normatively acceptable motivational factor: John Paul II. Officially a saint since April 27, 2014, many of the places we visited were connected to his life. Elsewhere, I have argued that John Paul II represented a more socially acceptable motivational factor, but he was an important saint to several respondents on a personal level (Skjoldli, 2017: 63–65). In several ways, stories about John Paul II shaped the journey as a pilgrimage in the sense that he was connected to so many of the places on the travel group’s itinerary. Francis still held considerable appeal. Sophia, for example, said she just thinks that “World Youth Day suits Pope Francis:” I think that he just has this joy. You know, everybody says how joyful he is. He just has this joy and this peace, and this, this hope, and he knows how to unify people, I think. And that’s what World Youth Day is all abou. It is unity and, you know, just joy and hope and so, I think that he can make that alive in the Church, especially in the young people.

For Sophia, unity, joy, and hope were what Pope Francis could hope to achieve through WYD; this was what she considered to be the purpose and essence of the events. Also worth noticing, is her faith in what she considers to be the purpose of WYD to be achieved. In other words, Pope Francis embodies the purpose of WYD by virtue of his personality. This seems to indicate that he was not an interfacial element himself, but a component that strengthened the WYD community as an interfacial element for interacting with the universal Catholic Church. My respondents mentioned Pope Francis far less often than they did Pope John Paul II, which might be due to the location of the 2016 event.

5.1.6 Places, Poland, and Pope John Paul II Victoria used pilgrimage to describe her motivation for coming to WYD before I asked questions that involved the words pilgrim or pilgrimage. She implicitly defined pilgrimage along the lines of “traveling and the, the being in sacred places that you [otherwise] wouldn’t get the chance to be in, and to pray in places that you [otherwise] wouldn’t get the chance to pray in.” Like in the previous section, Victoria’s choice of words shows that she also viewed the pilgrimage aspect of WYD as a privilege. Victoria combined being and praying in sacred places. In terms of religious interaction, that combination indicates that she expects “sacred places” to provide her with means of interaction with a superhuman person. Being in a certain place, then, provides certain benefits for transrealm interaction. Sophia expanded upon Victoria’s statement:

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Sophia:

So all these canonized saints that everybody talks about. You know, being a first grade example, and how we’re supposed to kind of imitate their way. And just to be in the same place as they were, is just… It just makes it so much more… Victoria: Real. Sophia: Real. Yeah.

In this conversational exchange between Sophia and Victoria, saints are characterized as role models, but it also affords a glimpse of the benefits of being in “sacred places.”. According to Sophia, being in the same places that saints had visited, makes “it”—which I interpret as the presences of and stories about those saints—more real. The enhanced sense of reality brought by being in a certain place, illustrates how religious interaction is aided by being in interfacial places. Their agreed statement that being in places connected to saints’ narratives renders them “more real” suggests that such places are conducive to religious immersion. The religious interface, informed by religious narratives, lets these respondents reach into a mytho-historical past, bring it into their present, and make the saints available to them. Transrealm interaction is more than transtemporal, however. Drawing on religious narratives lets Sophia and Victoria intermingle past and present, place and person. Wagner argues that interactivity, rules, play, narrative, and conflict are five main similarities between rituals, games, and stories, and suggests that “perhaps the only way to clearly differentiate between [them] is to look at the attitude of those interacting with them […] not what they ‘are’” (Wagner, 2012: 73, italics in original). I agree with Wagner that the similarities are intriguing, but I would posit that all three constitute forms of transrealm interaction, and regardless of whether we as researchers approach interaction with superhuman persons as ritual, game, or story, we learn something about how such interaction works. Consider Victoria’s response to the question of which saints were the most important to her on this particular journey. She answered, “Definitely JP2” (a popular abbreviation for John Paul II). Another saint was also important to her: Edith Stein (1891–1942), a Jewish convert to Catholicism who joined the Discalced Carmelites of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel, and died at Auschwitz. I just appreciate her life a lot and connect with her, so when we were at Auschwitz, I was just wondering, “Which gas chamber,” you know, “was she sent to” and “where did she stand” and I walked in places that she walked.

Stein was a saint Victoria connected to in that specific location. Her knowledge of Stein’s life and death enabled her to treat Auschwitz as an interfacial space as well as an important historical site. In this case, then, the interfacial potential of a specific place was rooted in an emotionally evocative narrative pertaining to both the Holocaust and to Stein within that context. Victoria’s response is a

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good example of how a place can become interfacial in interaction with a specific superhuman person when informed by a narrative. Aria provided another example, this time related to John Paul II: I think JP2 is big for all of us coming here because, you know, that’s who was pope from the time we were born until the time we were becoming young adults. And so that’s just who we always heard about. And just to know that this is where his faith was formed and this is, you know, he fought so much for the faith in his own country. And he loved it so much and he went on to become pope and became such a great leader. [He is] a role model for all of us, and that’s just this… […] It’s very… breathtaking to be everywhere that he has been, kind of.

Aria described how her relationship to John Paul II had formed: First, he was the pope she had known growing up and second, the pope she had “always heard about”—the latter of which she generalized to a wider “we.” Veiled within these two and her other statements is a narrative about John Paul II’s life —a narrative frought with semi-hagiographical elements. I say “semi-hagiographical,” because stories and biographies about him often hint at hagiographical aspects of his life rather than explicitly establish them.15 Furthermore, John Paul II was venerated as a popular saint from the time of his death, prior to his canonization in 2014, and especially after his beatification in 2011.16 To Aria and Victoria, John Paul II is a saint, but he is also a hero. Comparing saints and heroes has been of interest to many scholars who have researched a wide variety of material from different times, places, and cultures. Among the most prolific is Robert A. Segal, whose work on myth has also brought his attention to research on heroes. Humans who seek to make themselves into gods are only accepted on exception in religions in “the West” (Segal, 2013: 39). Referring to the Hebrew Bible, he claims that the “difference between God and humans is a difference of degree, not kind” (Segal, 2013: 40). To Segal, “heroism constitutes an in-between category that narrows the divide between humans and gods” (Segal, 2013: 41). Drawing on the typology of heroes authored by Thomas Carlyle—hero as divinity, prophet, poet, priest, man of letters, and king—Segal unceremoniously copies Carlyle’s historic examples of “Great Men” according to each category. As examples of the heropriest category, Carlyle named Martin Luther and John Knox—both central agents of the Protestant Reformation marked by history as people who set great changes in motion (Segal, 2013: 42–43). Yet, as Carlyle notes (and Segal ignores as it is not his intent to critically analyze or evaluate, but rather to employ Carlyle’s typology):

15 Examples of this can be found in George Weigel’s two best-selling John Paul II biographies, Witness to Hope and The End and the Beginning (Weigel, 2005 [2001]; Weigel, 2010). 16 For a study in Norwegian of the material aspects of religious interaction with John Paul II in Rome after he was beatified in May 2011, see Skjoldli, 2012.

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There have been other Priests perhaps equally notable, in calmer times, for doing faithfully the office of Leader of Worship; bringing down, by faithful heroism of that kind, a light from Heaven into the daily life of their people; leading them forward, as under God’s guidance, in the way wherein they were to go. But when this same way was a rough one, of battle, confusion and danger, the spiritual Captain, who led through that, becomes, especially to us who live under the fruit of his leading, more notable than any other. He is the warfaring and battling Priest; who led his people, not to quiet faithful labor as in smooth times, but to faithful valorous conflict, in times all violent, dismembered: a more perilous service, and a more memorable one, be it higher or not (Carlyle, 1846: 104).

It seems relevant to inquire as to the conceptual difference between saints and heroes on the emic level Both terms are often used in reference to John Paul II, most commonly as saint of the Catholic Church and national hero of Poland. Saints are Christianity’s heroes, and largely the same things that made John Paul II a hero also made him a candidate for sainthood. In a religious interaction perspective, hero takes on another meaning, as interfacial elements opening imagined realms to interaction. Such imagined realms can be thought to have their place in the past or the present. Either way, heroes link the two. The John Paul II Family Home museum in Wadowice, where Wojtyła grew up, encourages precisely this mode of interaction in situ as another hic locus est. Beginning at the entrance, the exhibition follows a linear, chronological path from one room to another, with each consecutive chamber leading visitors one step further into the museum’s own version of Wojtyła’s biography. Upon exiting the museum and entering the museum shop, visitors have been materially immersed in the museum’s overarching exhibit: the life of John Paul II from birth, through life, beyond death, and to canonization. His extensive worldwide travels and visits to Poland, are also integrated into the rich biographical tapestry woven in the museum. Here, the biography of John Paul II is simultaneously mediated and performed by the individual visitor, who progressively interacts with items, videos, audios, and photographs displayed in each chamber according to the script created by the exhibition designers. Many digital games offer something similar. They, too, offer scripted narratives—a player avatar’s biography (in part or total) is created through player performance from a scripted beginning to a scripted end. Digital games involve players in stories that develop their avatar as a hero in the game realm. The avatar’s “life,” in other words, is preordained though not necessarily predestined. Typically, the avatar starts out without a hero status in the game realm and gradually acquires it by facing dangers and defeating foes that no one else (in the game realm) may overcome.17 17 Games do not progress without the player’s involvement, and games that cast the player’s avatar as a character in a story centered on that avatar as the force of nature that saves the world. Within a limited number of possible trajectories—or slight variations of the same trajectory—player

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By comparison, people who draw on religious narratives to contextualize their own lives, setting similar goals for themselves, aspire to religious heroism. Interestingly, one of John Paul II’s most profound impacts on the magisterial concept of sainthood was its redefinition from exclusive to (ideally) universally available. This was achieved in three ways: Through exhortations to Catholics (especially young people) to “be saints,” by reforming the canonization process to make it significantly less complicated and, finally, by formally canonizing (and beatifying) more people than all his predecessors put together. Like many digital games, religions promise and offer rewards to those who complete prescribed tasks and, the more arduous the task, the greater the reward. In this regard, John Paul II is both Carlylian Hero Priest and Catholic rolemodel, and he is made an element available for integration into the religious interface. It is also a narrative quest path that was once played successfully to conclusion by Karol Józef Wojtyła, parts of which can be replayed by those who visit places equipped with narratives that frame those places as apertures to the superhuman realm. These places, experiences of which are shaped by religious narrative are, to use Wagner’s term, “windows” to the past. That capacity also empowers visitors who consider John Paul II to be present, to be available for communication in those places, opening not only windows but doors to a superhuman realm and reinforce their own aspirations to religious heroism. John Paul II was also important to Caspar and Sister Adelaide, both of whom named the canonized pope among their personal motivations for attending WYD 2016. Sister Adelaide explained that, compared to lay participants, “It’s kind of different in the convent, because you’re just asked if you wanna go.” Laughing, she added: “and of course I did, because I love John Paul II.” She connected her love for the saint pope to visiting Kraków: And to come to his own city that he lived in and was a bishop in, and suffered in. It’s just a really powerful place for me. I love him so much, so even my favorite place that I’ve been so far was this little church off the main square, where he would sit and hear confessions of the college students and I got to pray in that confessional and that’s just my favorite place. Just kneeling there, it’s just such a palpable presence.

Earlier, we saw how the Eucharist and Confession are linked; two separate interfacial elements in Confession function as a gateway to the Eucharist for those who had become normatively ineligible for receiving Communion. In the quote from Sister Adelaide, we see an example of a confessional—a material object and location where Confession takes place—turning into an interfacial element. A story of religious interaction in the past, attributed to a saint, invited transrealm interaction in the present and consequently turned that confessional into an interfacial element for transrealm interaction. The choices always lead towards the successful conclusion of the story, and the story that develops concludes with the declaration of a hero.

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interaction was powered by the social construction of John Paul II as a saint, a kind of superhuman agent, and the narratives connected to him. Sister Adelaide’s statement that praying at this particular confessional brought “such a palpable presence” indicates a high level of religious immersion. Caspar took an interest in how Sister Adelaide had joined the journey, asking her to provide more detail. Sister Adelaide explained that her superior had “wanted six to come,” especially “the junior sisters and those who haven’t made their final vows yet.” However, she elaborated, so many at her convent were preparing to make their final vows that summer, that the travel group did not have enough room for all of them. “So then some of us older-younger sisters got to come,” she laughed. “This is a unique opportunity for you,” Caspar responded. I proceeded to ask Caspar about his motivation for participating at WYD 2016. “Well, for me it was part of my job,” he laughed, and elaborated: But if I didn’t want to go, I’m not sure if I would’ve been forced to go at the same time, so… Yeah. I don’t know. I mean it was definitely—what was special about this one was Poland. I’ve never been to Poland before and it was JP2’s homeland, and with pope— particularly Pope Francis. I would like to have it over here to see Pope Francis. Hear from him what he has to say. So it was a combination of things. I, because I’m older, I remember JP2 more than the pilgrims for this too, so it’s more of a connection for me.

Like with Aria, Sophia, and Sister Adelaide, John Paul II was important to Caspar. Like Aria, he implied that his relationship to John Paul II rested on him being the pope he knew best. Like with both Sophia and Sister Adelaide, Caspar’s relationship to John Paul II seemed to imbue the entire country with interfacial capacity. Pope Francis was also important to Caspar, but his significance fades into the background as John Paul II takes the fore. Nor did his or any of the others’ responses indicate that Pope Francis was an interfacial element in their transrealm interaction. He was still significant in other ways, as I will note later. From the statements made by the respondents featured in this section, it appears that the places they might describe as “holy” or “sacred” are locations particularly suitable for religious interaction, and conducive to religious interaction, and potentially conducive to immersion. This is demonstrated in Aria’s and Victoria’s statements that seeing the places they have heard about make the stories “more real,” and Sister Adelaide’s description of the confessional as providing a “palpable presence.” In these immersive modes of religious interaction, the superhuman realm is experienced as “more real” than when interaction is enacted at a lower point on the immersive scale. The role of religious narrative in these statements is to connect interfacial elements to specific stories relating to humans and superhuman beings that matter to them personally, that these elements become relevant to religious interaction. Moreover, the significance of one narrative compared with another—such as Edith Stein over Maximillian Kolbe for Victoria at Auschwitz

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—results from a personal relationship to the person central to the respective narrative. The places—“where it happened”—is a narrative form of hic locus est (Brown, 1981: 88). Without the narrative providing the information that John Paul II used to sit in the specific confessional where Sister Adelaide prayed, it would simply have been another confessional booth, indistinct from other objects with the same function. Without the stories about John Paul II’s life in Poland, hers and Caspar’s motivations for seeing the country due to their relationships with him would have been void. Through narratives of John Paul II’s life and his assumed presence in a superhuman realm, interfacial elements for interacting with him are scattered throughout the Polish landscape—facilitating his presence in the human realm through interfacial elements. Rather than limit us to the vaguaries of presence and mediation, the framework of religious interaction has provided a way to discuss their interactive function. As one component of that framework, the religious interface explains how and why some places or objects invite interaction while others do not; religious narratives and interfacial elements contribute to religious “world-building,” as they do for virtual realities in digital games. Interfacial capacity is not either there or not there, but dynamically scales up and down in accordance with narrativization, interaction, motivation for religious interaction, and alignment with cognitive predisposition (cf. Guthrie, 1993: 105). Increasing interfacial capacity aligns with increasing interactive potential and mediation of presence. As interfacial capacity, the mediation of somebody’s presence is about how available a depicted person, or narrated person linked to the object, is perceived to be for interaction. With figurative depictions for example, perceived “eye-contact” with a person in an image may add to its interfacial capacity, and lack of “eye-contact” may retract. According to David Morgan, painted eyes that seem to look at the viewer increases the image’s interactive potential (Morgan, 2012: 119). Other body positioning and posture may similarly add or retract. “Graphics quality” may add or retract, such as levels of photorealism and anthropomorphization. As Rachel Wagner has argued in Godwired, both religious and virtual worlds “are concerned with a mode of being that lies beyond our ordinary day-to-day experience” (which corresponds to frame one in frame analysis (Wagner, 2012: 1–2). In Huizinga’s terms, “sacred performance” affords “something invisible and inactual […] beautiful, actual, holy form” (Huizinga, 1938: 14; cf. Wagner, 2012: 2). In the framework of religious interaction, “sacred performance” and “world-building” are anchored in narratives which in turn activate interfacial elements. People who design narratives, like game designers, “create a space in which a story might emerge” (Wagner, 2012: 26, italics in original). Sister Adelaide’s story of experiencing a “palpable presence” at the confessional she employed as an interfacial element, is an example of that potential being realized. The person who told Sister Adelaide that story, whether present in person, or absent through a book, brochure, or a placard nearby, is the narrative designer

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and storyteller. In turn, that narrative designer corresponds to Wagner’s game designer. As such, the story of John Paul II’s hearing students’ Confessions at this particular confessional, fits Michael Mateas’ description of “emergent narrative” in game design as “a rich framework within which individual players can construct their own narratives, or groups of players can engage in the shared social construction of narratives” (Mateas, 2006: 644). Religious interaction, then, is entrenched in the formation of individual and group narratives, which lends interfacial capacity to particular places, people, and objects. Such “emergent narratives” may also include superhuman beings as initiating agents in human-superhuman interaction, which in turn may generate new narratives that lead to the production of interfacial elements. The story about Saint Faustina and the origin of the Divine Mercy image(s) present an example of that. 5.1.7 The Divine Mercy image(s) and the relics of Saint Faustina For Sophia, the saints that had been the most important to her on this trip were John Paul II and Saint Faustina: I mean in terms of just this trip in particular, I think I identify more with… Saint Faustina’s been really big for me. I mean JP2 obviously, just seeing what he was all about […] With Faustina, I just think she suffered so beautifully, and the Divine Mercy image has always just been really important to me.

Copies of the Divine Mercy image were ubiquitous at WYD 2016, which also took place during the Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy. It was displayed next to the altar at all main events (figure 5.4), featured on everything from keyrings to framed paintings in shops selling souvenirs and religious articles. The difference may seem heavily blurred (figure 5.5), but the framework of religious interaction provides us with the tools to make distinctions where the concept of religious media would aggregate related meanings: In principle, all items featuring a copy of the Divine Mercy image mediate the presence of Jesus as the King of Divine Mercy. In this perspective, all such images possess equal powers of mediation. Yet, there are qualitative differences between the image depicted on, say, a keyring or even a painting while it is for sale, and the image situated above an altar in a church or a shrine placed in the home of a devotee. An altar image is more public, the property of a community, while a keyring is usually a personal possession. Their material contexts differ too, but another important distinction is functional: An altar image is an interfacial element, meant for transrealm interaction with a superhuman person, while the function of a keyring may be to serve as memorabilia. What distinguishes one copy of the Divine Mercy image from another from the perspective of religious interaction, is whether or not a specific copy is employed in interaction with a

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superhuman person. In other words, the difference is functional, and the material context reflects that function. The question remains: Why was the Divine Mercy image given such a central role at WYD 2016? The Divine Mercy is the name of an image—or rather two images and copies thereof—of Jesus as the King of Divine Mercy, originally painted on request from Sister Maria Faustina Kowalska (1905–1938) after she had a revelation of Jesus commanding her to have his specific appearance to her rendered visually. Saint Faustina’s birth name was Helen Kowalska. She was born in 1905 in Głogowiec, Poland, and entered the convent of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy in 1926, before her 21st birthday. Aspiring to become a nun, she adopted the name of Sister Maria Faustina Kowalska of the Blessed Sacrament, took her vows in 1928, and was later transferred to a convent in Płock, also in Poland. In Płock, she developed an undiagnosed illness. That was also where she reportedly had a vision of Jesus as the “King of Divine Mercy” on February 22, 1931—a vision where Jesus’ pointed to his heart, whence two colored beams radiated: one red, the other white. Jesus instructed Kowalska to have an image painted according to the vision, featuring the phrase Jezu, ufam tobie (“Jesus, I trust in you”; Kowalska, 2014: Entries 47–48). The purpose of the image and text was to invite veneration of that image “as a last hope of salvation” for humankind, with the accompanying promise that any soul that venerated the image would “not perish” (Siepak, 2014: Sections 2a–b). Improficient in the art of painting, Kowalska sought assistance in making the image, but it was only realized three years later, in Vilnius. In 1935, Kowalska received a new revelation where Jesus dictated the prayer now known as the Chaplet of the Divine Mercy, whose formula aligns with the prayer pattern of the Rosary (Kowalska, 2014: Entry 48). Kowalska died in 1938, only 33 years old. She was beatified in 1993 and canonized in 2000 by John Paul II, her fellow countryman. In the meantime, devotions to the Divine Mercy image had become a widespread phenomenon, and new versions of the image had been created.18 Where the first image had Jesus’ eyes look downward, new images made his eyes meet the gaze of the viewer. The Polish pope promoted the Divine Mercy image globally, leading to its presence in Catholic churches all over the world.19 In the words of Eamon Duffy, “Wojtyła’s piety was populist and saturated in the preoccupations and attitudes of Polish Catholicism. It had a strong apocalyptic streak, represented by his insertion into the sacrosanct Easter Calendar of the new and frankly kitsch visionary Polish cult of the ‘Divine Mercy’” (Duffy, 2014: 393). John Paul II also instituted the Feast of the Divine Mercy, which is celebrated 18 Numerous renditions of the Divine Mercy image exist, but the first version of the image was painted by Polish artist Eugeniusz Kazimirowski in 1934. Another, more widespread version was created by the Polish painter Adolf Hyła in 1943 (Mróz, 2006: 47–48). 19 One prominent shrine can be found in El Salvador City in the Philippines, where the Divine Mercy is rendered as a statue standing over 15 meters tall. Solid rays of red and white stretch out from the heart of Jesus, simultaneously supporting the statue (Valenti, 2008).

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globally on the first Sunday after Easter. In 2002, the Divine Mercy Sanctuary opened in Łagiewniki, south of Krako´w city center. It contains Saint Faustina’s tomb, various relics from her life in the convent, and two images of the Divine Mercy, reportedly including the original rendition.

Figure 5.3: The Divine Mercy image above the main altar in the Divine Mercy Sanctuary at Łagiewniki outside Kraków, with paintings of Saint Pope John Paul (left) and Saint Faustina (right). The tabernacle is a globus flanked by two storm-ridden trees. Author’s photograph (2015).

Figure 5.4: WYD-participants gathering in front of the stage and altar at Błonia Park before the Opening Mass. The Divine Mercy image can be seen below the canopy, to the lower left of the white cross. Author’s photograph (2016).

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Figure 5.5: Toys, images, and various religious articles for sale at a stand outside the Divine Mercy Sanctuary in Łagiewniki. Two images are placed in front of the others, the Divine Mercy with John Paul II at the bottom left, and Saint Faustina at the bottom right. Second from the left is a copy of Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa, with the fourth from the left showing the most popular version of the Divine Mercy image, and the fifth displaying John Paul II in the shadowy embrace of Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa. Author’s photograph (2016).

Figure 5.6: The relics of Saint Faustina as seen through glass window at the Divine Mercy Sanctuary, Łagiewniki, Kraków. Author’s photograph (2016).

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The Divine Mercy Sanctuary is located close to the John Paul II Sanctuary— the city’s biggest shrine to its national hero. Their proximity connects the two most prominent Polish saints of the 20th century geographically in addition to their historical bond. Along with John Paul II, Saint Faustina was the patron saint of WYD 2016, with the Divine Mercy featuring prominently throughout the celebration. We have already seen that John Paul II was important to several of my respondents, but the Divine Mercy image and Saint Faustina were significant as well. Sophia described Saint Faustina as “really big” for her as a motivation for attending WYD 2016. I asked if there was a copy oft he Divine Mercy in Sophia’s parish church, to which she replied that there was not. There had been, however, a copy in the parish church in her home town. At the Divine Mercy Sanctuary in Łagiewniki, relics of Saint Faustina were on display, including instruments of self-flagellation (figure 5.6). Sister Adelaide brought up Saint Faustina in response to my question as to what she thought was most important about WYD 2016 in particular: Saint Faustina’s diary talks about how a spark will come forth from Poland, that will ignite the world, set the world on fire. And that’s JP2, clearly, but the fact that now millions of youth are here from every country that are gonna take this message of mercy back to their homeland—I think that’s the most important.

Barbara expressed agreement with that and elaborated: → I think it’s the message of Divine Mercy and how Divine Mercy actually affects everybody’s life. It certainly can revolutionize. I think not only individuals, but also communities, and therefore further into society. So, us bringing that message of mercy back, I think is going to be really powerful and it will be interesting to watch in the coming years—how those messages of mercy have actually affected the world around us.

Later in the interview, participants from Mexico came over and wished to trade items with people in our group. Their trade items of choice were two prayer cards: one featuring Our Lady of Guadalupe, the other the Divine Mercy with a map of Mexico on them. Sister Adelaide and Barbara provide evidence that the Divine Mercy image has more than a devotional function; it is also imbued with potential for evangelization. By “set the world on fire,” which for Sister Adelaide was a prophecy about John Paul II’s globalizing pontificate, she was employing a metaphor that has long been used among Catholics and Protestants, including Pentecostals and other Charismatic Christians, to describe successful mission efforts and “awakenings.” The metaphor plays on fire as a symbol of the Holy Spirit which, in Charismatic Christian contexts, also often entails charismatic practices such as speaking in tongues, healing, or prophecy to name a few (Skjoldli, 2014: 82). The respondent for whom the Divine Mercy perhaps carried the strongest personal significance, however, was Mabel, a woman in her thirties who

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described her background as Polish. WYD 2016 was Mabel’s third WYD, as she had already attended WYD 2002 in Toronto and WYD 2005 in Cologne. Along with seeing Pope Francis (which she later described as somewhat “anticlimactic” as she had already seen him before), she gave visiting religious sites in Poland as her main motivation for participating. Her great grandparents had migrated from Poland to the United States, and they had “brought with them a number of traditions and that’s been passed on.” I asked Mabel what it was like for her to visit Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa and see the Divine Mercy images. All my life growing up, I’ve heard about Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa, about Divine Mercy, and that’s something that my mom passed on to me, and we still do the Novena for the Divine Mercy. And it meant a lot to go visit those particular sites personally.20

One thing Mabel reacted negatively to were the crowds present in both places. “I think part of that is just my personality. I knew that there was going to be crowds here. I don’t think I totally expected how many people would be at these different sites.” Her previous WYD experiences had prepared her somewhat for the number of devotees, but not entirely. Still, she found it… …cool to see, to see the actual images of Divine Mercy with my own eyes. Especially after, like I said, growing up with that, and then also in preparation for this pilgrimage, watching a video about Saint Faustina. So, kind of walking through that myself.

Like with Victoria’s and Sophia’s experiences with Edith Stein and John Paul II, Mabel also connected the location of the Divine Mercy image to a familiar narrative. In choosing the formulation “walking through that myself,” we are clued in on an experience of religious immersion as narratively informed on the one hand, and employed with interfacial elements on the other. At this point in the interview, I had not yet used the terms pilgrim or pilgrimage, but Mabel did. Visiting sacred sites in Poland was not only one of Mabel’s most explicit motivations; she also characterized visiting them as the most important aspect of WYD 2016. I think just seeing the different sites, the holy sites in Poland: The image of Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa, the images of Divine Mercy, seeing where John Paul II grew up. I’ve heard so much about him, and actually walking there. Being present physically myself.

So far, those of my respondents’ motivations for attending WYD that were connected to visiting Poland have been linked to John Paul II and Saint Faustina. For Mabel, John Paul II recedes into the background as the Divine Mercy and Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa come forward. Oliver, too, was intrigued by the Divine Mercy, which he described as “this idea of—here in Poland especially—there’s ‘Jesus, I trust you’ with the Faustina image. It’s a way to— just to participate more.” 20 A Novena is a series of prayers performed over a period of nine days, often for a specific cause or purpose.

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The hagiography of Saint Faustina and the narrative of the Divine Mercy image(s) amount to what Orsi has dubbed “abundant history”—stories about where “the transcendent broke into time” (Orsi, 2016: Chapter 2, Section 1, para. 1, Kindle edition). In terms of religious interaction, the emergent narrative of Saint Faustina and the Divine Mercy is anchored in material objects that embody them. That embodiment is socially constructed through narrativization. Copies of the Divine Mercy image(s), as interfacial elements can enable those who interact with Jesus through it to make the narrative of Divine Mercy part of their own personal history, while the story of Saint Faustina recounts how the interfacial element became available in the first place. The hagiography of Saint Faustina, then, is a story about how a human being became an interfacial element herself as a saint. It is also the story of how her transrealm interaction with a superhuman person led her to facilitate transrealm interaction for others by means an image of what she had seen. Her purpose was to establish and distribute interfacial elements for interacting with that superhuman agent. According to the emergent narrative, then, the aperture was activated from the superhuman realm, and extended an invitation to employ these new and specific interfacial elements—Divine Mercy image(s) —in response to that invitation. Through their ubiquity at WYD 2016, narratives connected to John Paul II, Saint Faustina and the Divine Mercy image(s) had the potential to involve the entire country of Poland with interfacial capacity, inviting each participant to integrate these narratives into their own religious interaction and the stories of their own lives.

5.2 Conclusion The interview material and observations presented in this chapter let us reveal a variety of interfacial elements. For my respondents, the Eucharist and Confession, the WYD community, the narrativized places, objects and images, and the Divine Mercy image were all interfacial elements that moved into their respective religious interfaces at WYD 2016. At times, such as during the Mass celebration at Tauron Arena, another layer was added to the communal religious interface by translocating a religious interface available at another location via live streaming. Religious interaction at WYD 2016, then, was enacted through the employment of a complex religious interface. The religious interface at WYD 2016 enabled interaction across the vertical and horizontal axes, oriented towards superhuman persons and fellow Catholics, entrenched in narrative construction. On the vertical axis, we find individual and communal prayer, the Eucharist, Confession, the Divine Mercy, relics, and the Way of the Cross. On the horizontal axis, broadly construed, we find other Catholics—the pope, the travel group, and the wider, transnational WYD community. Communal

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interfacial elements are enacted in the Liturgy, the pilgrimage walk from Kraków city center to Campus Mercy, the vigil, and the Sunday Mass. Individual and communal social exchange cut across the vertical and horizontal axes; some forms of interaction are individual and so employ interfacial elements individually, while others are communal and employ interfacial elements on a communal level. Places can turn interfacial when linked to narratives about saints the respondents know. For Victoria, visiting Auschwitz II: Birkenau gave her a new way of interacting with Edith Stein. She and Sophia agreed that visiting places they were told had been significant to John Paul II made his story “more real.” To Mabel, visiting the places and seeing the icons she grew up with reinforced her identity as a Polish Catholic. For Sister Adelaide, the confessional she had heard that John Paul II used for receiving Confession from students afforded her the experience of a “palpable presence.” For Caspar, the whole of Poland and each place connected to John Paul II provided him with opportunities for interaction. Stories activated places, people, and objects, made them interfacial elements for religious interaction, and afforded immersion. The responses and observations explored in this chapter point to the WYD community as an interfacial element in ist own right. Further examples will be explored in the next section. Because WYD offers a unique vantage point for experiencing the Catholic Church as a global, “universal” community that joins the living and the dead, the community as an interfacial element allows WYD to provide adherents with the experience of becoming immersed in a superhuman realm. Having identified interfacial elements at WYD 2016 and their role in motivating participants to attend, it also is important to explore how pilgrimage can function as a search for religious immersion.

6. Pilgrimage and immersion: Nuances of pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage at World Youth Day 2016

When I signed up for WYD 2016 with my travel group, my consent to the “Guidelines for Pilgrims” was represented by my signature on a line with the subtitle “Pilgrim Signature.” When I received preparatory emails from the travel group’s diocesan youth ministry, they addressed me and all the other participants as pilgrims. On our bus rides through Poland, the places we visited, and the Mass celebrations we attended, we were often reminded that were on pilgrimage. Upon arrival at our hotel in Kraków, we received “Pilgrim Backpacks,” with “Pilgrim Guide” books. There is no doubt that we were supposed to think of ourselves as pilgrims. But what does that mean to WYD participants in the early twenty-first century? Several respondents used the words pilgrimage and pilgrim(s) in reference to WYD and its participants. For example, Mabel reported watching a video about Saint Faustina as “preparation for this pilgrimage.” Caspar, explaining that visiting John Paul II’s homeland was a strong personal motivator for him, said “I remember JP2 more than the [other] pilgrims here.” Existing research on WYD tends to assume that participants understand WYD as a pilgrimage and themselves as pilgrims, and that researchers and readers alike know what that means. So far, only one article has discussed whether or not WYD “is” a pilgrimage, and concluded that it is a “pilgrimage event” as opposed to conventional “pilgrimages” due to its changing destination from one occasion to the next (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 378). “It could be surmised,” Alex Norman and Mark Johnson assert, “that the organisers have sought to separate the WYD experience from semantic associations with festival tourism—they do not want WYD to be perceived as a ‘frivolous’ event” (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 379). For Norman and Johnson, that is the reason for what they see as the ubiquity of pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage in connection to WYD. Nevertheless, Norman and Johnson propose that WYD “can be understood as a ‘pilgrimage’ towards a holy person or an office holder and a ‘pligrimage’ [sic] towards a sacred centre—at least in a figurative or hierarchical sense—which is represented by the Pope” (Norman and Johnson, 2011: 380). But such a view fails to distinguish between attending WYD and other papal events, not all of which are called “pilgrimages.” It also implies that the pope is the strongest motivational factor for participants. By contrast, I have found that the WYD community experience is what makes the strongest impact on participants, and that the reigning pope is but one of several

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motivational factors. Other factors include experiencing a transnational community, a close-knit small community in the travel group, saints, places considered sacred, a sense of God’s calling to participate, but also work and spiritual development (Skjoldli, 2017: 57). Due to the media attention surrounding popes in the past few decades, the pope is easily the most conspicuous component of WYD, but we should be careful not to assume too much based on media visibility. As I show in this chapter, asking whether participants self-describe as pilgrims, view other participants as pilgrims, and what they mean by it, reveals something important about how they conceive and conceptualize pilgrims and pilgrimage. Those questions are therefore at the heart of this chapter, which is organized into two main sections: First, we will look at whether and how respondents use pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage in reference to themselves and other participants, when explicitly asked to reflect on those terms. Second, we will explore two new types of interfacial elements, one connected to dealing with pain and discomfort, the other to superhuman persons as co-players of pilgrimage. Even though most participants probably would not see it this way, in my analysis, I continue to apply a ludic perspective informed by the framework of religious interaction, seeing pilgrimage as one ludic frame among many—one that participants could be more or less immersed in. The function of a ludic approach in his chapter is to enable a distinction between those participants my respondents viewed as pilgrims and those they did not (including themselves) by drawing on parallels between games and ritual. The concept of transrealm interaction helps make visible how sensations of pain and discomfort contributes to immersion rather distraction, as we might otherwise expect.

6.1 Asking about pilgrimage As I explained earlier, pilgrim and pilgrimage emerged as keywords early in this project, because they appeared frequently in the source material. We have already seen that respondents employ pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage at early stages in the interviews, before I had prompted them by using those words in my questions. Weh ave also seen examples from material related to promotion, preparation, and news media in various languages, as well as occasions when these terms were used in the early stages of the journey. Unprompted mentions of pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage do not necessarily indicate that respondents’ usage was idiosyncratic. Rather, they point to an internalization of those terms as integral to participation at WYD. Conversely, prompted mentions of pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage do not demonstrate that individual interviewees did not consider themselves pilgrims before being prompted. Interviews do not take place in a social or historical vacuum; they are part of a contextual tapestry that interweaves with the lives of each participant. The terms pilgrim(s) and

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pilgrimage are part of WYD promotion and discourse broadly construed. This has been the case since its very inception, as I showed earlier. In this chapter, all participants I discuss had been prepared by the diocesan administration to view WYD as a pilgrimage. Three interview questions contained the words pilgrim and/or pilgrimage, and they each appeared toward the end of the interview. I asked respondents whether they would describe themselves as pilgrims at WYD 2016, what the word pilgrimage meant to them, and whether they considered all participants to also be pilgrims. We have already seen some responses to the first question. In this chapter, my analysis concerns respondents’ language use when prompted to describe their associations to two specific words: pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage. In the analysis, we are looking for items in those descriptions that indicate transrealm interaction and immersion. Anthropologist Webb Keane noted that, “[l]anguage is one medium by which the presence and activity of beings that are otherwise unavailable to the senses can be made presupposable, even compelling” (Keane, 1997: 49). This helps us confront the problem of recording interaction with “invisible and intangible entities,” which may “pose problems for even the trained observer” (Keane, 1997: 50). Although Keane does not employ the term superhuman person(s), I take his “invisible and intangible entities” to include them. Like Keane, I consider prayer to be one form of interaction with superhuman persons (Keane, 1997: 50). A word of caution, however. Interview analysis often presumes “that language […] represents stable, preexisting realities” (Harding, 2000: x). In this chapter, I have attempted to avoid this pitfall by including examples to the contrary.

6.2 Transrealm interaction as a criterion for pilgrimage 6.2.1 Self-describing as pilgrim(s) Seated at Campus Mercy as the sun was setting after a long day, Oliver and I started talking. As our conversation continued, I invited Oliver to an interview, went through the regular technicalities of obtaining informed consent, and asked him whether he considered himself a pilgrim at WYD 2016. He laughed and responded: “Feeling my aching back and knees and feet—yeah!” His afflictions were brought on by an eighteen-mile walk from Krako´w city center in the scorching Central European sun. The walk was described on the WYD program as a “pilgrimage walk”—now a consistent part of WYD. Oliver was not the only who felt like a pilgrim due to pain and discomfort. After the return walk on the following day, Mabel confidently professed herself a pilgrim: “Yes!” she exclaimed, laughing. “For sure. Especially after that trek we made today.” Leona responded in a similar manner: “I totally feel like more of a pilgrim now,” she said, laughing as well: “I just was like, my bag was too heavy.

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It was just not enjoyable at all. I just felt so awful.” There had been times when they had not felt like pilgrims, though. At the beginning of the journey, “the way we were traveling” had that impact on Mabel; most of our travel during the first three days was by bus. Mabel contrasted walking for miles in hot weather and sitting in vehicles fully equipped with air-conditioning and cushy seats with reclinable backs. She extended that contrast to her previous WYD experiences, when she had been a backpacker. Despite the divergence, she “never felt like just a tourist or going on vacation.” By comparison, Leona felt that there had been “waves of kind of feeling a little bit like a tourist, or feeling kind of like, ‘Oh! You can do what you want today!’” Days earlier, at the Welcoming Ceremony for Pope Francis, Damian expressed that uncomfortable situations influenced his view of himself as a pilgrim: “Yeah. I mean, I think one of the big things about pilgrimage is suffering, and—not that any of us are in, like, huge suffering— but it’s definitely not the most comfortable experience of my entire life.” Several scholars have noted how different means of transportation impact pilgrims’ experiences and, when travelers remain with one means of transportation, distance themselves from those traveling by others (e. g. Coleman, 2004: 56, 68; Reader, 2014: 49, 68–69). Mabel’s diverging experiences of WYD with different modes of travel conforms to this wider pattern, but in my source material, hers were the only ones that did. The comfort level of our accommodation was mentioned more frequently, Most respondents were willing to self-describe as pilgrims without reference to modes of travel, although several associated the term with pain and discomfort. Other factors also appear to be involved: First, being a pilgrim was presented as opposed to being a tourist or vacationer. Second, pilgrim identity was a dynamic matter, and a matter of degree. Third, some respondents articulated their self-description as pilgrims in terms of feeling, and those feelings were rooted in bodily, emotional, and social experiences. Fourth, feeling more like a pilgrim was linked to discomfort rather than comfort, to organized time rather than free time. These factors do not display the complexity among my respondents in its entirety, but provide some entry points to discussing topics that were prevalent in participant responses: When they self-described as pilgrims, they called attention to discomfort and suffering, ways of traveling, and (un)structured time. Connecting these components to feeling more or less like a pilgrim, respondents showed that how and whether they perceived themselves as pilgrims was subject to change. It was a dynamic negotiation between norms and experience, measured on a scale that sometimes had “tourist” or “vacation” on the opposite side. Pilgrimage and tourism or vacation (the latter two were used interchangeably) already indicate two different ways of participating. In a ludic perspective, different forms of participation can be interpreted as different Goffmanian frames, each of which is afforded by WYD as a Huizingian playground. According to Huizinga, “[a]ll play moves and has its

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being within a play-ground marked off beforehand either materially or ideally, deliberately or as a matter of course” (Huizinga, 1938: 10). Approaching WYD as a playground means treating its social context as a social space where several “games” may be played out. In turn, this suggests that pilgrimage conceals a variety of activities at WYD. Other activities were given other names, such as vacation, tourism, work, and research—the latter two were my primary “games.” Scholar of religion James P. Carse distinguishes between finite and infinite games: the former “is played for the purpose of winning, an infinite game for the purpose of continuing the play” (Carse, 1986: 3). From this perspective, pilgrimage is an infinite game; its purpose is to continue playing after the journey is concluded. In this view, participants become “players” who share a common playground and engage in some common activities, but engage and interpret those activities differently; the researcher becomes a player who studies other players but does not necessarily engage in the same frame(s) as them. It might be helpful to compare WYD to actual playgrounds. Neither dictate what games may be played within its bounds, but they often facilitate some games more obviously than others. WYD as playground facilitates but does not necessitate religious interaction. In this regard, the WYD playground differs from ball courts, where only one game may be played at a time. Basketball, football, soccer, rugby, handball, and other ball games may not be played in the same space at the same time because they follow disparate sets of rules and tend to require different types of equipment. Nevertheless, the responses so far cited indicate that pilgrimage was the “game” my respondents preferred to play at the WYD playground, and the game they wanted others to play with them. For these participants, pilgrimage was the desired game, and was marked by discomfort, structured time, and pedestrian travel. Vacation, a game deemed inappropriate but not necessarily undesired game, was marked by comfort, unstructured time, and highly comfortable travel by vehicles. Such a sketch paints a fairly tidy picture of participants’ ways of relating to pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage, but as this chapter unfolds, that tidiness unravels, revealing a much richer complexity. Some respondents considered pilgrimage the only valid game to be played at WYD. Sister Adelaide, a nun in her thirties, confidently proclaimed that “[a]bsolutely, yes,” she was a pilgrim. “I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t coming as a pilgrim,” she said. She explained that she was “a religious,” a term readers familiar with Catholic parlance will recognize as denoting members of Catholic religious orders.1 Attending WYD was different for members of religious 1 Religious (for men religious and women religious) as a noun is an intra-Catholic term that denotes an entire category of people who have some level of commitment to a religious order. They may or may not be fully consecrated, having taken the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Monks and friars are both fully consecrated, but are distinguished by their level of engagement with society, with friars being more socially engaged than monks. Both bear the title of “Brother.” Nuns

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orders than for others, she asserted: “[W]e don’t, like, take vacations like the rest of the world. Pilgrimages [though]: Yeah!” She laughed. Sister Adelaide’s point was not that it was impossible to be a vacationist at WYD, but that she considered pilgrimage to be the only form of participation available to herself and other religious. In her view, however, there were people present who were “not on a pilgrimage.” Her statements tell us two things: first, that pilgrimage was not the only possible game, but the only one that was considered appropriate. Second, they imply that some participants considered differences between pilgrims and non-pilgrims to be observable. Sister Adelaide was not alone in her views; Ibis also saw pilgrimage as the only valid form of participation. She “definitely” described herself as a pilgrim, saying she was “definitely with the prayerful aspect” of pilgrimage. She added that she was “making sure to, like, add that and not be just like ‘Oh, vacation.’” While pilgrimage was the preferable frame for Ibis, she seemed to also fear “slipping into” a vacation frame. Avoiding that meant praying several times a day, reading Scripture, staying positive, and trying to grow in charity. In the framework of religious interaction, these practices were Ibis’ means of becoming and remaining a pilgrim at WYD. So far, we have seen self-descriptions that were fairly assertive, where respondents confidently proclaimed that they were pilgrims. Other respondents were less decided. Consider Nathaniel, who answered: “I would think so. A pilgrim is just somebody who is traveling for, you know, whatever reason, so— yeah.” Nathaniel’s response was affirmative yet uncertain at first, and only conclusive after proposing a broad understanding of a pilgrim. Caspar, too, was cautious and contemplative: “I don’t know about yes or no—if it’s a binary,” he pondered. As the travel group’s leader, Caspar’s WYD experience was complicated by another factor: work. “It’s like two degrees,” he reflected. “I kind of come as a worker, and not a full pilgrim. I mean, I’m kind of a pilgrim, but taking care of the group overcomes what I want to be able to do and to enter into, so it’s a little different.” To Caspar, then, his self-description as a pilgrim was relative; it negatively correlated with time constraints placed upon him by his responsibilities as a group leader. Were it not for those constraints, Caspar suggested, he might have pursued more activities he associated with pilgrimage and thus become more of a pilgrim. By comparison, Leona associated free time with feeling less like a pilgrim. The effect of having more or less free time thus led to opposing effects on Caspar’s and Leona’s self-descriptions as pilgrims. Work was another form of participation that could be enacted at WYD—a are similarly distinguished from the wider category of women religious by their full consecration involving the same vows. Like “Brother,” however, “Sister” is also applied more widely. “Brothers” and “Sisters” are religious, but not ordained as priests, thus formally laypersons although their socioreligious status differs considerably from the status of other laypersons (McBrien and Attridge, 1995: 923; Scully, 1995). Conversely, “religious priests” are male members of religious orders that have also been ordained, for example Jesuit priests.

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frame that interfered with involvement in the frame of pilgrimage because the structured time of work meant less time to become immersed in religious interaction. Barbara was also cautious in self-describing as a pilgrim: “I think so. I don’t think that I really fully understood pilgrimage as a World Youth Day participant prior to coming here. But I think as the journey continues, I do feel more that it is a pilgrimage.” Unlike the others, Barbara first linked being a pilgrim to the consideration of whether or not WYD was a pilgrimage. She proceeded to quantify feeling more or less like a pilgrim according to a “pilgrim scale”—a phrase that had been introduced to the conversation before the group interview commenced. She picked that back up when responding to whether or not she viewed all WYD participants as pilgrims: “It’s kind of like on a scale of like, ‘You’re not very pilgrim-y,’ and ‘you are very pilgrim-y,’ like… If there’s a graded scale, I’m feeling like a 6 pilgrim today.” She laughed, and her statement was met with amicable laughter from others in the group, indicating that there was something humorous about the notion of quantifying “pilgrimy” so concretely. Nevertheless, the pilgrim scale was a heuristic tool for communicating that insofar as being a pilgrim meant feeling like a pilgrim, it was subject to change on a daily basis. Oliver, Mabel, Leona, and Damian linked specific bodily sensations to feeling like a pilgrim. Discomfort and painful sensations reinforced feelings of being a pilgrim and of seeing WYD as a pilgrimage. Like the American sports saying “no pain, no gain,” pain was also part of the pilgrimage frame.2 References to feeling more or less like a pilgrim over time suggest that it was not necessarily a stable identity or mode of travel for the participants. Rather, a pilgrim identity was contingent upon factors that changed over time, making it dynamic. The self-referential articulation of such feelings further reveals that self-descriptions were highly subjective and individualized. Despite top-down insistence that WYD is a pilgrimage, whether a participant considered herself a pilgrim or not was subject to continuous and autonomous evaluation of individual experience, albeit in accordance with internalized norms. Readers might object that the subjectivity demonstrated resulted from how the question was posed. That is a fair observation; asking a respondent “Do you consider yourself a pilgrim at this WYD?” encouraged subjective self-reflection and response from the outset. It did not, however, ask respondents to articulate their self-description in terms of feeling. While some associated feeling like a pilgrim with physical pain, others found that it depended upon other factors: Barbara, who felt more like a pilgrim as time progressed, connected it to “searching […] for not only, like, these holy sites, but also, like, in yourself for 2 There is a similar saying in Norwegian: “Er du med på leken, får du smake steken,” which can be literally translated into: “If you play the game, you will [or: better be willing to] taste the heat/ steak.” Stek plays on the two possible interpretations of “intense heat” on the one hand, and “steak” on the other, implying that playing the game provides players with both pain and pleasure.

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these new insights or new messages from God to your heart.” Apart from mentioning holy sites, Barbara’s self-description as a pilgrim was similar to that of Ibis, who was making a conscious effort to remain a pilgrim by maintaining religious interaction and seeking immersion. From the perspective of religious interaction, transrealm interaction was important to both of them. While Ibis prayed, attended Mass, and read Scripture, Barbara looked for interfacial places and personal messages from a superhuman person. Self-descriptions as pilgrims were linked to the employment of the religious interface, which was also subjective and individually enacted. Feeling more or less like a pilgrim also played a part in the articulation of binaries (pilgrimage vs. tourism, vacation vs. work; pilgrim vs tourist, worker vs. participant). The binaries sometimes included a derogatory view of whatever pilgrim or pilgrimage was seen as opposed to: Mabel and Leona contrasted feeling like a pilgrim with feeling like “just” a tourist or being on vacation. While Mabel gave the means of travel as the differentiating factor, Leona was more concerned with how her time was organized; attending to a pre-organized schedule made her feel more like a pilgrim, while organizing her own time made her feel less like a pilgrim. The journey had been scheduled in detail during our bus travels, but included more free time after we arrived in Kraków and traveled on foot or by public transportation, which meant that the two women had felt more and less like pilgrims at opposing times. For Caspar, on the other hand, the time restrictions work placed on him inhibited his pilgrim experience. Derogation of vacation, tourism, and work, however, was conditional upon pilgrimage as the desired way of participating; these three alternatives to pilgrimage were only “just vacation,” “just tourism” or “just work” within that particular context. Among these responses, some factors were prominent. As already noted, some respondents referred to pain and discomfort (“ascetic factor”), others to “feeling” more or less like a pilgrim as conditional and dynamic (“feeling factor,” “dynamic factor”), and yet others to binaries between pilgrimage and tourism (“binary factor”), vacation, and work, as well as degrees of time management. In research on WYD, the binary factor has received some attention, but only insofar as it has tacitly given rise to typologies of participants by researchers, and then merely as adjectives to describe subcategories where all participants are “pilgrims” (Mason, 2008). All my respondents identified as pilgrims, a common denominator that extends into the wider interview material. One caveat should be mentioned here, however. At one point during an informal conversation, one participant who did not participate in an interview, said she did not consider herself a pilgrim. After the eighteen-mile walk, however, that had changed. The dynamic factor in identity formation has received some attention in research, but only with regard to “converts” from less to more “devoted” Catholics as an effect of WYD, and not in relation to the pilgrim concept during the event itself

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(Mason, 2010). The ascetic and feeling factors are altogether absent from existing research on WYD. This is surprising considering the hitherto uncritical application of pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage to WYD participants combined with the prominence of asceticism and emotionality in studies of other phenomena classified according to the same terms (e. g. Aziz, 1987; Frey, 2004; Lynch, 1988; Reader, 1987). One reason for this absence could be that WYD has so far been studied as almost anything but a pilgrimage, probably because it diverges from conventional scholarly definitions of what a pilgrimage is. My respondents present different ways of approaching and understanding pilgrimage. Nathaniel viewed all participants as pilgrims, because the term denoted simply someone who “moves around,” which would embrace all travelers. He was unique in the sense that he did not contrast pilgrim(s) or pilgrimage with something else. Sister Adelaide considered pilgrimage the only available form of participation for herself, but was aware of other participants behaving in ways that did not conform to her view of pilgrimage. Other respondents identified those ways of participation as vacation, tourism, and work. Respondents who distinguished between two or more ways of participating at WYD described themselves and others in terms of being more or less “pilgrim-y” which, in Barbara’s case, was presented as a scale along which she found herself to be moving up and down. Such an approach seems to fit the relationship between pilgrimage and tourism described by Stausberg as “[occupying] two diametrically opposite semantic poles” that denote “prevalent emic cognitive frames generally engaged in order to classify public behavior and individual intentionality” (Stausberg, 2011: 19). However, he also notes that, on the etic level, “some scholars have pointed towards their [pilgrimage and tourism’s] deeper, structural convergence” (Stausberg, 2011: 20), and points to Turner and Turner’s trope of a tourist being “half a pilgrim if a pilgrim is half a tourist” (Stausberg, 2011: 21). Yet these descriptions appear to assume conceptual and experiential stability, and that approach illumines little beyond pointing out that the two apparent opposites can not only be mixed, but also move along a scale that reaches from one to the other. Such a view, however, offers few connections to the framework of religious interaction. A ludic approach is more promising, offering two main routes of interpretation. The first involves seeing pilgrimage, work, vacation, and tourism as different games enacted (or not enacted) in the context of WYD as playground. In this view, pilgrimage was the frame all respondents considered preferable both with regards to themselves and to other participants. Mixed and changing feelings of being more or less like a pilgrim could even be interpreted as participants playing different games and being involved in respective frames’ or games’ “magic circles” as their

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journey unfolded.3 Supporting this view are cases where respondents express views of themselves and others that appear to be more stable than fluctuating. The view is primarily supported by the notion that rules and rule-making are an important parallel between games and religion, ritual in particular. Having made that connection, another option emerges by considering the lusory attitude in pilgrimage and seeing pilgrimage as offering religious immersion. Openness to or anticipation of response from superhuman persons might indicate a lusory attitude toward the superhuman realm rather than acquiescence to a set of “rules.” Feeling more or less like a pilgrim may indicate corresponding levels of immersion. For example, Barbara identifying as a 6 on the pilgrim scale can be interpreted as a 6 on a scale of religious immersion. In this view, tourism, vacation, and work do not denote different “games” as much as lower degrees of religious immersion relative to pilgrimage as descriptive of higher degrees. Two main components from the source material support taking this latter view. First are references to specific practices that contribute to making respondents feel more like pilgrims. Second are the cases of Caspar, Mabel, and Leona, whose WYD experience swung between being more of a pilgrim on the one hand and being more of a tourist or worker on the other. The factors contributing to a dynamic self-description as pilgrim would not result from moving in and out of different Goffmanian frames, but from their experiences of mixing elements from distinct modes of participation as they sought to achieve higher levels of immersion. Furthermore, in Religion and Tourism, Stausberg credits Carlos Alberto Streil with introducing the term religious tourism “to refer to more ‘external’ experiences with less immersion into the sacred than is the case with pilgrimages” (Stausberg, 2011: 10, italics added). Stausberg does not elaborate on immersion in this case, and I have not succeeded in obtaining the quoted source, so the degree to which the denoted concept corresponds to immersion in the framework of religious interaction remains an open question. However, it appears that religious tourism can involve two levels of involvement that are distinguished by higher or lower levels of immersion in the superhuman realm, although that requires an interpreting “the sacred” as corresponding to the superhuman realm, and I prefer to avoid that notorious category. Nevertheless, we encounter two conundrums here: First, sensations of pain and discomfort can disrupt immersion in other realms, whether virtual or superhuman. Second, Nathaniel’s view of a pilgrim was not described in terms of either scale or binaries. Pursuing a ludic perspective of religious interaction as we move on, digital game studies offer ways of incorporating these two apparently separate interpretations into a richer whole.

3 The “magic circle” has been connected to immersion in studies of new media technologies. One example is where Christopher Moore refers to “boundary-crossing experience” as the “magic circle of immersion” (Moore, 2011: 382).

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6.2.2 Describing pilgrimage In this section, we will see examples of how my respondents described pilgrimage in the WYD context. They understand the term pilgrimage in different ways, and emphasize differing aspects of the concept as they see it. As I will show, however, the ludic framework of religious interaction allows them to come together. We will start with a quote from Nathaniel. Recall his initial definition of a pilgrim, following his self-description as such: “Someone who is traveling for whatever reason” is minimalistic, non-binary, and highly inclusive. As noted, Nathaniel was unique among my respondents due to his initially highly inclusive view of pilgrimage. His definition of pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage also changed gradually during the interview. By the end of our conversation, he had provided four different sets of connotations to pilgrim and pilgrimage, which can be interpreted as incoherence, reluctance to commit to a definition, or as processual reflection on the terms as the conversation proceeded. While it is difficult to assess which is more accurate, the third is the more analytically fruitful interpretation. On a methodological level, the resulting divergence calls for analytical flexibility. Margery Wolf has observed that “‘ethnography is a messy business.’ And the messiness does not go away” (Wolf, 1999: 355). In order to accommodate Nathaniel’s evolving articulations, his statements will be treated separately, as they relate to the views of other respondents. For example, when I asked him to describe the meaning of the term pilgrim, Nathaniel said: Pilgrim normally is—to me, it’s normally referring to somebody of religious status, whether that be Muslim, Christian, Jewish, whatever happens to be. And, so, to me it’s more of a religious term rather than just a person who moves around. It’s normally a religious person who moves around.

In other words, his description had changed from “someone who is traveling for whatever reason” to “a religious person who moves around.” For initial comparison, consider Mabel’s response: Probably religious journey. […] It involves some sort of journey of some type, I think for a higher purpose. To me that would be related to my faith. […] I think, like, a nonChristian or even, like, someone who didn’t believe in God can still go on a pilgrimage.

Nathaniel’s and Mabel’s descriptions of pilgrimage were construed in different ways. Nathaniel’s emphasis had shifted from the act of traveling to the person traveling. At first glance, the two seem to lead in different directions: one to identity construction processes, the other to motivational factors.4 Their 4 I have written about motivational factors elsewhere, based on self-reports from the same selection of respondents (Skjoldli, 2017).

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common denominator is movement through space and time. Nathaniel now saw pilgrimage as a type of journey carried out by a religious person, while Mabel also included people who “don’t believe in God.” To her, the defining factor of a pilgrim was a “higher purpose”—whether that might be considered a religious purpose or not. Both, however, considered pilgrimage to be a journey characterized by a tacitly implied religious quality on the part of the traveler. Ibis had a different view. For her, what distinguished pilgrimage from other forms of travel was “making sure at different times during the day you pray,” “attend Mass every day,” “read Scripture,” “being more aware of your thoughts and keeping them more focused on the positive,” and “trying to be more charitable and really kind of grow in charity so that, going home, I’d be more charitable.” Ibis’ concept of pilgrimage involved various forms of transrealm interaction, and the purpose was maintaining and prolonging immersion. Unlike what the other respondents disclosed, she expected WYD-as-pilgrimage to change her disposition towards others. Carole M. Cusack has argued that “prolonged immersion in, and social vindication of, highly affective narratives […] can result in the transformation of ‘the essential structures of everyday life’” (Cusack, 2016: 587). It appears that Ibis was looking for this kind of transformation, but although she mentioned going to Mass every day during pilgrimage, she did not explicitly mention anything that might count as a “highly affective narrative” might be. Oliver, however, did. Like Ibis’ description of pilgrimage, Oliver’s corresponded not only to transrealm interaction, but also to immersion: “You kind of escape from the rest of the world,” he reflected. Unlike Ibis, he linked pilgrimage directly to the Passion narrative: “The love and the sacrifice that Jesus did for us demands a response,” he said. To Oliver, going on pilgrimage communicated “that we’re willing enough, that we love him enough, that we’re seeking him enough, that we’re willing to suffer some in order to have that mountain top experience […] when you feel like you come closer to God.” At WYD, the Passion narrative features prominently in several ways: The Opening and Closing events of WYD are Mass celebrations, and the Way of the Cross is performed on Friday afternoon. At Kraków 2016, the Way of the Cross was dramatized in a performance that combined elements of dance, mime, audio, and lighting effects. A further artistic component was included as an artist painted accompanying images as the performance progressed. As the Passion narrative was performed through these dynamic media, the religious interface came alive and danced. Oliver’s pilgrimage was about investing time and effort as a transactional interaction with a superhuman person, specifically Jesus. Pilgrimage was both a response to a superhuman person’s initial interaction, and a votive, do ut des offering. He pointed out that traveling did not indicate God being more available in one place than in another:

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So even though God is everywhere and, like I said, he’s home just as much as he is here, but it’s our heart that brings us here and we come to meet Jesus just as he’s meeting us here in this much more physical way, in addition to spiritually.

The difference lay in “the heart,” and in the ways in which he “met” Jesus in the context of WYD. It is difficult to decipher what made Oliver’s encounter with Jesus “much more physical” at WYD than at home. Oliver was aware that his statement regarding God’s increased availability in one place was “theologically incorrect” when taken in conjunction with the dogma of God’s omnipresence. It is possible that Oliver’s appeal to the normative teaching of God’s omnipresence conflicted with anthropomorphization and cognitive constraints, as Justin L. Barrett and Frank C. Keil might have argued (Barrett and Keil, 1996). As Keane puts it, however, “[e]ven belief in the omnipresence of divinity does not assure that one can interact with it” (Keane, 1997: 50). A ludic perspective offers a different interpretation: Approaching pilgrimage as a game of transrealm interaction involving human and superhuman persons as co-players raises the topic of immersion. Immersion in transrealm interaction is dependent on synchronized interfacial elements, whether internal (thoughts, sensations) or external (images, places). Taken together with Oliver’s description of pilgrimage as an “escape from the rest of the world,” his statement on God’s general omnipresence but specific availability in the context of WYD as pilgrimage indicates that WYD offers a religious interface that, to him, is particularly conducive to immersion. Leona described pilgrimage according to two criteria: a “religious pursuit” and simplicity. The “goal is not to be comfortable. And I say this sitting in this nice hotel!” she added, laughing at the obvious irony. Leona expressed gratitude for the accommodations of the travel group, “but a typical pilgrimage would be a little bit more simplistic, and so I guess that’s why I say, like [the night oft he Vigil] was especially more pilgrimage-esque, because it had that element of simplicity to it.” If Leona had wanted to come to Kraków as a tourist, she explained, she would have stayed in precisely the kind of hotel we were staying in. It was the combination of elements that made a pilgrim, however, as she noted that traveling “can be uncomfortable, no matter the pursuit.” The notion of a religious pursuit became clearer as I asked her to elaborate on her earlier mentions of a few places that she considered more “tourist-y.” She gave examples like Wawel Castle and the Salt Mines as “tourist-y” places, but she also connected being tourist-y to certain activities, especially “taking a day to do souvenir shopping. That, that seemed tourist-y to me.” Commercial exchange was not the problem; being at a “religious site and buying religious things” did not take away from being a pilgrim, she stated; “you need things to bring back to your friends and family.” Anything that might detract from “that religious focus” was tourist-y in Leona’s view. There were places that escaped the pilgrim/tourist binary, however. Visiting Auschwitz, for example, was something in-between: “I

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wouldn’t describe Auschwitz necessarily as tourist-y,” she said. “It’s such a unique place. […] Tourists go there, but it can also be a religious place in the sense that it was a prayerful time for me. And I think it was a prayerful time for most people.” What Leona meant by “religious pursuit” and “religious focus” now came clearer into view. It was about being prayerful, which corresponds to continuing engagement in transrealm interaction. Similarly, buying religious things could be seen as extending the religious interface available in one place to others. Leona’s description of the last two days as more “pilgrimage-esque” invites the second course of interpretation sketched out at the end of the previous section. “Tourist- y” was not a way to diminish the participation of other pilgrims, but a way of labeling places and practices that distracted her from immersion in religious interaction. The first few days, which she considered more “pilgrimage-esque” were not only entirely structured by the travel group’s leaders. They also consisted of traveling to one interfacial place after another, every one of them connected to superhuman persons—John Paul II and Our Lady of Cze˛stochowa in particular. Those visits were only interrupted by bus rides between locations, and every longer bus ride involved praying the Rosary and/or the Divine Mercy Chaplet. By extension, it is reasonable to assume that being on the move, collective prayer sessions, and visits to places also linked to saint narratives helped Leona attain and maintain immersion in transrealm interaction. Nathaniel’s understanding of pilgrim and pilgrimage in the WYD context was oriented towards communal, horizontal interaction with other participants. When I asked him to name the three most important things that make up a pilgrim, he responded: Well, obviously, the first one is your faith. So you have to—in this case [WYD]—you have to be a Catholic. Well, you don’t necessarily have to be a Catholic. You just have to know about […] Catholicism. Unity again, because you’re gonna be meeting people from halfway across the world or all the way across the world. So, you have to have a common understanding as well and that understanding also comes with care. Because, if you just act like you don’t care about the other cultures, you could offend somebody or bad things like that, and you don’t want that. Plus, it’s just a good Catholic thing—to be nice, and to want that unity.

In his earlier statements, Nathaniel described a pilgrim first as a person who “moves around,” then as a “religious person who moves around.” In those cases, he gave a general description, whereas now he drew on the immediate context of WYD specifically to inform his answer. The differences show how his description of a pilgrim changed as he moved from thinking about pilgrimage generally to thinking about WYD specifically. At first, he restricted WYD pilgrims to Catholic participants, but soon extended his view to include anyone with knowledge about Catholicism. Calling to mind Nathaniel’s inclusive view of universality in Chapter 5, and his listing of unity as the second component of a pilgrim, his view expanded to a point of coherence with the

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significance he had placed on universality earlier. Nathaniel’s concern for people of other cultures and taking care to avoid offending them testifies to his social and intercultural sensitivity in a transnational context. That sensitivity manifested in the interview as well: Nathaniel knew that I was not a Catholic, which may have affected his response; asking him to define a pilgrim and pilgrimage, I had the impression that he did not wish to exclude me from his definition. In the context of the interview, to avoid offending “people from other cultures” specifically meant to avoid offending me, even though he knew that I was there due to research interests. This was further accentuated when he responded to whether he viewed all WYD participants as pilgrims. I—yeah, I would think so. I mean, even if you’re not a Catholic or religious even, but you want to learn about it, that would make you there for a religious reason. Even though it’s not because of your religion specifically.

Nathaniel’s use of the second person personal pronoun could be interpreted to mean the general you or the more specific you—to my primary role as the interviewer. It is difficult to determine, however, as he did not explicitly refer to my religious identity as different from his own. His knowledge of my religious identity being different to his may also have increased his awareness of nonCatholic participants. In that context, curiosity about Catholicism—which I take to include research—was sufficient for Nathaniel to count someone as participating “for a religious reason.” Applying the framework of religious interaction, Nathaniel’s concept of pilgrimage was more concerned with unity and horizontal religious interaction than vertical religious interaction. He did not distinguish between players and non-players, and considered everyone present a co-player. I wish to draw attention to Nathaniel’s reference to WYD’s potential didactic aspect as well. Game designer Jason Anthony introduced a typology of religious games, where one category comprised didactic games. An example of a didactic religious digital game might be The Bible Game (2005) which was released for Xbox, PlayStation 2, and GameBoy Advance. The game lets players “experience” Moses parting the Red Sea, thereby teaching a version of the Old Testament narrative to players. Anthony writes that didactic religious games “generally focus on passing along rules and concepts, rather than offering a sacred experience. Such games may take place in sacred space […] but are rarely seen at sacred events” (Anthony, 2014: 29). Interestingly, he describes religious games as “mostly pointing towards the divine without participating in it.” If we interpret “sacred” and “divine” as transrealm in accordance with the definition of religion given earlier, Nathaniel’s statement highlights the potential of WYD as an example of a “sacred event” and a didactic religious game. In Nathaniel’s view, WYD offers Catholics and non-Catholics alike a way of participating in a Catholic pilgrimage, informed by the cultural patterns particular to Catholicism and thereby learning the rules of its religious

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“games.” WYD thus becomes a Catholic religious game for beginners— pilgrimage as religious tutorial.5

6.2.3 Pilgrims, non-pilgrims, and the “pilgrim scale” While binaries were absent from Nathaniel’s descriptions of pilgrimage, other participants distinguished between pilgrims and non-pilgrims. As we proceed, specific criteria are revealed for distinguishing between the two. For example, when I asked Leona whether she would describe all WYD participants as pilgrims, she quickly retorted: “Well, you’re a participant.” “Mhm,” I nodded. “Were you a pilgrim? Do you consider yourself as a pilgrim?” Her question was partly open and partly rhetorical. To avoid interview derailment, I turned the question back around: “Well, do you consider me a pilgrim?” I asked. Leona laughed and hesitated. “I won’t be offended if you say no,” I assured her. She paused before answering: I’d say no! Because of the three elements [of pilgrimage] that I was talking about. Definitely the other two—because you did everything with us—were certainly there. But, religious perspective… Well, OK, let’s go back to the definition of what does it mean to be a pilgrim, I guess. Like, not just visiting the religious site, but actually, like, worshiping there, actually participating in that, in that experience, and not from the outside, but from the inside perspective. So in that way, yeah, no: I’d say that you were not.

In addition to referring to her earlier description of pilgrimage, Leona grounded her view of a pilgrim in a specific kind of activity: worship—a kind of transrealm interaction. Since Leona based her reflection on a binary model, I was curious as to how she viewed those who might embody the pilgrim/work duality introduced by Caspar. Mentioning tour guides, medical personnel, policemen, and local Polish people, Leona said: “They were working. I see them as working. They were not on pilgrimage. I was not working. And that’s what makes it different, is that I set aside this time.” People could be working and be a pilgrim, however: But that’s up to you as an individual, you know, do you participate in that? […] [L]et’s say you’re medical personnel, so you need to make sure that everyone’s safe. But, you know, do you receive Communion when the time comes at Mass? Because certainly, you could. You know, you could still be working and participating. Do you say the prayers under your breath as, you know, as you’re keeping watch? 5 This is a wordplay on tutorial mini-games or modes in digital games, which are often offered in order to introduce players to the game’s rules and mechanics. Narrative-driven digital games tend to incorporate tutorials in the narrative itself. In such cases, for example Electronic Arts’ and BioWare’s Dragon Age series, players may only enter the game proper after completing the tutorial introduction.

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For Leona, receiving Communion and praying while working made someone a pilgrim as opposed to “just” working. Being at a “religious site” without worshiping there amounted to “just” visiting, which indicates that pilgrimage offered visitors something more that, lest engaged, left part of the site’s potential unrealized to the individual. This view became all the more apparent when Leona took WYD workers into consideration. She could not tell by what they were wearing or what they looked like, she said, “but I do know that they’re working. […] So I’d say that they could have a dual kind of identity.” The one consistent element that distinguished pilgrims from non-pilgrims in Leona’s responses was whether or not they engaged in transrealm interaction. Leona also added that she did not view participants from neighboring countries as pilgrims, which reveals a sense of importance regarding the distance traveled. Others did not express that view, but like the experience of pain, the impact of distance traveled has an interesting parallel to Catholic pilgrimage practices in medieval times. Pope Alexander III (1159–81) “varied the level of indulgences for visitors to Rome according to,” precisely, “the distance traveled” (Bell and Dale, 2011: 603). The interesting factor consists in Leona’s distinction between pilgrims and non-pilgrims according to what distance they traveled, rather than references to Catholic teachings on indulgences (a word that never occurred in any of my interviews). In the 1992 Catechism, pilgrimage is described as a form of penance and connected to the sacrament with the same name, as well as a metaphor for earthly life (nos. 1438, 1469, 1475). By contrast, the 2011 Youth Catechism, YouCat, describes a pilgrim as someone who “‘prays with his feet’ and experiences with all his senses that his entire life is one long journey to God” (Schoenborn, 2011: No. 276, cf. CCC 1993 [1992]). This latter portrayal corresponds more closely to the descriptions of pilgrims and pilgrimage provided by my respondents, and may be interpreted as a shift away from a penance-centered understanding of pilgrimage on a magisterial level.6 Barbara drew on the WYD context to inform her understanding of pilgrim and pilgrimage. She, too, distinguished between pilgrims and non-pilgrims: “[T]here’s a difference between pilgrim and participant, I think. […] I think the word ‘participant’ comes to mind a little bit with folks who maybe don’t have that mindset,” Barbara reflected, though she was careful not to devalue other participants’ experiences. “To be a pilgrim anywhere, you first have to be a pilgrim in your own heart, really,” she said, lascribing the pilgrimage mindset to the “heart.” “You can’t, just like, attend, because it’s—otherwise it’s a vacation, and it’s not really as fruitful as perhaps anything else might be that might be considered a pilgrimage.” Note that Barbara does not even begin to mention specific destinations or religious identities. Instead, she emphasizes the importance of a specific “mindset” which, if interpeted as a lusory attitude 6 No. 1674 of the 1992 Catechism classifies pilgrimage as one of many expressions of “popular piety.”

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in a religious context, becomes the willingness to incorporate a superhuman person into one’s social reality. She also compared WYD to previous Catholic gatherings she had attended: “If I look back to other large Catholic gatherings that I’ve been to,” Barbara reminisced, “you can be like, I just wanna go here,’ and like, ‘participate in the things with my friends,’ and like, ‘try to get something out of it.’ Or,” she added, “you can take a mindset of, like, ‘God is going to speak to me through this journey.’” Barbara distinguished pilgrims from non-pilgrims by pointing to the anticipation that God would speak to them through their journey, which indicates a lusory attitude. Speaking indicates interaction, and the preposition through indicates that the journey itself holds interfacial capacity. This means that what separated pilgrims from non-pilgrims for Barbara was a combination of two components: the journey as interfacial in its own right, and anticipation of communication from a superhuman person as part of a lusory attitude. That expectation entailed that the religious interface would be activated from the superhuman realm. Some of the respondents who had been to previous WYDs retrospectively classified their past selves as non-pilgrims. This was the case with Victoria, Mabel, and Oliver. All three had been to Cologne in 2005, but Oliver had also been to Denver 1993 and Mabel had attended Toronto 2002. Their differentiation between current and former selves came up in response to whether they considered all participants to be pilgrims, after they had described themselves as such. Mabel, for example, responded: “I… Yes and no. I mean, I think they fulfill some of that—if we’re trying to define pilgrimage.” Mabel seemed interested in the question of how to define pilgrimage. As indicated by “we,” she saw defining pilgrimage as a concerted effort between me as interviewer and herself as interviewee. “I think for some people it’s—you hear about it in the church bulletin, sign up, and then go and it becomes kind of a vacation,” she said, implicating that those who fit that description were not full pilgrims to her eyes. She pointed to her earlier WYD experience as an example. I can think back to when I first signed up for World Youth Day when I was a teenager, like, I don’t know if I had kind of the pilgrimage mentality at first. It just sounded cool and I wanted to go to Canada, and my best friend was going and so we were, like, “Yes! Let’s go!”

Mabel’s main motivation for participating at WYD 2002 in Toronto, then, had been visiting another country with her best friend, which she anticipated would be fun. In retrospect, she did not consider that motivation to qualify as a “pilgrimage mentality.” I also don’t think that everybody fully understands what World Youth Day is about, and I think that depends on the formation of the group that they’re in. So I hesitate a little bit. And also just seeing, like, some of the people: the way that they seem to ignore the holy sites—either in Poland or the religious events with Pope Francis was a little

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discouraging. So I’m not… I’m not quite sure they were there for that, for a pilgrimage. It’s hard because I don’t really want to judge them.

Mabel felt she should be cautious about describing anyone as a non-pilgrim; it would involve judgement, which she wished to refrain from. She considered understanding WYD as a pilgrimage to be the responsibility of the travel group each participant belonged to. Nevertheless, she found that having the impression that people around her “ignored the holy sites” or “religious events” with the pope was discouraging. From her description of what might characterize a non-pilgrim, we can infer that engaging “holy sites” and being involved in “religious events” with the pope was more characteristic of pilgrims. Descriptions of sites as “sacred” or “holy” can be indicative of those locations’ interfacial capacity. From this perspective, Mabel’s view of pilgrims was characterized by transrealm interaction at interfacial places and during events led by the pope, and non-pilgrims would be those who did not engage in transrealm interaction. Victoria had a similar take, but was more decisive in her response. Replying to whether or not she considered all WYD participants as pilgrims, Victoria simply said “No,” and referred to her own earlier experience: I mean even in Cologne when I went on pilgrimage before, I think I was too young to treat it as a pilgrimage. And so I don’t think I was a pilgrim then. And I think there’s probably a lot of people like that here. Just like, “Oh! I’m gonna travel around Europe! It’s gonna be a fun time, we’re gonna,” you know, “see cool stuff.” And that’s different.

Even though Victoria described her participation at WYD 2005 as a pilgrimage, she did not consider herself to have been a pilgrim at that time. Going on a pilgrimage was not sufficient to make someone a pilgrim. Victoria also pointed to her increased age playing a part: Having “a lot lower energy” made it an “enormous struggle to get around and it feels more pilgrimage-y.” She handled those struggles by “join[ing] my suffering to the cross.” That, along with being older and feeling more spiritually mature were the major differences between WYD 2005 and 2016 for her. Joining her suffering to the cross meant uniting her struggles with the Passion of Jesus, which I argue later in this chapter is a form of transrealm interaction. By putting distance between her past self and her current self, Victoria indicated that traveling exclusively for fun and seeing new places had disqualified her as a pilgrim in 2005. Victoria was not criticizing people for having fun at WYD in general, but again th the crux of the matter was whether or not participants treated WYD as an occasion for transrealm interaction. Describing how she had thought about pilgrimage before our conversation about my research, Victoria elaborated on what it had entailed: “Like, with the community joining your travels and your trials and the sufferings that you have along the way—with Christ and the cross.” She went on:

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It was more about travelers, and more about travelers together on a journey. Finding spirituality in whatever trials came along that way. Yeah, the destination wasn’t really ever so important to me before we had that conversation […] Because I think a pilgrimage can be a short thing, you know, but if I think historically, it is like “Oh, there’s a site,” you know, “there’s Meccah, there’s the Holy Land, so we’re making a pilgrimage to these places.” So. I’d have to add, [that] after that [our conversation]—I had to think about that.

The concept of pilgrimage as traveling to a destination of high religious status and significance is often taken for granted in pilgrimage studies,7 but Victoria’s pre-reflexive understanding of pilgrimage had more to do with traveling and employment of suffering in transrealm interaction. Her example does not shatter the conventional concept, but begs us to question our assumptions regarding its presumed universality. According to conventional concepts of pilgrimage, Victoria’s earlier understanding of pilgrimage would fall outside the category of pilgrimage as conventionally conceived. Approaches to pilgrimage have primarily been concerned with spatiality—its construction, contestation, and role in claiming civic space (e. g. Tweed, 2011). Spatiality has sometimes been seen as metaphorical, casting heaven as the destination of life (Coleman and Eade, 2004: 13). As Grimes puts it, “[p]ractitioners sometimes theorize” (Grimes, 2014: 6), and thinking about pilgrimage in terms of geographical space led Victoria to think differently about pilgrimage: After that Denver conversation, I have to add that, yeah, pilgrimage has to entail kind of a spiritual destination, you know? Something significant for your spirituality, like a holy place, a holy site, because… It’s kind of a metaphor of what [another participant] was saying—we are travelers to heaven, you know, our goal is something spiritual and higher.

Victoria exhibits two main associations to “spiritual destination”: heaven and “holy place.” As Jesus is thought to reside in heaven, interpreting “spiritual destination” as heaven aligns with Sister Adelaide’s statement that “my destination is Jesus,” and corresponds well with the 1992 Catechism where pilgrimage is often a metaphor for life itself.8 Yet we also see Victoria referring to “holy places” and “holy sites,” which corresponds to conventional a understanding where pilgrimage denotes a journey to a specific destination. The framework of religious interaction allows us to connect these two views of pilgrimage in a new way: In Catholic teaching, heaven is a place inhabited by God, angels, and the saints. While taking up residence in heaven is only 7 Some examples that unquestioningly include “sacred” or “holy” sites, places, spaces or other denotations of geographical or otherwise demarcated locations in their definitions of pilgrimage, can be found in (Coleman, 2014; Coleman and Eade, 2004; Reader, 2014, 2015; Turner and Turner, 1995 [1978]; Turner, 2005 [1987]), to name a few. 8 In the YouCat (Youth Catechism), Saint Augustine is cited as an authoritative source for viewing the life of Christians as a pilgrimage (Schoenborn, 2011).

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possible after death, interaction with its residents is possible from the human realm. The human and superhuman realms are separate but connected. The connections consist of interfacial elements, which comprise religious interfaces. Places can be interfacial elements when informed by religious narrative. From this perspective, the destination is the superhuman realm and its inhabitants, but becoming a resident of the superhuman realm—“crossing over”—necessitates death, by which humans may enter and inhabit a superhuman realm. We should also pay attention to Victoria’s reference to “our Denver conversation.” She later said, “I’d have to add that—after the Denver conversation. Before that I necessarily—well, I wasn’t thinking on that level.” I asked her how our conversation about WYD 1993 in Denver had changed how she thought about pilgrimage. “I would say that before that conversation, like, the concept of World Youth Day kind of defined what I thought a pilgrimage was,” she said. This is of no small consequence: For her, WYD and pilgrimage were so strongly connected that WYD was her primary pilgrimage reference, and not the other way around. Her responses also mean that Victoria’s understanding of pilgrimage was influenced by our previous conversation in a very particular way: it had shifted her understanding from a WYD-specific definition of pilgrimage to one that more closely resembles the established convention. Like Victoria, Oliver also recounted an earlier WYD experience: 1993 in Denver. “Denver was different,” he said. A high-school student at the time, Oliver characterized his younger self as a “goon.” He gave two examples of what he alluded to: Me and my friends were playing hacky-sack while they were doing Stations of the Cross […] [W]e were kinda just goofing around and, like, for lunch we went to Hooters, which is this restaurant where girls wear inappropriate clothing. Because we’re high-school boys, you know.

Oliver distanced himself from his past self, saying “that’s not me now by any means, but me at the time—that was me.” Later in the interview, he referred to himself as both a “cradle Catholic” and a “heathen” at the time of WYD 1993, placing his younger self both inside and outside the Catholic community— inside in terms of religious belonging, and outside with reference to his behavior at his first WYD. Retrospectively, Oliver anno 2016 considered his younger self a non-pilgrim for playing hacky-sack while others performed the Way of the Cross, for going to Hooters for lunch, and for breaking apparently tacit rules of pilgrimage. Oliver anno 1993 had perhaps not adopted a lusory attitude toward transrealm interaction at the time. Nevertheless, Oliver saw WYD 1993 as a turning point in his relationship with Catholicism:

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[Y]ou would think that going to this giant event in the middle of Denver was pointless for me. But it wasn’t! I saw for the first time the universal Catholic Church. Seeing the worldwide Catholic Church was really eye-opening to me.

In Chapter 5, we saw how the WYD community could be an interfacial element to the universal Catholic Church. It seems that this was the case with Oliver, the WYD community was realized as an interfacial element that engaged him in WYD as a tutorial pilgrimage. It appears that Oliver’s 1993 experience corresponds to Mason’s model of conversion at WYD (Mason, 2010), from less to more “involved,” due to the differences between attending Mass at his home parish and at WYD. At home, he explained, …you go to your one church and you see the people in your pews and that’s it, you know. You don’t know what makes you different from the Lutherans or the Baptists or, you know, any other religion, except that we’re the most worldwide out there really.

Oliver was accustomed to the Catholic fellowship and the religious interface of his parish church, but it seems that WYD gave him a clearer view of differences between Catholicism and other religions. WYD also brought him a new interfacial element that renewed his subjective religious interface. “From that point on,” he said, “I’d research the Church, I’d research JP2. I’d learn more about my faith. I had this hunger to learn more about it.” The didactic aspect of WYD Nathaniel described earlier was realized. For Oliver, that led to later WYD experiences where he considered himself to be more of a pilgrim. Going by Nathaniel’s description of a WYD pilgrim, young Oliver would have been a pilgrim, but to older Oliver himself, that was not that case; young Oliver and his friends had been playing a different game altogether. Providing humans with realms besides the “everyday world” is one of the key parallels between games and religions. Wagner, for example, has paid particular attention to how this parallel manifests in social structures and expectations related to rules and rule-breaking. As she puts it, “the greatest offense in both experiences is to break the rules, that is, to become an apostate, an infidel, a cheater, or a trifler, to fail to uphold the principal expectations about how to inhabit that particular experience’s world view” (Wagner, 2014: 193). Compared to Huizinga’s original categories, Wagner’s are more imprecise: The “apostate” or “infidel” corresponds better to the Huizingian spoil-sport than the cheat. The cheat plays the game but ignores or breaks the rules. The spoil-sport refuses engagement altogether, and thereby “shatters the play-world itself” (Huizinga, 1938: 11). Moreover, both religions and games— particularly digital games—possess mechanisms that accommodate the rulebreaker (e. g. “sinner”) and the cheat, but the spoil-sport breaks the “magic circle” and disrupts immersion for others (Leibovitz, 2013: 78–80). The rules of religious games can be implicit or explicit. Some of my respondents seemed to feel a little guilty about staying in “nice hotels,” perhaps considering it a kind of cheating, which again reveals a tacit rule of the

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pilgrimage game. Earlier, we saw how Leona found staying in nice hotels to be incongruent with self-describing as a pilgrim. Highlighting transrealm interaction as the distinguishing factor of pilgrimage rendered further negotiation of discomfort as a pilgrim criterion unnecessary. Damian employed a similar strategy. He described pilgrimage as “all about the mindset. Physically, we’re all kind of in the same boat, I think. I don’t really know anyone who’s living at the height of luxury. Even though our hotels are pretty nice. But, yeah, I think it’s all about the mindset.” Aligning with earlier responses, Damian said not everyone at WYD was a pilgrim: “I know even certain people in our group are probably like, ‘Yay, I’m traveling Europe,’ you know, and that’s it.” Note that Damian acknowledges all participants at WYD as being equal in terms of physical presence. His disclaimer regarding our group’s accommodation implies a tacit notion that “living at the height of luxury” would be inconsistent with the rules of pilgrimage as he perceived them. Framing pilgrimage as a mindset let Damian set aside associations of pilgrims with simplicity and asceticism, rendering appropriate living conditions a spacious concept with a vague threshold. Like Mabel and Leona earlier, Damian’s point was not so much to decry elements of fun and tourism as to denounce a mindset that lead to foregoing WYD’s potential for something “more.” This was evident from his later statement that “God works through it anyway, so it’s a beautiful experience no matter what.” Relegating pilgrims’ distinctive factor to a mindset shifted attention away from tacit rules of pilgrimage they felt they might be breaking. In the language of authenticity, the criteria for the “authentic pilgrim” were redefined to accommodate their own experiences.9 In these cases, the relationship between pilgrim and pilgrimage acquires uni-directionality. A bi-directional (and circular) understanding of pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage would make a pilgrimage a journey performed by pilgrims, and a pilgrim someone who makes a pilgrimage. Instead, a WYD pilgrim is someone who plays pilgrimage at the WYD playground, while WYD is considered a pilgrimage whether or not participants play pilgrimage in its context. Pilgrimage as understood by most of these respondents is not primarily defined by a journey to a destination to which they attribute a special quality (“sacred,” “holy,” “religious”), nor necessarily by the “correct” motivation. Rather, importance is placed on what “mindset” is engaged and what “game” is played during the time of the event. The binaries constructed by my respondents tended to place pilgrimage on the one hand and, on the other, various forms of participation seen as less 9 The notion of “authentic” pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage has been gaining attention in scholarly discussions (Kaell, 2016b: 4). Nancy L. Frey has noted that “[a]mong some pilgrims, especially those actively involved in religious practice, one’s religious motive is very important in the definition of the ‘authentic’ pilgrim” (Frey, 2004: 91). However, play stretches beyond motivation, and the idea that “God works through it anyway” begs us to look also at WYD as an “authentic” pilgrimage, even though some respondents do are not initially consider all participant co-players.

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abundant, signaled by “just vacation,” “just sightseeing,” or feeling like “just a tourist.” Respondents’ convictions that pilgrimage offers something “more,” some-thing “beyond” other modes of travel lead to the question: What is the “more” of pilgrimage—of their experiences compared to those they view as “non-pilgrims”? 6.2.4 Pilgrimage as immersion Hervieu-Léger described WYD as an “extremely dense and highly emotionalised group experience” (Hervieu-Léger, 1994: 136), a description that calls to mind immersion as emotionally charged involvement. But what kind of emotions did my respondents display? Laughter, for one, was frequent during and outside of interviews. As some scholars have noted, laughter serves to release tension and “marks a transition away from and back to a serious frame” (Myers and Lampropoulou, 2016: 78).10 In game studies, fun and seriousness are often interwoven.11 As Wagner puts it, the “error people tend to make the most in thinking about games and religion is to assume that the primary opposition at work is the idea that religion is ‘serious’ whereas games are ‘fun’” (Wagner, 2014: 193). The same applies to WYD as pilgrimage: It would be a mistake to interpret my respondents’ statements as relegating “fun” exclusively to non-pilgrimage activities. Laughing and joking may have been a way to release tension, for example when Barbara was playing with the concept of a “pilgrim scale,” but we should not ignore that my respondents were also having fun, experiencing joy, and that pilgrimage could be fun, even though other emotions and feelings were more forthcoming in the interviews. According to social theorist Clark C. Abt, “games offer expanded possibilities for action” (Abt, 1987 [1970]: 5, italics added). Applying this angle to WYD invites the question as to what expanded possibilities for action pilgrimage affords WYD participants. In his critique of the concept of magic circle in digital game studies, Michael Liebe observed that “computer games first of all facilitate or enable” rather than constrain “possible player actions” (Liebe, 2008: 337–338, italics in original). I would contend that games—digital or otherwise—do both. They expand possibilities for action in specific ways— you can play this game on this console, but not on that one; you may use this button for firing at digital zombies, but not that one; you may interact with this computerized “person,” but not that one. Likewise, many religions also offer combinations of facilitation and constriction: within a given religious group or tradition, you may interact with this superhuman person, but not that one; you 10 From ritual humor to laughter in the history of religion, the combination of the two elements has received some scrutiny from scholars, where laughter is often connected to fun, and hardships to seriousness (Gilhus, 1997; Raj and Dempsey, 2010; Rhodes, 1983). 11 Huizinga criticized the assumption that play and seriousness are diametric opposites, and showed throughout Homo Ludens that the two are interconnected (Huizinga, 1938).

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may seek to change your situation through this spoken formula, but not that one; you may read this text to obtain superhuman guidance, but not that one. In Christian religions, examples might be that you may pray to Jesus, but not to Zeus; you may say the Rosary, but not use tarot cards; you may read the Bible for superhuman guidance, but not the Qur’an. Thus culturally conditioned Christian interfaces and the elements that comprise them both facilitate and constrict transrealm interaction. Liebe’s critique is still useful because it asks us to look for the ways in which possibilities for action are expanded as well as constricted. Similarly, if we view WYD as playground that offers participants opportunities to play the game of pilgrimage, that means it offers its players expanded possibilities for action by facilitating a specific type of journey. Those journeys are littered with apertures to superhuman realms, providing means for interacting with the superhuman persons thought to inhabit those realms. As my respondents discussed pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage, two new types of interfacial elements emerged as prominent: pain and super-human intervention. Both illustrate how pilgrimage expands possibilities for transrealm interaction.

6.3 Expanding possibilities for (inter)action 6.3.1 “Offer it up”: Pain as part of play Recall how Barbara shared that her own level of identifying as a pilgrim was subject to change on a daily basis. Explaining this dynamic in terms of a “pilgrim scale,” she revealed that she felt more and less like a pilgrim at different times. To Victoria, the WYD experience so far had been “kind of a mix, because it hasn’t been so pilgrimage-y…” “Yeah!” Barbara enthusiastically replied, before Victoria continued: “Because we’re in hotels and […] you know, cushy buses and all that, but the times when I’m tired, I really feel like a pilgrim.” Speaking to Victoria, Caspar concluded: “Your definition of a pilgrim is, ‘You must be tired.’” The whole group burst into laughter. Still chuckling, Barbara said: “Well, at least it’s one of the components to have some sort of hardship—to be a pilgrim, yeah.” Victoria added to that: “And then all of the religious things, one after another. That’s when I really feel like a pilgrim.” Hardship and discomfort were central to other respondents’ conceptualizations of pilgrimage as well. In this connection, the phrase “offer(ing) it up” was something I heard numerous times from various participants throughout WYD, including several respondents. We saw earlier that Ibis distinguished between pilgrimage and vacation. I asked her what she thought to be the most important differences between the two. Having listed prayer, reading Scripture, being charitable, and

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keeping thought processes positive, she also added another component: suffering. We call it—I don’t know if you’re familiar with offering things up—but we believe that we can unite our suffering to Jesus’s sufferings for us, and that helps to get this to happen, just in a prayerful way. It’s a way of entering into the prayer, so I think that too, just to unite our discomfort—like “my feet are achy,” and whatever.

As we can see, the practice of “uniting” one’s suffering with Jesus’ suffering informed Ibis’ understanding of pilgrimage in addition to the other practices. Ibis’ phrase “entering into the prayer,” with prayer being a form of transrealm interaction, highlights pilgrimage as a particularly immersive form of travel. I asked Ibis if she had any negative experiences so far. “Auschwitz,” she said promptly. “I felt a lot of sorrow there. So that would probably be the biggest thing. But also yeah. Walking is fine, but if we’re staying in one place for long periods, it’s like my feet will… complain,” she laughed. Uniting one’s discomforts to Jesus’ suffering helps prayer in some way, Ibis confirmed, though she found it difficult to describe how. Through the interpretation of sorrow as suffering, Auschwitz became a place that she could integrate into her religious interface. As a museum and historical location, Auschwitz is already an interfacial place that transports the past into the present. As we saw in earlier, it is also interfacial for Catholics because it hosts locations where people died who are counted as martyrs, like Edith Stein and Maximillian Kolbe. With Ibis’ testimony, Auschwitz gains another interfacial layer due to its capacity to evoke deep emotional discomfort which, to Catholics, can be interfacial when narrativized and framed as suffering. Ibis said she found it difficult to expand upon the phrase “offer it up,” but other respondents were more ready to do so. Among them was Leona. We saw how Leona felt more like a pilgrim during the last few days of WYD 2016. “Offering it up” gave her a way of dealing with the pain and discomfort she experienced: I guess I kind of did two things. One is thinking back to Jesus’s walk to his death. And he had no shoes. It was fricking hot. […] He was mocked the entire way, after being almost near death from all the scourging at the pillar, I mean it was excruciating, and they would literally—I don’t know if you’ve seen The Passion…

Leona was referring to the movie The Passion of the Christ (2004), directed by Mel Gibson. Wagner discussed The Passion in Godwired: “For viewers of The Passion of the Christ,” she writes, “despite the liberties that Mel Gibson took with the gospels, the story was commonly perceived by believers to be an accurate retelling. […] The Passion could be perceived as an experiential phenomenon” (Wagner, 2012: 34). Approaching a viewing of The Passion of the Christ as an experience enables us to get somewhat closer to what it means to unite one’s suffering with Christ. On the one hand, conceptualizing one’s experienced discomforts as suffering allows that pain and discomfort to

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become interfacial elements. Christ’s suffering is available by thinking of one’s own suffering as ultimately belonging to him and being part of his passion story. In one sense, uniting one’s suffering to Christ is transtemporal—it transports the passion narrative of the religious past into the present. But once transported into that present, it becomes an interfacial element. Thus, prayer as transrealm interaction became more than a means of confronting and dealing with suffering (cf. Tweed, 2006: 54). Through the transformation of discomfort into suffering, sensations of tiredness, aching feet, and other painful experiences became interfacial. Discomfort that might otherwise have been distracting was itself made to serve religious immersion. Respondents were careful to point out that they were not in any significant suffering. Using the word “suffering” to describe discomfort was often followed by disclaimers that their suffering was comparably mild. Take Leona’s comment on the movie for example: [T]hey literally had to stop because he [Jesus] couldn’t walk. And he was not even recognizable. So it was like, “and then you’re giving him a cross to carry?” Anyway, so just thinking about all of that, where it’s like I’ve got these keen shoes that are good for walking [laughs], and a backpack, and you know, plenty of water stations and stuff like that, where it’s a fairly pampered trip as treks go. And I had things to complain of So it helped me to center and say, “Alright, Jesus, you did this for me. I’m uncomfortable, I am not happy [laughs], and the only thing that’s gonna make me actually have any significance of that and turn this into something that can be bigger —it is to unite it with what you did on the cross.”

There are several factors of interest here. First is the strong indication that watching The Passion of the Christ was indeed transrealm interaction for Leona, transporting the events of the Passion narrative to her present as a viewer. According to Wagner, The Passion of the Christ was taken by many to be an “unalterable, realistic depiction of Christ’s death”, and Leona may be one of them.12 Second is her rejection of her own discomfort as suffering on the same level as Jesus. Seen as the story of ultimate suffering, no suffering can truly compare to that of Jesus’ last days, certainly not her own discomfort as signaled by Leona’s description of the 18-mile hike as “fairly pampered.” Interpreting her own discomfort as suffering, “uniting” it with the suffering of Jesus, nevertheless helped. It helped not only because of the interfacial window that was activated by connecting to Jesus’ suffering in the past, but also her interaction with him in the present on that basis. Leona’s interpretation of 12 Wagner uses play differently from me, interpreting the term as having to do with playful exploration of religious narratives’ boundaries for alteration. She does not appear to distinguish between Catholic and non-Catholic viewers, or to pay attention to the fact that Mel Gibson is himself a Catholic. The Passion of the Christ is less “playful,” in Wagner’s sense of the word, to a Catholic than it is in, say, to a Protestant, because the movie incorporates many narrative elements that are not recognized by Protestants as canonical, but are important to traditional retellings and depictions of the Passion in Catholicism.

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tiredness, sore muscles, and sweating in hot weather as suffering activated those sensations as part of her religious interface. She was clearly conscious of the significance the effect of her own interpretation of discomfort had on her experience, adding that “that’s how I interpreted it.” Leona’s experience of discomfort also became interfacial in another way, as she thought about people outside the WYD community. “I’ve talked with refugees before, and I know their stories. This is so different than that.” She had only packed for one night, it was not all that she owned, and she knew “that there’s a destination where they’re gonna take care of me, and then I’ll go back and then I’ll go back to my home country.” Thinking about refugees made her feel “more united with our brothers and sisters that are suffering […] and that’s only a portion. I mean they’ve suffered so much more, right!” Interpreting pain and discomfort as suffering enhanced immersion by providing apertures for interaction with both human and superhuman persons. It enabled Leona to share her pain and experience it as a portion of another’s. Oliver also elaborated on “offering it up.” “You know, ten years ago, I wasn’t as good at just living a day-to-day pilgrimage,” he said. Oliver connected being a pilgrim at WYD 2016 to an overarching pilgrimage lifestyle. He explained that he had taken inspiration from the Franciscans, which made it easier for him “to put myself in a mindset of offering it up in the suffering—and being a pilgrim is kind of about that,” he concluded.13 I asked Oliver to explain the phrase “offer it up.” “Catholics are very unique in [that] we’re one of the only religions and churches that even teaches anything like that,” he said and elaborated: Oliver: To a lot of other groups, suffering is entirely bad. And, yes! Obviously we believe suffering is bad, because that’s why we’re feeding the poor, and that’s why we’re helping the sick and the needy. We’re not like, “No! Suffer…” [laughs] Jane: “Suffer more!” Yeah. Oliver: “Offer it up, people! What’s wrong with you!” [Laughs] No. But! It’s this idea of joining yourself with Jesus’s suffering, that he invited us to do that.

According to one Franciscan friar, those who practice “joining” one’s own suffering with that of Jesus “understand the essential unity of their own suffering and the suffering of Christ. They will be able to feel the suffering of Christ in their own persons. They will find the unity with His suffering through active engagement with their own suffering and that of their patients, just as Francis did on Alvernia” (Sulmasy, 2001: 47). From the perspective of religious interaction, “offer it up” allows people to transform painful sensations into interfacial elements. Note also that Oliver mentioned a “mindset” that enables him to employ his pain in transrealm interaction, which I interpret as indicative of immersion. When Charlene Jennett and her colleagues set out to “measure and define the experience of immersion in games,” they detected a 13 The issue, published in the Catholic journal New Theology Review, was edited by Kenneth R. Himes, himself a Franciscan friar.

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difference between immersion and Csikszentmihalyi’s concept of flow; “whereas Csikszentmihalyi (1990) claims that flow involves a serene mindset, immersion is much more emotionally charged” (Jennett et al., 2008: 657). That observation conforms well with Oliver’s experience, but it also leads to a new observation. Oliver’s Franciscan-inspired mindset helped him employ pain as an interfacial element, which means that religious immersion aided interfaciality. So far, though, we have mostly seen examples of the dynamic going the other way. Have we been putting the cart before the horse? Not necessarily. As Oliver continued to explain “offering it up,” he illustrated by referring to Simon of Cyrene—a man who, in Oliver’s words, was “forced to help Jesus carry the cross and help him in his suffering.”14 He also mentioned Simon of Cyrene featuring in the fifth station of the Way of the Cross. Just like the interfacial elements studied earlier, the interfaciality of pain was activated by recourse to an emotionally evocative story about a superhuman person in the past that came alive in the present. To Oliver, painful sensations could be useful for transrealm interaction much like the Stations of the Cross. Immersion was not a prerequisite for turning pain into an interfacial employment of pain, but made it easier. The two, then, are intertwined and one can reinforce the other. My respondents’ concept of suffering fascinated me. It was not so much that suffering was part of pilgrimage as opposed to vacation—many of the discomforts they mentioned are also part of experiences they consider to be non-pilgrimage-y. What interested me was their application of the term to minor discomforts, such as feet aching from walking, going a few hours without food, waiting in line for toilets or delayed departures, and withstanding heat or rain. All respondents who used “suffering” in reference to their less enjoyable WYD experiences were careful to distinguish between menial and severe suffering. Where does this broad concept of suffering come from? Robert A. Orsi identifies a “modern American Catholic cult of pain and suffering,” arguing that it “cannot simply be attributed to the European heritage, although it certainly had an ancient resonance” (2005: 34). Instead, “American Catholics of the second and third generation improvised an ethic of suffering and pain out of elements available in their tradition, in conscious and unconscious response to their contemporary circumstances” (Orsi, 2005: 34). This ethic of suffering, Orsi asserts, “assured them of their moral superiority over the culture they were ambivalently striving toward.” In the process of becoming fully integrated and accepted in American society, the ethic of suffering transformed “their resentment of the people who appeared to be more successful than they were (…) into a satisfying reaffirmation of traditional Catholic values” (Orsi, 2005: 34; see also Tweed, 2011: Conclusion, section 2, para. 7, Kindle edition). In the context of WYD, the ethic’s function changed—again in response to contemporaneous circumstances. It equipped 14 Simon of Cyrene appears in Matthew 27:32, Mark 15:21, and Luke 23:26.

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young people used to a culture of comfort with the means of facing discomfort, calling to mind elements of Tweed’s definition of religion, especially “intensify[ing] joy and confront[ing] suffering by drawing on human and suprahuman forces” (Tweed, 2006: 54). Conceptualized as way of joining in Jesus’ redemptive suffering, the ethic of suffering transforms discomfort into an interfacial element. These discomforts—pain, weariness, hunger, thirst, or need for a bathroom—all are anchored in mind-body experience. This is how menial discomforts, which have the potential to distract from interaction, desynchronize the religious interface, and disrupt transrealm immersion, are reconceptualized in a way that instead affords new opportunities for religious interaction and immersion. Interpreted as suffering, discomfort steers transrealm interaction “back on track,” and resynchronizes the interface by transforming pain into an interfacial element. Framing pilgrimage in terms of a “mindset” shifted the defining character of pilgrimage from external factors such as simplicity, from which they were disqualified due to staying in “nice hotels,” to less conspicuous factors like immersion in transrealm interaction. That shift enabled participants to see themselves as pilgrims despite the demands they would otherwise place on people claiming that status. Those demands never completely left their idea of pilgrimage, though, as indicated by the differences in how they felt “more like a pilgrim” when things went wrong or not according to plan, or how their “sufferings” were relatively mild. The Catholic ethos of “offer it up” prepared WYD participants to interpret their discomfort as suffering, thus outlining a specific category of experiences that would be challenging to face on their own, not to mention the disruption they pose to transrealm interaction.15 Naming that category “suffering” connects those experiences to others, placing them in a context of narratives abundant with other experiences also classified as suffering. When sensations of pain and discomfort were made into interfacial elements, suffering went from being disruptive and frustrating to being a source of self-empowerment and reassurance in the midst of a struggle that was very real in the moment. So real, in fact, that Leona felt it gave her a taste of the sufferings of Jesus and of refugees—though she was emphatic that hers was nothing when compared to theirs. Small as her discomforts seem in the wider perspective, joining her pain to that of Jesus allowed her to see her own pain, to feel seen and acknowledged 15 On the theological level, John Paul II had ideas on the topic of suffering as redemptive as well. In his apostolic letter Salvifici Doloris, he wrote that “the Divine Redeemer wishes to penetrate the soul of every sufferer through the heart of his holy Mother, the first and the most exalted of all the redeemed. As though by a continuation of that motherhood which by the power of the Holy Spirit had given him life, the dying Christ conferred upon the ever Virgin Mary a new kind of motherhood—spiritual and universal—towards all human beings, so that every individual, during the pilgrimage of faith, might remain, together with her, closely united to him unto the Cross, and so that every form of suffering, given fresh life by the power of this Cross, should become no longer the weakness of man but the power of God” (John Paul II, 1984d: No. 26).

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in that pain. Its low intensity was besides the point: He was there; she was not alone. The Catholic ethos of suffering can also be informative in a wider, Christian context, Tanya M. Luhrmann describes how churches like Vineyard “handle the problem of suffering […]: they ignore it. Then they turn the pain into a learning opportunity. When it hurts, you are supposed to draw closer to God” (Luhrmann, 2012: 268). Handling a problem by ignoring it is a long way of spelling “denial.” Denial is one strategy with which to handle the cognitive dissonance that arises from theodicé and unanswered prayers in the face of a God who “always answers” (Luhrmann, 2012: 268). Cognitive dissonance arises when two opposing and incompatible beliefs are held to be true at the same time; one is the observed truth of what is happening, the other is the ideal truth of what one wants to believe. Cognitive dissonance is deeply uncomfortable, so one is prioritized over the other. If we choose the ideal truth, we must deny the observed truth, but the observed truth will continue to make haunting returns for as long as it is denied. If we choose the observed truth, we suffer the loss of the ideal truth—hearts break, dreams shatter, faith is lost. Luhrmann’s Vineyard Christians held on to the ideal truth; to deny the observed truth and its opposition to the ideal truth was an act of piety that confirmed God’s perfection. Conversely, my respondents had no cognitive dissonance because suffering is congruent with God’s will and activity; God himself suffers, so people can suffer with him, and with him present in their suffering. The prominence of “offer it up” also enables an interpretation of this Catholic ethos as a rule in the serious game of pilgrimage. It is a way of creating order in a chaotic environment. Judging from my respondents’ experience with that strategy, it is a powerful way of claiming control over pain that one might otherwise feel powerless to confront. This bears some interesting parallels to recent findings in medical studies on the use of digital games in pain control. The relationship between pain and distraction is not unilateral. Virtual reality has itself become a form of distraction from pain and discomfort for medical patients undergoing treatment. One study found that, while pain itself distracts from immersion in virtual worlds, adding interactive gameplay makes this form of pain management more effective (Bidarra et al, 2013). Eleanor Jameson and her colleagues in psychological medicine conducted an experimental study of pain and distraction. Apart from the control group, the experiment involved three conditions, one with no distraction, one with passive distraction (television), and one with active distraction (electronic games). They found that, in their experiment, participants “enjoyed the active distraction condition more than the passive distraction condition,” and indicated that the cause might be twofold: “the greater appeal and enjoyment of the task” and its more demanding “attentional load” (Jameson et al, 2011: 31).16 Psychologists have also studied prayer as a coping strategy for dealing with pain (Ashby and 16 For more on virtual reality and pain control, see Jameson et al, 2011; Mehrer and Gold, 2009.

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Lenhart, 1994; Bush, 1999). Ellen Greene Bush and her colleagues found that forms of “positive religious coping,” wherein patients sought love, care, strength, support, comfort from God, as well as spiritual growth and a greater purpose for their suffering, were positively correlated with reduced pain (Bush et al, 1999: 254–255). “Offer it up” provides that greater purpose. They also criticized earlier studies’ treatment of prayer as a “unidimensional construct” where “items measuring prayer were combined with items measuring distraction. As a result, it is unclear whether the associations with negative outcome were due to prayer, distraction, or a combination of prayer and distraction” (Bush et al, 1999: 251). While I agree that such an approach is simplistic, and it is interesting that patients’ perceptions of God’s attitude towards them (supportive, punishing, or absent) had a significant impact, I think the approach to prayer as a form of distraction from pain is too limited. The framework of religious interaction allows us to view prayer and playing digital games as different forms of transrealm interaction. From this perspective, the case could be made that patients’ level of distraction from pain might correspond to immersion in transrealm interaction. If transrealm interaction becomes the primary activity, then it is no longer a mere distraction; pain instead becomes the potentially distracting factor from the primary activity. We might therefore ask whether and to what extent pain has the potential to distract from prayer and electronic games, where at least one condition should include patients’ employment of painful sensations as interfacial elements. This is especially pertinent to pilgrimage, which has often been connected with asceticism, some forms of which involve self- inflicted pain (Kaelber, 2005 [1987]: 527). Pilgrimage itself can be a form of self-inflicted pain, as scholar of religion Ariel Glucklich has argued: “[T]he spiritual ends of the pilgrimage—loving union with [the Hindu deity] Ayyappan—spring from pain” (Glucklich, 2001: 38). Conversely, Ian Reader observed in one of his early studies of the Japanese Shikoku pilgrimage that a shift in focus has taken place among pilgrims, moving from asceticism to pain relief (Reader, 1987: 136–137). Yet one could argue that both forms relate to dealing with pain; its absence prior to the journey provides an impetus for self-infliction. Relief in the form of “union” with or healing from a given superhuman person—expressions of religious immersion—then becomes a reward for enduring pain through transrealm interaction along the journey. How pain comes about in the first place is less important, because pain is endured by making interaction with a superhuman person the primary objective and pain a part of it. As Abt puts it, play “creates order, is order” (Abt, 1987 [1970]: 10). If religion is about intensifying joy and confronting suffering, it is interesting that religion can also provide ways for generating pain in order to confront it and process it in transrealm interaction, and thereby aid immersion. In the context of WYD 2016, that meant turning experiences of pain and discomfort into interfacial elements.

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6.3.2 God as fellow pilgrim: Superhuman persons initiate interaction Other experiences also gained interfacial capacity while playing pilgrimage. Immersion in transrealm interaction meant that superhuman persons could become co-players of pilgrimage. While we were waiting for Pope Francis to arrive for the Welcoming Ceremony, I asked Barbara to describe her best experience at WYD 2016 so far. “I’ve had a lot of experiences on this trip,” she stated. Without going into details, she shared that there had been “some specific things that I felt that the Lord was saying to me, directly to me in my heart.” At Mass the day before, she had another such experience, “which was really incredible. This has been a trip where I’ve experienced the voice of God directly to me the most in my entire life. Which is really amazing.” The specifics of what Barbara had felt God saying to her were likely too personal for her to share in a group setting. Yet that content is not necessary for our analysis; more important is her emphasis on WYD 2016 as where she had experienced the most direct communication from God to her specifically. This went far beyond her anticipation, she said. It’s unexpected. It’s not something that I necessarily thought that, “Oh yeah! I’m totally gonna go and have all these great spiritual awakenings” or whatever. That was never my intention for [the WYD] experience.

Barbara may have anticipated an outsider’s interpretation of her reported high frequency and intensity of interaction with God as due to her anticipation, leading her to state that this was not the case. Although we may note that this statement is incoherent with how Barbara described the “pilgrim-y” mindset as one of “God is going to speak to me through this journey,” speculating in the reasons for this incoherence is secondary to the implications of the statement itself. Underlining that this was unexpected underscores a view God as a social agent—as one who not only responds to but also initiates interaction from the superhuman realm. As we can see above, Barbara describes these experiences of interaction with God as him speaking to her “heart.” The “heart” thus comes to represent God’s means of communicating with Barbara—the interfacial element employed in their interaction—using language that localizes that component internally rather than externally. In the religious interaction framework, the “heart” becomes a stand-in for the mind and interfacial thoughts, or what Luhrmann calls “interjected thoughts”. Highlighting the unexpectedness of God’s communication to Barbara also hints at a relatively high degree of immersion in pilgrimage as she understood it. Enacting pilgrimage at the WYD playground afforded Barbara the most frequent and intense transrealm interactions she had experienced with God. Those interactions were deeply personal and too intimate to divulge; her religious immersion was not collective and general, but personal and specific. Barbara’s immersion in pilgrimage was not dependent on things going

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smoothly. Instead, her immersion increased when things went wrong. Consider her description of an unexpected distressing situation:17 To be in a situation where I do not have any control. That was an awakening for me, because […] “I’m just gonna accept what I can,” and “go with it.” [laughs] So, I don’t know. If I had to pick a worst experience, I don’t know if I could, because every bad experience has come with some sort of insight or lesson that I just like, “I wouldn’t have had this otherwise, if I hadn’t gone through it.” Even the little stuff. You know, riding on the sweaty tram, or [laughs] whatever else it is. I relied on the kindness of one of my friends to help me through it, because I had to, you know, with those little lessons I don’t think that I could have learned those little lessons without the more trying opportunities during pilgrimage.

Note that the pilgrimage frame and context encouraged Barbara to transform painful and upsetting experiences along the way into interfacial elements. Doing so expanded her comfort zone and enabled her to re-establish control of the situation by employing those experiences in transrealm interaction with both a friend and with a familiar superhuman person that made her feel safe and cared for. In a similar way, when asked to describe her best experience at WYD so far, Sister Adelaide said that “Mary has been really prevalent for me on this pilgrimage.” I didn’t come into it expecting that, but especially starting with Cze˛stochowa and then there’s visiting the different parishes. I’ve just been really struck by all of the religious here, so, I think just trying to see what she’s got for me. It’s really exciting.

Like Barbara, Sister Adelaide’s expectations for transrealm interaction were superseded. Even when participants were not being pilgrim-y at WYD, “the Lord still works through it,” Sister Adelaide stated. Following expressions of agreement from the other interviewees, she explained: Even when people who have never been on one [a WYD] before, they come on one, but they don’t know much about their faith and after the pilgrimage, they sometimes talk about how much it’s affected them and changed them.

Sister Adelaide seemed convinced that God was acting through WYD whether those present were interacting with him or not. Whether or not individual participants were playing pilgrimage, God himself was playing it with them. He was not restricted by the frames they operated in, by their rules. Ultimately, Sister Adelaide’s statement is a testimony to the pervasiveness of her own frame. To her, WYD was a pilgrimage, whether you played it as a pilgrim or not. One might assume that Barbara’s and Sister Adelaide’s statements on whether or not they expected God and Mary to participate in the game of 17 Providing details of that situation would compromise anonymity and violate research ethical guidelines.

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pilgrimage were simply incoherent with their previous statements that transrealm interaction defined pilgrimage. However, doing so furthers neither our understanding of pilgrimage nor the emphasis that my other respondents placed on transrealm interaction as a characteristic of pilgrimage. It is more helpful to distinguish between two kinds of anticipation regarding superhuman persons as co-players: one general, the other specific. The sense of superhuman persons’ general participation seems to be key to understanding my interviewees’ concept of the mindset that identifies a pilgrim. Such anticipation includes interaction between the individual human player and superhuman co-players. The specific moment, form, and content of the expected interaction cannot be anticipated. Here we find people playing pilgrimage as a game of adventure. They explore relationships with superhuman persons in the pilgrimage play frame. Hence Sister Adelaide’s excitement, Barbara’s bad experiences becoming personal lessons, and the instrument of suffering as a means of transforming disruption into immersion. What ist he next lesson? What will God or Mary tell me tomorrow? They do not know, and the anticipation is, paradoxically perhaps, that their superhuman co-players will surprise them by communicating to them through new experiences—especially painful ones. Among my respondents, the game of pilgrimage is played as a journey that stretches over time primarily, space secondarily, and is co-played with superhuman persons. Seen as a game, pilgrimage also acquires elements of adventure, of seeking something new. “Something new” is characterized not so much by whether it is a place, object, or person, but that these will involve new interactions with superhuman co-players, provide new revelations, and thus keep the experience of their mutual relationship fresh. This adventure game, co-played with superhuman players, is what non-players miss out on, the lack of which renders them mere “participants” on “just vacation.” Players of pilgrimage seek out their superhuman co-players, anticipate their seeking them in return, and their interactions afford further immersion into the pilgrimage adventure game. Pilgrimage, then, mixes religious treasure hunting with hide-and-seek, only between human and superhuman persons. If superhuman persons are engaged as co-players at the WYD playground, then we might expect the rules of pilgrimage to apply to them as well. They must be available for interaction to their human co-players; they must be mediated and thought of as present and active. Yet they are not restricted by the level of participants’ transrealm interaction. This idea reflects a rule on the part of human players: part of pilgrimage is to refrain from restricting the potential operations of superhuman co-players to the frame within which they themselves operate. Superhuman co-players, then, are expected to transgress the frames of pilgrims and non-pilgrims, thereby including non-players in the game after all. These observations and reflections might give us a specific way of looking at the concept of faith as well; it is the anticipation of bi-directional transrealm

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interaction, of not only superhuman persons responding to humans initiating contact, but also of superhuman persons themselves seizing that initiative.

6.4 Conclusion This chapter started by suggesting that participants’ understanding of the terms pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage needs to be investigated, and a description of the methodological procedure involved in the interviews followed. As we have seen, my respondents tended to self-describe as pilgrims, although with varying degrees of confidence and swiftness. Some constructed pilgrim/nonpilgrim binaries, while others described a scale of identifying with being a pilgrim that was fluid and variable. WYD was generally described as a pilgrimage, but it became apparent that participating in a pilgrimage did not necessarily equate to being a pilgrim. From a ludic perspective, that corresponds to distinguishing between those who play and those who do not play pilgrimage. The most shared view of what it means tob e a pilgrim on pilgrimage was to interact with superhuman persons. Analyzing my respondents’ language about pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage within a framework informed by religious interaction has shown several things: Participants who self-described as pilgrims tended to do so either with assertion or hesitation, but talking about WYD as a pilgrimage was quite natural to them. One respondent even said that WYD used to define her understanding of pilgrimage prior to our conversation about pilgrimage more broadly. Those who hesitated to describe themselves as pilgrims found ways not only of contrasting pilgrims and pilgrimage with other types of participants and participation, but also of describing their experiences as mixed and dynamic. Feeling more or less like a pilgrim could change from one day to the next. Elements considered typical of tourism did not disqualify participants as pilgrims, but made them less pilgrim-y or the journey less pilgrimage-esque. What turned out to raise someone’s position on the “pilgrim scale” were religious interaction, pain, and discomfort. Pilgrimage can be seen as the name of some serious games afforded by the WYD playground, but when pilgrimage is seen as dependent upon transrealm interaction, it seems to be a term for itinerant religious immersion, for transrealm interaction during a journey, and for the journey itself as a form of religious interaction. In this view, pilgrim(s) became a term for people who sought to attain and maintain religious immersion, while pilgrimage could denote efforts to facilitate transrealm interaction as well engaging with it. Tourism, vacation, and work, on the other hand, are forms of participation that distract from transrealm interaction and disrupt the itinerant transrealm immersion in pilgrimage. If WYD is a playground, it is primarily the pilgrim’s playground. The emphasis on pilgrimage in promotion and preparation

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material not only facilitates pilgrimage more than other serious games; it also engenders a social hierarchy between participants, placing those participants at the top who both self-describe as pilgrims, and are seen by others as pilgrims. Pain and discomfort—sensations that might commonly distract from interaction and disrupt immersion—were turned into interfacial elements in their own right. That happened through the practice of “offering it up,” by which discomfort could be interpreted as linked with the story of Jesus’ suffering, and therefore a way of communicating with him. The practice of “offering it up” transformed otherwise distracting and disruptive elements into interfacial elements that catalyzed immersion. Emphasis on suffering helps distance WYD from other festivals that might be associated with fun and frivolity. Approached as a significant part of pilgrimage, a light version of asceticism provides a referential framework for interpreting pain and discomfort in ways that increase immersion in transrealm interaction. Among the various forms of transrealm interaction exemplified in the interviews, one seemed particularly potent: experiences of interactions initiated by superhuman persons. For those who understood pilgrimage as transrealm interaction, superhuman persons were co-players of pilgrimage. They were not only thought to respond to pilgrims, but also to initiate interaction themselves—sometimes in ways that went beyond my respondents’ expectations. Some self-described pilgrims also figured that their superhuman co-players were capable of engaging participants on their own, transforming non-pilgrims into pilgrims. In this sense, WYD is also the superhuman coplayers’ “playground.” “Playground” here is not meant to infantilize people; it is a term for showing that WYD takes place in a marked social space in which certain types of activity are facilitated and expected. Moreover, we have seen that a religious interface not only can lead to immersion, but also that immersion in transrealm interaction can lead to new interfacial elements being created. In other words, the causal arrow between immersion and interface can go both ways; the point is that the dynamic starts somewhere. (Suspected) non-pilgrims are ambiguous entities. As they are identified as non-players of pilgrimage, one might have assumed that they would become part of the social backdrop, reduced to mere context or one more person adding to the WYD community as an interfacial element. But they are more. Suspected non-pilgrims can be interpreted as activating the Huizingian terms cheats or spoil-sports. Cheats would be those who are suspected to “pretend” to be playing pilgrimage in order to gain the journey—which is facilitated by pilgrim being the only available category for registrants signing up to WYD (Huizinga, 1938: 11). As Nancy L. Frey observed among travelers on the Camino, that suspicion can also be leveled at oneself: “Some pilgrims describe feeling like ‘frauds’ because they act like a pilgrim (wearing the scallop shell, carrying the Pilgrim’ Passport, staying in pilgrims’ refuges) but do not feel like a pilgrim on the inside” (Frey, 2004: 94). As mentioned above, only one among the participants I spoke to said she did not feel like a pilgrim. Some were

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cautious in applying the term to themselves, making references to their perceived lack of outward conformity with norms of what a pilgrim “should” be. Those norms encompassed how comfortable a pilgrim’s lodgings should be, or how a pilgrim should travel. Huizingian non-players can also be spoilsports, having signed up but refusing to play the game altogether. This latter case helps make sense of Oliver’s descriptions of himself as simultaneously a “cradle Catholic” and a “heathen” when playing hacky-sack with his friends during the Stations of the Cross at WYD 1993. Once again, we are reminded that it is not so much the place but your actions and mindset that make you a pilgrim or not. To those who consider themselves pilgrims, non-pilgrims are context that matters; they are “others” that help them negotiate their own play. As stories of purported non-pilgrims becoming pilgrims later are transmitted, the frame of pilgrimage expands to non-players as players who are simply unaware of what game they are playing. The powers of superhuman co-players include opening the religious interface to non-players, and inviting them to engage in the pilgrimage game. The pilgrim identities of my respondents are religious in the sense that they involve interaction with superhuman persons as co-players of a serious social game, rather than an obscure “belief” in their existence or even conviction about their presence. This recalls Vitor Ambrósio’s somewhat archaically formulated definition of a “spirituality-based” concept of pilgrimage as “an encounter between Man and God” (Ambrósio, 2007: 78). Rather than wading in the murky waters of spirituality, discussing pilgrimage as play enables a more precise approach to the social roles of superhuman persons in those encounters. Huizinga wrote that the “player can abandon himself body and soul to the game, and the consciousness of its being ‘merely’ a game can be thrust into the background” (Huizinga, 1938: 20). The “consciousness of its being ‘merely’ a game” does not easily translate into approaching WYD as a pilgrimage without the risk of demeaning its participants. Play ends, as per Huizinga’s concept (1938: 9). So does pilgrimage, but the relevance and opportunities for religious interaction and immersion do not end when pilgrims return home. Nor is it marked by a “consciousness of its being ‘merely’ a game” or indeed “merely” anything. We may yet say that a “pilgrim” is someone who can abandon themselves body and soul to a relationship with a superhuman person or, put differently, someone who can become immersed in the superhuman realm by means of a journey made for that very purpose. Pilgrimage to these respondents is about religious immersion—emotionally charged consuming involvement in a superhuman realm. Pilgrimage, as a journey dedicated to transrealm interaction, facilitates immersion by drawing participants to one interfacial element after another and telling stories about them. Mass-produced copies of the Divine Mercy image(s), pictures of Saints John Paul II and Faustina along the highway entrench the religious interface of WYD 2016 to participants. This is what they came for: to come together to

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encounter new interfacial elements, to have them embedded in their individual interfaces, to have the religious interface opened together—to pass through the wardrobe. And to come back and tell their siblings.

Conclusion

What is World Youth Day (WYD)? This book shows that there are several ways to answer that question. From a historical point of view, we might have been content to understand how WYD emerged as one of the world’s largest recurrent religious gatherings with a global outreach, that it has become a key religious festival for Catholic teenagers to thirty-somethings, that the concept of pilgrimage has been helpful to its success, and that the communist World Youth Festival likely inspired the idea. From an ethnographic perspective, we might have been satisfied to add nuance to what researchers trained in diverse disciplines have already found out: WYDs are hybrid events incorporating media, marketing, music and artistry, concerts and mass gatherings, pilgrimage and festival. Interpreted as attempts to revitalize Catholicism by inspiring young people to attend Mass and commit to Catholic social teaching, we would have learned something about what using the term pilgrimage has meant for creating and maintaining momentum for WYD (Fizzell and Armstrong, 2008; Gebhardt et al., 2007; Hepp and Krönert, 2010; Hervieu-Léger, 1994; Mason, 2008b; Mason et al., 2009; Norman and Johnson, 2011; Perreault, 2005; Pfadenhauer, 2010; Rymarz, 2007; Smith et al., 2008; Tyner et al., 2012; Webber, 2008). Content, satisfied, and happy as we might have been with these gains, we would still be without a way to approach WYD as its organizers and participants describe it—a religious pilgrimage. The differences between WYD and many other Catholic pilgrimages would have remained a discursive fact, and we might have continued to refer to WYD as a pilgrimage and to its participants as pilgrims without further ado. Doing so would mean missing an opportunity to ask what WYD has done to the concept of pilgrimage. That question would have remained an intellectual itch, waiting for someone to scratch away just enough of the surface to reveal that the old conceptual map of pilgrimage no longer suits the territory—and perhaps it never did. As the late Jonathan Z. Smith famously noted, “map is not territory” (Smith, 1993). When scholarly “maps” of pilgrimage no longer fit, we should not be content, satisfied, or happy to continue describing how the map differs from the territory. Rather, we need to ask why the discrepancies are there, where they came from, and how new maps may provide new paths for us to tread. I have chosen to draw up a new map, which I have called religious interaction, by making use of one of the youngest fields of research to have

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inspired interest among scholars of religion: digital game studies. I chose digital games studies because I think we can learn a lot about religions by studying the ways in which they resemble digital games: They let us engage in realms of reality that differ from our own. In order to adapt the three key concepts—interaction, interface, and immersion—that constitute the core of the new theoretical framework, I stipulated a definition of religion as interaction with culturally postulated superhuman persons. I placed superhuman persons in what I called superhuman realms—a parallel to digital games’ virtual realms—and argued that interaction between such realms constitute transrealm interaction. That laid the foundation for talking about a religious interface—subjective collections of interfacial elements (e. g. objects, texts, people, places) that people employ as they interact with superhuman persons. In dialogue with the source material, it became apparent that narrativization is a key to transforming non-interfacial elements into interfacial ones. Objects and places at WYD 2016 were activated as interfacial elements as they were narrativized with stories about saints that the respondents already maintained relationships with. As one respondent said, her specific reason to participate was to “visit holy saints and things.” We also saw examples of transrealm interaction going both ways; prayer, for instance, is not a one-directional exercise because it postulates a listening person who is assumed to be capable of responding. To my respondents, WYD as pilgrimage is a journey characterized by transrealm interaction, a search for religious immersion. Compared with Csikszentmihalyi’s flow, which involves a “serene mindset, immersion is much more emotionally charged” (Jennett et al., 2008: 657). The relationship between immersion and distraction has helped clarify the practice of “uniting one’s suffering to Christ” because the practice affords narrativization and interfaciality to otherwise annoying and painful sensations. Thinking about the suffering of Jesus and the saints can change pain from a distraction into interaction with them, leading to immersion in the superhuman realm. Some interfacial elements are also symbolically laden with messages that they mediate to those who are taught how to read them. In the preparation process for WYD 1993 in Denver, for example, participants were taught to use prayer cards that showed a recently created icon of Mary in preparation for WYD as a pilgrimage. Preparation materials tied the icon up with life as the official WYD theme, which encapsulates the religious imperative to resist what John Paul II called the “culture of death,” which included war, euthanasia, and capital punishment, but often focused on abortion. * This book makes three contributions to research: It aims, first, to contribute to conversations among scholars of twentieth-century and contemporary Catholicism. It offers an historical argument about the transformation of a

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traditional practice for the purpose of evangelization, recruitment, and engagement. This argument builds on existing research that considers WYD a tool for evangelization. It also nuances the narrative of the history of WYD, how it became what it is today, and how contemporary participants make sense of what they are doing. As part of the new evangelization, the Eucharist, Confession, and the festival community are central interfacial elements at all WYDs. Other interfacial elements are more changeable, giving WYD an event design that accommodates both change and continuity, locality and universality. The second contribution is to research on communal ritual, especially pilgrimage studies. This book traces how WYD developed from a traditional pilgrimage to a malleable Catholic festival capable of morphing to adapt to each host city and its organizers’ aims, regardless of ist religious topography. The two most common interpretations—assuming WYD is a pilgrimage or rejecting its claim to be one—both conceal something much more interesting: WYD changed the meaning of pilgrimage for Catholicism from being about traveling to place-bound interfacial elements to accommodating and promoting mobile ones. By introducing and applying the framework of religious interaction, which I argue is a fruitful way of exploring the changes to WYD and pilgrimage, I make a third contribution to method and theory in the study of religion. I suggest we might apply interaction, interface, and immersion as analytical concepts inspired by digital game studies and operationalize them for the study of religion. I think these concepts can teach us something about how people do religion—imagining superhuman realms and persons, embracing a lusory attitude toward the games in which they engage, creating interfacial elements to access them, upholding relationships with superhuman persons, seeking religious immersion, and sometimes attaining it. Although the framework of religious interaction has shown some limitations, for example when superhuman persons are sought as mediators for higher ranked superhuman persons, I propose that the framework of religious interaction can be used to redescribe other religious practices and phenomena studied by scholars of religion. For example, approaching Hindu dars´an from this perspective becomes about treating an image or sculpture as an interfacial element with the god or goddess depicted. Dars´an, seeing and being seen by the god or goddess embodied in the sculpture, becomes a visual form of transrealm interaction and immersion (cf. Babb, 1981). In a similar way, Muslims’ dream visions of face-to-face encounters with the Prophet Muhammad and his family may be interpreted as interfacial elements to inhabitants of a superhuman realm that is otherwise considered inaccessible (Mittermaier, 2007: 234). To mention a final example, Charismatic Christians experience the Holy Spirit manifesting in their bodies as they speak in tongues, convey messages from God, fall in the Spirit, laugh or cry uncontrollably, or experience healing (Skjoldli, 2014: 82). All those embodied experiences testify to how

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people render external objects as well as their own minds and bodies interfacial. From the revelatory events Taves examined (2016), through Orsi’s analyses of real presence in “holy dirt” (2016), to the most seemingly commonplace Sabbath recitation of the Torah or everyday taking of hukam from the Guru Granth Sahib, religious interfaces facilitate interaction that sustains human relationships to superhuman persons. The framework also offers new ways of understanding why destruction and distortion of religious imagery, as well as prohibitions against their production and use in transrealm interaction, upset people. Accusations of iconoclasm and blasphemy are accusations of destruction and distortion of what was once invited and interacted. They are reactions to finding distraction in the place of immersion, to dismantled religious interfaces and finding the doors to the superhuman realm shut. I propose that the framework of religious interaction is a way for scholars to “approach history and culture with the gods fully present to humans” (Orsi, 2016: Introduction, section 4, para. 5, Kindle edition), to open new ways of understanding the varied and complex realities and relationships that people live.

Appendix: Method and methodology

1. A mixed-methods approach I don’t do “pure” research. In fact, I’m not sure I know what it is. For me, field research is by its very nature “impure.” Ronald Grimes, The Craft of Ritual Studies (2014: 28)

In the words of Grimes, “reading and writing are of central methodological importance […] They are skills with direct bearing on the field study of ritual” (Grimes, 2014: 28). The publications that result from processes of reading and writing—whether books, chapters, or journal articles—are deceptive devices, ever masking the messiness of the experiences that engendered them (Wolf, 1999: 355). Writing extends beyond the enmeshed activities of writing, reading, re-writing, re-reading, and editing of chapter drafts; together with other methods like photography, videography, and audio recording, it is a method that enables collection, production, analysis, organization, and representation. It is the tool by which and arena where analysis is expressed. What I write is ultimately the result of situated selection processes that reflect my interests and interpretations in a series of moments of observing, interacting, analyzing, organizing, reading, and writing. Selection criteria and interpretations often change as new clues appear and ideas emerge, and the works of other scholars are consulted. Writing is a meta-method that connects all other methods, from those we use to develop research design, take notes in archives and the field, to submitting keywords for a completed book or journal article to help others find our work. Writing is often the arena, activity, and platform where triangulation happens. In this book, triangulation has occurred on at least two levels: the level of source production and collection, and the level of analysis. Regarding sources, offline and online archival research, interviews, and participant observation form one triangle. That triangle hooks into another, analytical triangle between produced and acquired sources, the theoretical framework, and pilgrimage studies. Yet another triangle must be mentioned, namely that between analyzing source material, developing theory, and writing it all down.

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1.1 The evolution of a research design Initially, I had planned to research public papal events during John Paul II’s pontificate. Since they are so numerous, I soon realized I needed to delimit the scope of my study. Looking into different kinds of public events, from papal visits to various countries to “World Days,” beatifications, and canonizations, one set of events had a clear and consistent conceptual frame that evolved over time and occurred at regular intervals: World Youth Days. They were frequently mentioned in biographic material on John Paul II, literature on the new evangelization and, although not always explicitly named, implicitly referred to in chapters on John Paul II in recent histories of the papacy. The scope narrowed and found its focus while I was doing archival research at the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism in the spring of 2015. That, in turn, soon led to visits to other archives, as described below. In that process, the terms pilgrim(s) and pilgrimage became keywords, and so I started paying attention to when and how they were used in connection to WYD. Throughout the data collection process, I was haunted by an idea of potential parallels between religion and digital games, specifically how people interact with other realms in those activities. In digital games, exploration of virtual realms is enabled by interfaces: openings in the boundaries between virtual realms on the one hand, and the “everyday” realm on the other. What if we operationalized the concept of interface for religion? Having pushed it aside repeatedly for some time, I eventually relented after returning to Bergen from WYD 2016, and began looking into studies that engaged the intersections between digital game studies and the study of religion. I wondered what a religious interface might look like, and how it might work in analysis of historical and ethnographic material. The result of that process is this book. 1.2 Historical research Source material for the diachronic dimension of this study was obtained through online and offline archival research. Through archival research at the University of Notre Dame, with the help of several archivists and hospitable colleagues at the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism, and discussions with my supervisors Michael Stausberg and Thomas A. Tweed, I realized that I needed to find out more about particular WYDs, especially 1993 in Denver and 1991 in Cze˛stochowa. I resolved to visit both places. The Archdiocese of Denver let me access their archives, which was an invaluable source of information. With the help of the archivist, I was able to access correspondences between organizers on different levels, meeting protocols from the archdiocesan organizing group, letters of praise and criticism after the event, and a plethora of photographs, media guides for journalists and

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reporters, some news articles, and ephemera that had been part of the event. The archives of The Denver Catholic Register at the Center also held largely unedited audiovisual recordings of a few preparation meetings, as well as WYD 1993 events. A recorded semi-structured interview with the primus motor of the event, Monsignor Edward Buelt, also proved invaluable. When I knew which parts of the interview would feature in the book, I consulted Buelt in order to secure a citation check and give him the opportunity to withdraw or otherwise change quotations I used. The changes made were minimal and largely grammar-related. I also visited the Denver Public Library, which held microfilm copies from The Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News; Regis University, which had photographs and correspondences related to the pope’s meeting with President Clinton there; and History Colorado Center, where I was able to view a documentary about WYD 1993. When I returned to the University of Notre Dame, more correspondences and audiovisual recordings surfaced in the archives. From July to December 2015, I lived in Kraków, Poland. I took a course in Polish language and culture at the Jagiellonian University, and followed up with individual language lessons. Although I cannot boast fluency in the Polish language, the course and lessons were of great help for gathering and interpreting material on WYD 1991 at the Pontifical University of John Paul II, the National Archives in Warszawa and Cze˛stochowa, as well as the public library in Cze˛stochowa. The Pontifical University has a large library situated near Łagiewniki, where I was able to study publications related to WYD 1991: commemorative books that included texts from speeches, post-event reflections by bishops and other prominent figures in Poland at the time, and photographs from the event. At the Public Archive and Public Library in Cze˛stochowa, I gained access to news material related to WYD 1991. I also met with the priest Marian Duda, who had a similar role at the festival in Cze˛stochowa to Buelt in Denver. Duda preferred to refer me to his own publications on WYD 1991 and did not grant me access to the archived material. As such, my source material on WYD 1993 is far richer than on WYD 1991. Visiting the Centre for the Thought of John Paul II in Warszawa in December 2015, I gained access to a large body of source material, most of which I had encountered in other places already. At the National Archives in Warszawa, I was able to study Polish news coverage of WYD 1991. In most locations, I searched for material in four ways, employing digitized search engines, asking librarians and archivists for help, following leads obtained in the sources, and conversations with locals. Tips and advice from my supervisors and fellow researchers at the Cushwa Center for Research on American Catholicism was also essential to this process. Online research not directly connected to an archive or library was mainly conducted by means of Google-connected search engines and the search portal of the Catholic Research Resources Alliance—self-described as a “nonprofit […] membership alliance of institutions collaborating to deliver projects and

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services in support of its mission ‘to provide enduring global access to Catholic research resources in the Americas’” (CRRA, 2017). Search phrases employed were usually some variant of “World Youth Day” and equivalents in various languages. Nevertheless, my language proficiency in English and Norwegian far exceeds my proficiency in Spanish, Italian, and Polish. 1.3 Fieldwork Source material for the synchronic dimension of my study was gathered mainly through fieldwork at WYD 2016, with semi-structured interviews and unstructured participant observation as primary methods. While in the United States, I made contact with a diocese with plans to organize a travel group to WYD 2016. Informing the group leader of my project, he invited me to join them. During my subsequent stay at the Jagiellonian University of Kraków and after my return to Norway, I stayed in touch with the American travel group via e-mail correspondences and newsletters about the journey. The e-mails contained information about the itinerary, various sites we would be visiting, preparatory events, and practical advice regarding such minutes as what and how to pack. I carried with me a field journal at all times for making notes along the way. Letters of information were handed out prior to the interviews which, in group interview settings, sometimes involved interrupting the interview to give new potential respondents the same document in order to secure informed consent. Consent was given verbally and confirmed at the beginning of the audio recordings. Semi-structured inter-views were navigated by means of an interview guide that had three main sections. The interview guide opened with questions of whether the respondent identified as Catholic, and if so, for long. I went on to ask why they had come to WYD 2016, what their expectations were, what they considered to be the most important thing about WYD 2016 specifically and WYD in general, whether 2016 was their first WYD and if they had been to something like WYD before, as well as what they thought the pope wanted to achieve with WYD. These questions were designed to have respondents use their own words to describe WYD, without prompting them to use pilgrim(s) or pilgrimage. The next group of questions included those terms, asking respondents whether they considered themselves pilgrims, whether they considered all WYD participants as pilgrims, and what the word pilgrimage meant to them. As the journey unfolded, I added questions about what their most and least enjoyable experiences at WYD 2016 were, as well as what the word mercy meant to them. Interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and deleted after completion of the transcripts, which were anonymized. Aids to these methods were a field journal that I carried with me at all times, 27 short video recordings, 37 audio recordings, and 712 photographs.

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1.4 Respondents I had eleven respondents from among the participants at WYD 2016, four men and seven women; one full member of a religious order for women, and ten lay Catholics. None of the respondents at WYD 2016 were ordained priests, and women are more strongly represented than men. However, I recorded one semi-structured interview with an ordained priest who had participated at WYD 1993 in Denver, and one of my respondents at WYD 2016 had also been to that event. It was a prerequisite for participating in the study that the respondents were eighteen years of age or older. Two respondents were in their late teens, six in their twenties, and three in their thirties. The majority were in their early- to mid-twenties. From a total of thirteen interviews, four were group interviews, while the remaining nine were individual interviews. Where relevant, I have also given quotes from interviews in other contexts, such as during my fieldwork in Rome prior to and during the canonization of John XXIII and John Paul II on April 27, 2014. This collection of respondents was more random, as they depended upon whom I met in Saint Peter’s Square and during the vigil before the canonization Mass. By contrast, all respondents at WYD 2016 came from the same travel group. The selection process itself was carried out during my fieldwork in Poland, through personal communication with each respondent. In Poland, I journeyed with the travel group from Warszawa to Cze˛stochowa, Katowice, Wadowice, and Auschwitz II: Birkenau before we arrived in Kraków for WYD proper. The journey lasted for a total of ten days. Visits to various places along the way to Kraków were on a long list of “places of interest” for WYD participants and were described as stops on a longer pilgrimage. I had many informal conversations with my respondents as well. One in particular affected a later group interview, exemplifying the impact a researcher can have on the production of her source material, and prompting reflexivity on the part of a respondent (Chapter 6, section 2.3). As such, it makes a good example of what Grimes has noted: “Practitioners sometimes theorize, and theorists sometimes practice” (2014: 6).

2. Research ethics In addition to seeking permission from the WYD 2016 travel group’s leadership to carry out research on the journey, I registered my project with the Norwegian Centre for Research Data and obtained a certificate of ethical acceptability. In cases where archival material was not already released into the public domain, I sought and obtained permission to quote sources from the archives.

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Something also needs to be said for online material—whether found in digital archives or in the jungle of information that is the internet. Employing online material frequently means treading murkier, more ambiguous waters than material found in physical archives, where the terms of use are often clear, institutionalized, and agreed to as a condition for gaining access in the first place. In her book Undoing Ethics, Natasha Whiteman criticizes the practices of some researchers using online sources for qualitative studies (Whiteman, 2012). Whiteman particularly calls attention to the trope that anything posted online is considered public as ethically problematic. In her view, that means abandoning responsibility. In order to accommodate Whiteman’s important critique, online material used in this book has been limited to that produced by official bodies, though they have sometimes been re-uploaded and hosted on various YouTube accounts. As the material itself was produced by official organizations, I did not seek permission from channel administrators for linking to their YouTube accounts. Express permission was, however, sought and obtained in the case of an e-mail signed by name. Anonymization is extended to the author as it is to my respondents. With the exception of Monsignor Edward Buelt, who consented to be named and was interviewed about WYD 1993 in Denver, I have sought to secure anonymization through various means: I gave respondents aliases, sorted them into age groups instead of providing their precise age, and omitted potentially identifying information about the travel group. This helps protect the integrity and identity of respondents to the readership, but it does little to aid anonymization within the travel group. Episodes involving certain individuals can be used to identify respondents which, if connected to an alias, risks compromising the anonymization of all quotes connected to that alias. As such, episodes that would distinguish one respondent in particular have been disconnected from alias, excluded, or paraphrased. Furthermore, I made minor changes to the quoted source material, for example through the omission of words such “like” and sounds like “uhm,” which may identify respondents according to speech patterns. Both of these words are fairly common in spoken American English—especially at the beginning of responses, indicating not so much hesitation as an intention to respond pending reflection. “Like” is also used as a verbal indicator of a quote instead of other indicators such as “air quotes.” For example, the phrase “I was like” followed by a statement indicates that the statement expresses an attitude, a reaction, or a past thought. In such cases, therefore, I have retained occurrences of “like.” Photographs used have also been selected according to criteria for ethical use: The faces of my respondents do not feature in any of the photographs because, in the age of Google image search, the face of even one respondent could compromise the anonymity of the entire group of respondents. The disadvantage is that there are many photographs I cannot publish that might have improved the capacity for illustrating what WYD—and fieldwork at WYD—can look like.

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As a lifelong digital gamer and a scholar of religion researching contemporary Catholicism, I am an insider to digital gaming, and a nonCatholic researching Catholics, their activities, and how they speak about them. I became a member of the United States-based, international Ásatrú organization The Asatru Community in 2016, and a member of the Norwegian Ásatrú organization Bifrost in 2017. I was open about my religious affiliation to my respondents at WYD 2016. Doing so, I often found myself adding that I belong to the universalist, anti-racist wing of Ásatrú and Norse-inspired Heathenry more generally. Before 2016, I did not identify with any specific religious group regardless of membership. Being open about my religious identity and belonging was important for two reasons: Honesty is important in general and research in particular, but even more so in research that involves asking people to disclose personal experiences. Self-disclosure of religious affiliation also let potential respondents know a bit more about who they were communicating with, which would help them make a more informed decision about whether to participate or not. For example, one ordained priest in the group was at first eager to converse with me, but when I disclosed my religious identity, he withdrew. On the one hand, my self-disclosure appeared to close the door to at least one respondent and the data interviews with him might have yielded, but such is the consequence of taking this path. On the other hand, most of my conversational partners in the travel group expressed interest and curiosity, which led to conversational exchanges that I believe helped me form a better understanding of “the basics” of Catholicism as they understood them. In extension of the insider/outsider discussion, it is also necessary to discuss the ethical implications of employing parallelisms between religion and concepts denoted by or connected to game and play. As WYD can be approached in many ways, some readers may find my use of these terms insensitive, disagreeable, or downright offensive. Play and game may be taken to suggest that WYD participants’ religious performances are somehow inauthentic. Connie Hill-Smith anticipated this also with regards to what she calls cyberpilgrimage, particularly with regards to the topic of authenticity: “There may be a sense that pilgrimage via the Internet intrinsically cannot be authentic, that without any physical depth, it can only be an affectation, even a caricature, of ‘proper’ (terrestrial) pilgrimage” (Hill-Smith, 2009: 1, italics in original). Approaching religion from a digital game studies perspective may invite similar skepticism, particularly perhaps, as religious sensitivities have often been disturbed by “moral panics” over role-playing game culture, as Joseph P. Laycock has analyzed in relation to Dungeons & Dragons (2015: 5–8). I invite readers to set aside any prejudice they may have regarding the apparent frivolity of digital gaming and consider instead the many parallels between engaging virtual realms and superhuman realms. Although, as we have seen, religion is not a “game” in the traditional sense, neither are many digital “games.” Both denote activities that involve the construction and mediation of realms that differ from the human realm of

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everyday life. They also lie beyond the reach of ordinary human perception without their respective support systems; superhuman realms rely on various forms of mediation and social construction, and virtual realms depend on various processes of design, artistry, and construction from digital code. Both also require interfaces for interaction—terms that are key to the theoretical framework developed in Chapter 2. I have attempted to provide my respondents with some agency regarding how their responses are interpreted. Some might disagree with my interpretations and may be uncomfortable with the parallels I draw. I did reach out to five of my respondents, inviting them to read an excerpt from Chapter 6. Some of those I contacted replied with enthusiasm, and I sent them an excerpt of five pages. So far, however, I have not received any negative feedback. In any case, I have tried to treat the synchronic and diachronic perspectives of this study with equal care and attention, as recommended by Grimes (2014: 27). I have also wanted to take my respondents seriously when they selfdescribe as pilgrims, refer to WYD as a pilgrimage, and discuss the criteria for treating WYD as a pilgrimage.

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Archival material AAD1. Box 4, Media Guide 2, pp. 19–20. World Youth Day ’93 Schedule of Events.

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AAD2. Box 5, Catechetical Materials, World Youth Day 1993 [Volume I] AAD3. Box 5, Catechetical Materials, World Youth Day 1993 Volume II AAD4. Box 5, Catechetical Materials, World Youth Day 1993 Volume III AAD5. Box 4, Media Guide. “WYD ’93 Community Service Projects.” AAD6. Box 4, Media Guide. “Friday, August 13, 1993. Thematic Events 3:00–5:00 p.m.” AAD7. Box 4, Media Guide. “Denver- -Volunteer services, in-kind donations and people’s generosity…” AAD8. Box 4, Media Guide. Vara, Richard, 1993. “Paying for the pope.” Houston Chronicle, July 17, 1993, p. 3E. AAD9. Ephemera Box. “Guidelines for participants.” AAD10. Box 4, Media Guide. “Volunteer Orientation.” AAD11. Box 4, Media Guide. “Pope picks Denver for youth rally.” The New York Times, April 13, 1992. AAD12. Box 4, Media Guide. Thavis, John. “Youth rally American style: This ain’t Czestochowa.” Catholic News Service, April 16, 1992. AAD13. Box 4, Media Guide. “Most Rev. Angelo Nam Son Kim, Bishop of Son Won, Korea. Catechetical Model for August 12, 1993.” AAD14. Box 4, Media Guide. “Catechesis, Mass, Vigil: Saturday,” pp. 88–95. AAD15. Box 4, Media Guide. “Re: interview Denver post.” Fax to Sr. Mary Ann Walsh, signed Dr. Jaoquín Navarro-Valls, Holy See Press Office. August 6, 1993. AAD16. Box 4, Media Guide. “Visas for World Youth Day ’93.” AAD17. Box 4, Media Guide. “Glossary of Liturgical Terms.” AAD18. Box 4, Media Guide. “World Youth Day Unilateral Media Update #2. Monday July 26.” AAD19. Box 4, Media Guide. “Vatican releases schedule for Pope John Paul II at World Youth Day ’93.” AAD20. Box 4, Media Guide. “Logistical Details [Community Service].” AAD21. Box 4, Media Guide. [Pope John Paul II’s revised schedule for WYD 1993.] July 7, 1993. AAD22. Box 4, Media Guide. William T. Conklin v. City and County of Denver and Mayor Wellington Webb. May 7, 1993. AAD23. Ephemera Box. World Youth Day, Inc., 1992. Mission of the Cross Resource Manual: Suggestions for the Use of the Holy Year Cross in Preparation for the International Gathering of Young Adults and Youth. Denver, Colorado 1993. Washington, DC: National Conference of Catholic Bishops. AAD24. Ephemera Box. World Youth Day Memories. Most Precious Blood Parish. May 5, 1994. AAD25. Box 7. File: Correspondence WYD COVAS Stafford Part 8, Letter to Stafford from Fr Regis Stanlon, O.F.M., Cap. Auraria Catholic Campus Minister dated April 23, 1993. AAD26. Box 7. File: Stafford Correspondence w/Bishops, Rome, Holy Father, Letter from John Paul II to Stafford. Undated. [Appears to be a telegram.] AAD27. Box 1. File: World Youth Day – Organizational Charts. “Corporate Structure and Organizational Chart.”

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AAD28. Box 7. Archbishop Stafford letters of congratulations, thank-you’s. File: World Youth Day-Stations of the Cross. AAD29. Ephemera Box. Letter from J. Francis Stafford [general letter to members of the diocese?], dated July 31, 1993. AAD30. Box 1: File: World Youth Day-Paris & Manila. 1) 12–23–1993 AB Stafford to Fr. Ames stating he sees he & Fr. Buelt working to coordinate the Archdiocesan trip to World Youth Day in Manila. AAD31. Box 1 Administrative Files: File: World Youth Day-Paris & Manila. 4) 1–3– 1996 Fr. Buelt to Pastors memo regarding World Youth Day 1997. APC1: Gazeta Cze˛stochowska: Tygodnik Regionalny, August 27, 1991. DCRA1. The Denver Catholic Register, May 15, 1991. p. 1 A. Cover page. DCRA2. The Denver Catholic Register, August 21, 1996. p. 1 A. Cover page. DCRA3. Mason, Colleen Smith, 1991. “New Icon commemorates Convocation on Laity.” The Denver Catholic Register, May 15, 1991, pp. 1–2. DCRA4. Thavis, John. “Pope’s visit to Germany will return young papacy to world stage.” The Denver Catholic Register, August 17, 2005, p. 2. DPL1. The Denver Post, April 12, 1992. p. 1 A. Microfilm. DPL2. Culver, Victoria, “Youth gathering described as ‘primarily spiritual event.’” The Denver Post, April 12, 1992, p. 13 A. Microfilm. DPL3. Culver, Victoria. “‘A huge undertaking: City has never had anything comparable to this.” The Denver Post, April 12, 1992, p. 13 A. Microfilm. DPL4. Roberts, Jeffrey A. and Lipsner, Steve, “Obtaining weapons easy for teens.” The Denver Post, April 12, 1992, p. 16 A. Microfilm. DPL5. Roberts, Jeffrey A. and Lipsner, Steve, “Kids and guns: More youths in Colorado playing with deadly toys.” The Denver Post, April 12, 1992, p. 1 A, 17 A. Microfilm. DPL6. Culver, Victoria. “Pope’s visit to bring the world.” The Denver Post, April 13, 1992, p. 1 A. Microfilm. DPL7. Eddy, Mark. “Denver Catholics split on visit news.” The Denver Post, April 13, 1992, p. 1 A. Microfilm. DPL8. Culver, Victoria. “Pope’s visit to bring the world.” The Denver Post, April 13, 1992, p. 1 A. Microfilm. DPL9. Brown, Fred. “World Youth Day: Awe-inspiring.” The Denver Post. August 22, 1993, A1. Microfilm. DPL10. Scrader, Ann. “Dehydration still a concern.” The Denver Post, August 14, 1993, 11 A. Microfilm. DPL11. Booth, Michael. “Registration exceeds 186,000, shatters projections.” The Denver Post. August 14, 1993, 16 A. Microfilm. DPL12. Bettelheim, Adriel. “6,000 pilgrims stricken.” The Denver Post. August 15, 1993, 1 A. Microfilm. HCC1. Archdiocese of Denver, 1993. “International Youth Gathering.” Video. JP2C1. Pope Tape 34 A_PBS Transfer. Digitized 2014. JP2C2. Pope Tape 18_PBS Transfer. Digitized 2014. JP2C3. Pope Tape 22_PBS Part 1 Transfer. Digitized 2014. JP2C4. Pope Tape 22_PBS Part 2 Transfer. Digitized 2014.

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UNDA1. CPJS 4/24, “Hill of Light,” “Five Million Hear the Pope.” UNDA2. APHS, C4581 (VHS), Hesburgh Cas. 6-A. I. “‘Five Extraordinary Days’: The Pope in Denver through NBC Cameras” [part 1]. Video. UNDA3. CMCN 51/05 Women for Faith and Family re Catholic Youth Day 1993/1014 [part 1] UNDA4. APHS C4581 (VHS) Hesburgh Cas. 2–7–98. “America needs prayer lest it lose its soul.” John Paul II at McNichols arena, Denver, Saturday, Aug. 14, 1993.

Index

Abt, Clark C. 43 f., 87, 240, 248 afford, affordance 47, 70, 77, 175, 181, 203, 208, 240, 246, 251, 258 agency 18, 31, 52, 55, 58–62, 73 f., 76 f., 119, 125, 132, 139, 198, 268 anthropomorphization 59, 208, 229 anti-modern 29, 31 anti-racist 34, 267 Argentina 96, 119 A´satru´ 34, 72, 267 Assumption of Mary 7–9, 22 atheist 72 Aukland, Knut 7, 65 Australia 32, 34, 63, 114, 122, 132, 198 Australian Catholic Bishops Conference 34 authenticity 45, 145, 239, 267 avatar (in digital games) 42, 67, 80, 194, 205 Baptism 95, 152 f. Barnes, Barry 58 f. belief(s) 58 – and presence 60 f., 82 – and religious interaction 151 – transmission of 176 Bellah, Robert N. 46 Bell, Catherine 38, 45, 81, 233 belonging 71 f., 93, 110, 123, 156, 187, 201, 237, 243, 267 – and interfacial elements 71, 208 – and superhuman persons 59, 63, 65, 71, 84 f., 184, 229, 244, 251

Benedict XVI 22, 34, 90, 99, 107, 110, 168, 194 Berger, Peter 70 bible 9, 71 f., 93 f., 117, 154 f., 183, 188, 190, 241 – and religious interaction 151 – and WYD 29, 87, 110, 141, 202, 214, 264 – as interfacial element 71, 73, 77, 85, 93, 95, 102, 129, 152, 154 f., 188, 205, 215, 248, 258 f. – as performance – Hebrew Bible 204 – The Bible Game (digital game) 231 blasphemy 174, 260 Blessed are the merciful (song) 7, 11, 53 blessings 63, 102 Boyer, Pascal 59, 176 Brazil 37 brotherhood 97, 101, 121 Buenos Aires 7, 19, 91, 96 f., 126, 133, 141 Campbell, Heidi A. 42 f., 45 Canada 32, 63, 139, 168, 234 canonization 109 f., 123, 131–133, 162, 168, 201, 204–206, 262, 265 – of John Paul II 9, 14, 22, 43, 61, 99, 108–110, 114, 119 f., 132, 137, 163, 179, 184, 187, 205–209, 263 – process 20, 35, 39, 57, 59 f., 68, 74, 77 f., 83, 87, 99, 106, 116, 123, 125, 131, 133, 136, 140, 142 f., 177, 185, 188, 193, 206, 227, 242, 245, 248, 258, 261–263, 265, 268

300 Casanova, José 98, 121 catechesis 18, 24 f., 99, 116, 140, 150, 157, 162, 177, 195 Catechism 9, 89, 99, 150, 176, 187, 191, 193, 233, 236 – Baltimore 42, 148, 174, 191 – of the Catholic Church 9, 29, 72, 78, 112, 115, 124, 132, 150, 154, 164, 168, 181, 187, 199 f., 205 – pilgrimage and 19, 21, 35 f., 38, 87, 99 f., 104, 106, 113, 116–118, 142, 154, 166, 181, 217, 220, 222, 224–226, 241, 257 – Youth 7, 9, 17 f., 20–22, 25, 28–31, 33 f., 36, 49, 52, 87–97, 99 f., 103 f., 107–117, 120–126, 128, 132 f., 135, 138–144, 148, 150, 152–157, 160–162, 164 f., 167–169, 171–181, 183, 185, 195, 200, 202, 213, 217, 223, 233 f., 236 f., 257, 262, 264 Charismatic Christians, Christianity 21, 48, 131, 213, 259 childhood, spirit of 118, 172 children 15, 31, 64, 79, 89, 91, 103, 112, 153 f., 164 f., 173, 178, 183, 187 – and WYD 29, 87, 110, 141, 202, 214, 264 – Hebrew 89, 163 Christ 7, 10, 13, 15, 52 f., 67, 88–91, 93– 95, 98, 102 f., 110, 115–119, 125, 142, 149, 151–156, 160 f., 165, 168, 171 f., 178, 180, 185, 189, 192 f., 235, 242–244, 246, 258 – and evangelization 102 – and Mary 22, 93, 105, 120, 130, 250 – and youth 30, 94, 112, 163, 178 – interaction with 46, 57 f., 60–65, 68, 72, 76, 78 f., 81 f., 84 f., 90, 98, 117, 142, 148, 156, 176, 188, 190, 192 f., 202–204, 209, 219, 228, 230, 237, 243 f., 248 f., 251, 254, 258 – love of 96, 152, 197 – relics of 30, 147, 169, 209, 213 – suffering and sacrifice of 235, 242

Index – The Passion of the Christ (movie) 242 f. – WYD Cross as cross of 125 Christmas 93, 128, 153 Christocentrism 118 f. Chrysostom, John 15 civilization of love 97, 145, 166, 172 Cleary, Anthony 21, 35, 88 f. coffee 51, 67 cognitive dissonance 247 Cognitive Science of Religion 176 Cologne 7, 9, 22, 29 f., 32 f., 90, 108, 214, 234 f. Colorado 9, 37, 49, 135, 139–141, 143, 146, 148, 157, 160, 163, 168, 171 f., 178, 181, 263 commercialization 156 commitment 32 f., 114, 192, 221 Communion 4, 20, 53, 64 f., 78, 83 f., 90, 95, 99, 126, 152, 165, 178, 180, 185–188, 190–195, 200, 206, 232 f. communism 88, 120, 124, 126, 131–133, 137, 181 communitas 38 community 24 f., 29 f., 33, 38 f., 52, 67, 71, 92 f., 95, 100, 124, 140, 146 f., 151, 154, 157, 161 f., 164, 167 f., 172, 179– 181, 184, 186–190, 192 f., 195, 197–200, 202, 209, 215–218, 235, 237 f., 244, 253, 259, 267 – experience 8, 21, 29 f., 33, 35, 38, 40, 45–48, 51, 56, 60–62, 66 f., 69, 76, 80– 85, 90, 95, 99, 107, 117, 120, 123 f., 130, 136, 142, 144, 150, 152, 155, 157, 160– 162, 171, 178, 181, 183, 187, 197–200, 206, 208, 214, 216 f., 220, 222–224, 226, 228, 231–235, 237–253, 259, 261, 264, 267 – sense of 7, 30, 59, 99, 108, 115, 147, 153 f., 164, 172, 180, 190, 192, 198 f., 203, 218, 233, 243, 251, 254, 259 – WYD 7–11, 17–22, 28–41, 48 f., 53, 57, 61, 63, 67, 71, 77 f., 83 f., 86–88, 90 f., 93–122, 124–126, 129 f., 132–154,

Index

301 distortion 84, 175 f., 260 distraction 42, 82, 84, 156, 176, 189 f., 218, 247 f., 258, 260 dogma 34, 187 f., 197, 229 Doomsday Clock 90, 98 Duffy, Eamon 17, 210 Dziwisz, Stanisław 53, 109, 127–129, 179

156 f., 160–168, 171–182, 184, 186, 189, 194, 198–202, 206, 213–235, 237–242, 244–246, 248–254, 257–259, 262–268 Compostela, Santiago de 7, 19, 98, 117, 133, 141 Conception, the Immaculate 33, 59, 97, 137, 164 Confession 20, 66 f., 78, 94, 118, 151 f., 181, 183, 187, 192–195, 206, 209, 215 f., 259 Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) 9, 78, 99 consecration 64, 66, 103, 119, 187 f., 190, 222 conversion 59, 64, 100, 131, 154, 238 co-presence 60 f. Council, Second Vatican 94, 99, 105, 107, 115, 132, 185, 191 Cox, Harvey 91, 121, 130 f. cross 7, 9, 18–21, 25, 29, 39, 52, 65, 69, 88–91, 124–127, 129 f., 135, 147–149, 151 f., 160, 162, 164, 166, 173–175, 179, 215, 228, 235, 237, 243, 245 f., 254 crossing 7, 65, 116, 226, 237 crusade (modern Charismatic) 130–132 Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly 82 f., 245, 258 Cummings, Kathleen Sprows 7, 148, 169 Cusack, Carole M. 56, 228 Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism 7, 20, 143, 262 cyberpilgrimage 35 f., 40, 141, 267 Cze˛stochowa 139

Faggioli, Massimo 21, 37, 113, 116, 178 f., 191 faith 7, 10, 30, 32, 38, 57, 69, 79, 91, 96 f., 99, 102 f., 106, 108, 114, 117–120, 125, 150, 155, 167, 172 f., 178, 189 f., 197– 199, 202, 204, 227, 230, 238, 246 f., 250 f. Faustina Kowalska (saint) 210 flow 20, 38, 55, 82–84, 106, 135, 153, 171, 245, 258 Francis, Pope 19, 22, 25, 110, 132, 136, 180, 186, 194, 200–202, 207, 214, 220, 234, 244, 249 Freedberg, David 60 Frisina, Marco 90

darshan 21, 48 deities 42 f., 72, 74 Denver 7–9, 19, 33, 36 f., 49, 117, 135 f., 138–148, 150, 153 f., 156 f., 160, 162, 164–169, 171 f., 175–182, 234, 236– 238, 258, 262 f., 265 f. desecration 42 digital games 41–48, 55–57, 65, 70, 82, 194, 205 f., 232, 238, 247 f., 258, 262 Dilecti Amici 7, 92 f., 112 Diocesan WYDs 28, 89

gamer, gamers 44, 80 f., 83, 267 – and immersion 21, 48, 57, 81, 83–85, 94, 103, 219, 246, 254, 258 f. gaming 42, 44–47, 51, 69, 83, 267 Gebhardt, Winfried 29 f., 33, 124, 126, 257 Gell, Alfred 60 gender 36, 175, 179 Geraci, Robert M. 42, 45 Gilhus, Ingvild Sælid 7, 57 f., 240 goddess 72, 259

Easter 7, 19, 21, 79, 88 f., 91, 148, 210 f. encyclicals 108, 137 Eucharist, see also Communion – as Christ 71 – as interfacial element 71, 73, 77, 85, 93, 95, 102, 129, 152, 154 f., 188, 205, 215, 248, 258 f. eventization 30 f., 109

302 god, God 7, 10 f., 15, 53, 63, 70–72, 74, 76, 81, 90 f., 93–99, 101–104, 109 f., 112, 115, 117–120, 123, 129 f., 143, 146, 148 f., 152, 165, 167, 171 f., 174 f., 178, 180 f., 184, 188 f., 191–193, 204 f., 218, 224, 227–229, 233 f., 236, 239, 246–251, 254, 259 gods 58, 61, 204, 260 Goffman, Erving 55, 60 f., 66, 77 Gorbachev, Mikhail 98, 137 Gospel 8, 106, 116 f., 125, 154 f., 157, 165, 178 f., 242 Grieve, Gregory Price 42 f., 45 Grimes, Ronald 34, 175, 200, 236, 261, 265, 268 Guthrie, Stewart E. 59, 208 hajj 19 f., 28 heaven 7, 10, 14 f., 67, 100, 103, 119, 147, 183, 186, 205, 236 Heidbrink, Simone 43, 80 Henriksen, Oskar 78 Hepp, Andreas 30 f., 257 Hervieu-Le´ger, Danielle 29 Holy Week, see Easter Holy Year of the Redemption 22, 125 Huizinga, Johan 45 f., 55, 59 f., 82 f., 183, 208, 220 f., 238, 240, 253 f. humor 7, 240 hunger 64, 238, 246 hymns 53, 177, 183, 189 iconicity 68 iconoclasm 84, 260 idols 70 image 14, 29 f., 37 f., 54, 59–61, 68–72, 74, 85, 96, 106, 118, 127, 134, 146, 149, 157, 169–172, 184, 191, 196, 200, 208– 211, 213–215, 228 f., 254, 259, 266 immanence 82 immersion 49, 55, 57, 79–86, 136, 146, 155–157, 165 f., 176, 181, 186, 188–191, 203, 207, 214, 216–218, 224–226, 228– 230, 238, 240, 243–254, 258–260

Index – at WYD 19 f., 28, 30, 33–35, 37, 41, 77, 86, 102, 104, 108, 110, 116, 118, 122, 126, 129, 133, 135 f., 139 f., 142, 147, 162 f., 168 f., 177, 181, 183 f., 194, 197– 201, 207, 209 f., 215 f., 218 f., 221 f., 225, 228 f., 234 f., 238 f., 244, 249 f., 254, 258, 264–267 – in digital games, virtual worlds 42, 83, 208, 232, 262 imperialism 97, 137 incarnation 22, 93, 119, 161, 172, 180 incense 81, 143, 172 Indonesia 78 indulgences 88, 105, 233 Inquisition 78 insider/outsider 34, 267 interaction 21, 29, 35, 38, 42, 45–49, 51, 55–64, 66–74, 77, 79, 84–87, 93, 95, 98, 103–106, 109, 117, 119, 129, 131, 138, 142, 144, 146, 151, 155 f., 164 f., 168, 172, 175 f., 181, 183–185, 187 f., 190– 194, 196, 198–200, 202 f., 205–209, 215 f., 218, 221–228, 230 f., 234, 236, 244, 246, 248 f., 251–254, 257–260, 268 – presence and 62, 163 f., 166, 208, 219 – religion as 43, 45, 47, 57–59, 62, 130, 194, 258 – religious interfaces and 260 – transrealm 147, 181, 191, 231, 246, 252 interface, interfaces 21, 46, 48 f., 57, 65– 74, 76–86, 89, 95, 98, 106, 109 f., 130 f., 133 f., 136, 138, 142, 146, 156, 165, 173, 177, 181, 187, 194, 196–198, 203, 206, 208, 215, 224, 228–230, 234, 237 f., 241 f., 244, 246, 253–255, 258–260, 262, 268 – and media 29, 31, 60, 109 – in digital gaming 43 – religious 8, 18–21, 28–35, 38–43, 47– 49, 51, 56 f., 60–74, 76–80, 83–89, 93– 96, 98, 103–106, 108–110, 112–119, 122, 126 f., 129–134, 136, 138–140, 142, 144–146, 148, 151, 155–157, 164–166,

Index 168 f., 173, 175–177, 180 f., 183–200, 202–209, 214–216, 218, 221–246, 248– 255, 257–260, 262, 265, 267 intimacy 92, 120 Ireland 32 f. Italy 91, 135, 148, 157, 168 Jasna Góra (see also Cze˛stochowa) 42, 102 f., 117, 126, 169, 198 Jerusalem 88 f., 96 f., 102 f., 117 John Paul II, Pope 8 f., 17, 19, 21 f., 28, 30 f., 40 f., 53, 89, 91–100, 102 f., 105– 126, 130–143, 145, 149, 152 f., 162–166, 168 f., 172, 174 f., 178–180, 182, 184, 187, 201–210, 213–217, 230, 246, 254, 258, 262, 265 joy 83, 100, 112, 140 f., 183, 202, 240, 246, 248 Kaell, Hillary 38, 239 Katowice 53, 183, 265 Keane, Webb 78 f., 87, 90, 219, 229 keyboard 81, 83 knees, kneeling 53, 89, 219 Knights of Columbus 196 Knoll, Tobias 43, 80 Krako´w 90, 127, 211, 219 Kselman 64 Kumbh Mela 19 f. lag 83 Lateran, the 88 Latin 29, 33, 78 f., 116, 121, 147 f., 166, 185, 188 lay Catholics 88, 114 f., 194, 265 – and the pope 135, 145, 166 f., 181 – in evangelization 127 – lay movements 108, 178 Laycock, Joseph P. 41, 45, 55, 76 f., 84, 267 legitimization 149 Lehenbauer-Blaum, Mario 44 Leibovitz 43, 45, 81 f., 192, 194, 238 leisure 95

303 life (religious concept) 4, 7 f., 10, 13, 15, 17, 25, 42, 46, 51–53, 59, 78, 83, 90–97, 103, 106, 108, 110, 112–114, 119, 123, 136 f., 142, 145, 148–157, 160 f., 163 f., 168 f., 172, 179, 184, 187 f., 194, 202– 205, 208, 211, 213 f., 220, 228, 233, 236, 246, 249, 258, 268 liminal, liminoid 38 f., 53, 71 liturgical calendar 28, 88 liturgy 53, 67, 81, 103, 118, 140, 144, 185– 188, 190, 200, 216 love 7–9, 11, 51, 63, 93, 97, 106, 116, 125, 135–137, 139, 161, 165, 172, 191, 197, 206, 228, 248 Lucy (fictional character) 51, 54 ludic, ludology 45, 83, 87, 194, 218, 220, 225–227, 229, 252 Luhrmann, Tanya M. 74–76, 247, 249 Lumen Gentium 91, 115 lusory attitude, lusory state 56 f., 61, 80, 96, 181, 188, 190, 195, 226, 233 f., 237, 259 luxury 46, 239 Madrid 7, 10, 109, 161, 194 magic 42, 51, 54, 127, 225 f., 238, 240 magisterial normativity 77 f., 152, 176 f., 191, 193 magisterium 76–78, 133, 136, 147, 155 f., 177 Makeeff, Tao Thyker 7, 45 Manchester Cathedral 42 manifest 64, 71, 77, 111, 137, 238 Manila 7 f., 17, 19 mariocentrism 118 f. Marley-Vincent, Lindsay 42 marriage 47, 56 martyrs 88, 242 Mary (Virgin Mother) 7, 11, 64, 66 f., 73, 79, 88 f., 93, 96–98, 100, 102–104, 106, 118 f., 130, 132, 141, 149, 155, 168–172, 175 f., 178 f., 181, 184, 203, 246, 250 f., 258

304 – Our Lady of the New Advent 36, 153, 168 f., 171 f. Mason, Michael 32–35, 38, 63 f., 83, 190, 224, 238, 257 Mass 4, 14, 17–19, 21, 24 f., 28 f., 33 f., 39, 52 f., 66 f., 71, 78, 81, 84, 90 f., 94 f., 102, 105, 121, 123 f., 126, 128–132, 140, 144 f., 149 f., 156 f., 160, 162–165, 171 f., 180 f., 183–186, 188–196, 198 f., 201 f., 215–217, 224, 228, 232, 238, 249, 254, 257, 265 material culture 21, 36, 41, 60, 71 f., 86, 129, 176, 200 meaning-making processes 42, 60, 151 media studies 36, 71, 176 mediation 52, 69, 71, 74, 164, 191, 208 f., 267 f. mediatization 30 f., 35, 109, 177 medieval 65, 130, 175, 233 mercy 7, 11, 13 f., 29 f., 118, 136, 174, 183 f., 189, 195 f., 209–211, 213–216, 219, 230, 254, 264 Messages (papal documents related to WYD) 68, 94, 102, 104, 117, 151, 213, 224, 258 f. methodology 20, 261 Mexico 37, 213 Meyer, Birgit 35, 60, 71, 73 f. Microsoft 80 Mikaelsson, Lisbeth 7, 57 f., 98, 113 military 44, 97, 130 millennium 94, 97 f., 100, 102 f., 105 f., 126, 133, 145, 152, 165, 171 mindset 57, 83, 233 f., 239, 244–246, 249, 251, 254, 258 miracles 38, 105, 127, 131, 133 mission, missionaries 25, 36, 103, 110 f., 114 f., 125, 156 f., 181, 213, 264 mobility 96, 106, 173 Morgan, David 60, 68 f., 74, 208 motivation 64, 79 f., 84, 133, 150, 186, 192, 197 f., 201 f., 206–208, 213 f., 234, 239

Index music 19, 24 f., 45, 47, 55, 67, 70, 81, 90, 160, 163, 177, 183, 189 f., 257 mystery 31, 95, 119 f., 165 mystical, mysticism 89, 98, 161 Narnia 15, 51 narrative, narrativization 31, 45–47, 49, 56, 66, 69, 72 f., 81, 89, 93, 96, 98, 102 f., 107–109, 120, 125, 131–133, 149, 154 f., 161, 167, 171, 173, 175, 184, 187 f., 190 f., 203–209, 214–216, 228, 230– 232, 237, 243, 246, 259 nature 147–149, 165, 205, 261 New Evangelization 29, 31, 97, 114–118, 120, 129, 132 f., 138, 142, 145, 151, 172, 181, 191, 194, 259, 262 Niedz´wiedz´, Anna 127 Nintendo 15 Norman, Alex and Mark Johnson 19, 28, 35, 88, 92, 104 f., 108, 126, 217, 257 normativity 77 f., 84, 177 Norway 53, 157, 264 Notre Dame, University of 7, 9, 20, 262 f. Nowa Huta 127, 129 f. Nowak, Stanisław 101 f. NPCs 46, 195 nuns 52, 221 obedience 64, 120, 171, 221 Ochu´n 72 f. offerings 42, 103, 130 “offer it up” (ascetic practice) 244, 246 f. Olympic Games 19, 126 O’Malley, John W. 99, 105, 107, 114, 131, 137, 191 Ordination 78, 180 Orsi 60 f., 82–84, 188, 215, 245, 260 orthomateriality 78 orthopraxis 78 Paden, William E. 66 pain 82, 218–220, 223 f., 226, 233, 241 f., 244–248, 252 f., 258 Palestine 79, 112

Index Palm Sunday 7–11, 17 f., 87, 89, 92–96, 98, 139, 150 Panama 7, 11 papacy 31, 78, 107, 109, 111, 120, 132, 141, 164, 179, 262 Paraguay 96 Paris 7 f., 22, 109, 179 Paul (apostle) 17, 25, 29, 40, 88, 107 f., 111, 119, 135, 143 f., 146, 148, 152, 177 Paul VI, Pope 25, 40, 91 f., 110–116, 119, 138, 188 Peace 25, 63 f., 67, 94, 97, 102, 106, 111– 113, 122, 124, 133, 167, 175, 202 – world 7–9, 14 f., 17 f., 20 f., 25, 29, 34, 36, 42–46, 51–56, 60, 63–69, 71 f., 77, 80–82, 87 f., 90–99, 102–113, 115–117, 119–126, 129, 131, 133, 135, 138, 140– 142, 144, 146, 148–157, 160–164, 167 f., 172–181, 183, 185 f., 190 f., 195, 197, 200–202, 205, 208, 210, 213, 217, 222 f., 228–230, 234, 237 f., 257, 262, 264 – World Day of 25, 94, 110–112 penance 94, 106, 151 f., 187, 192 f., 233 Pentecost 102 f., 149, 152 perestroika 98 Pereyra, David 96 f. Perreault, Jean-Phillipe 21, 28 f., 257 persecution 64 personhood 58, 68 personification 59 f. Peter (apostle) 21, 88, 91 f., 102, 125, 131, 141, 146, 149, 153, 165, 178, 201, 265 Pfadenhauer 21, 30 f., 35, 109, 257 Philippines 17, 32 f., 37, 210 piety 18, 84, 116, 122, 181, 191, 210, 233, 247 pilgrim 13 f., 20, 25, 32–36, 41, 48, 65, 79, 86–89, 95–100, 102–106, 108, 113 f., 117, 119 f., 122, 124, 127, 133, 140 f., 145, 149 f., 153–155, 160, 164 f., 172, 187, 202, 207, 214, 217–235, 237–242, 244, 246, 248–254, 262, 264 pilgrimage 18–21, 25, 28, 31, 35–41, 43,

305 46, 48 f., 65 f., 79 f., 86–89, 91, 95–100, 102–106, 108, 113, 117–120, 122, 125– 127, 130, 132–136, 138–151, 153–156, 160, 162–166, 169, 172, 176 f., 179–183, 187, 189, 202, 214, 216–242, 244–254, 257–259, 262, 264 f., 267 f. – transrealm interaction as a criterion for 219 pilgrimage studies 20, 35–38, 40 f., 48, 236, 259, 261 play 29, 42–47, 57, 59 f., 63, 65–67, 69, 73, 80–83, 86 f., 102, 114, 129, 150, 153, 173–175, 183 f., 194 f., 199, 203, 205, 213, 220 f., 223, 231, 238–241, 243, 248, 251 f., 254, 267 playful, playfulness 43, 183, 189, 192, 243 Playstation 42 pluralization 31 Poland 18–20, 52 f., 102 f., 107, 120, 122, 124, 126 f., 130, 135, 137, 163, 173, 183 f., 187, 198, 202, 205, 207 f., 210, 213–217, 234, 263, 265 polytheism 45 Pontifical Council for the Laity 9, 17, 21 f., 78, 92, 108, 124–126, 143, 145, 175, 178 f., 181 Post, Paul 7, 19, 35 f., 51, 71 f., 111, 118, 120 f., 132, 137, 139, 143, 156, 162, 166, 177, 179, 185, 193, 263 poverty 63, 166, 221 prayer 24 f., 33, 52, 61, 63 f., 79, 84, 90, 95, 98, 102, 106, 110 f., 143, 150 f., 154 f., 160, 171 f., 174 f., 177, 183, 185, 190, 201, 210, 213–215, 219, 230, 232, 241–243, 247 f., 258 prejudice 34, 44, 267 presence 35, 60–62, 72 f., 75 f., 82, 84, 92, 95, 107, 110, 118, 124, 126, 149, 163, 166–168, 173, 185, 188, 197, 200 f., 203, 206–210, 216, 239, 254, 260 priest, priesthood 4, 15, 30, 42, 53, 66, 78, 81, 83 f., 90, 96, 107, 109 f., 116, 118, 121 f., 126, 136, 148, 165 f., 169, 172,

306

Index

180, 183, 187–195, 204–206, 222, 263, 265, 267 propaganda 29 Protestantism, Protestants (see also Charismatic Christianity) 34, 88, 121, 130, 133, 181 proto-WYD 7, 88 f., 91, 93, 98, 109, 112, 115, 126, 160 Queen

52, 102

Radde-Antweiler, Kerstin 41, 43 Reader, Ian 17, 19 f., 40, 43 f., 47, 52, 55, 61, 65, 71, 73, 93, 97, 117, 127, 143, 145, 149, 162, 171, 173, 181, 217, 220 f., 223, 225, 236, 248, 267 redemption 88 f., 119, 125, 180 Redemptor Hominis (encyclical) 98 Redemptoris Mater (encyclical) 102, 119 relationships 22, 42, 47, 62–64, 73, 84– 86, 96, 105, 112, 117, 130, 181, 186, 190, 201, 208, 251, 258–260 – with superhuman persons 63, 66, 68, 73, 76, 106, 117, 130, 133, 155, 186, 200, 251 f., 258 f. relics 61, 70 f., 89, 110, 129, 146, 150, 168, 187, 191 f., 211, 215 religion (definition of) 7, 19 f., 28–31, 33–36, 38–45, 47, 51, 55–68, 70–74, 77, 80–85, 87, 104, 107, 126, 130, 139 f., 156, 169, 176, 192, 194, 204, 206, 221, 226, 231, 238, 240 f., 244, 246, 248, 258 f., 262, 267 Renfrew, Colin 57 f. research ethics (see also methodology) 45, 48, 58, 265 revelations 64, 251 revival 99, 105, 113, 116, 130, 132 revolution 98, 103 Rio de Janeiro 7, 10, 22, 33, 35, 161, 194 ritualization 30, 38, 129, 151 ritual studies 19, 34, 36, 38, 45, 53, 261 role-playing 41, 45 f., 55 f., 194, 267

Rome 7–11, 18 f., 22, 25, 73, 81, 87 f., 90 f., 95 f., 102, 106 f., 110, 118, 123, 125–127, 133, 141, 146, 149 f., 172, 179, 204, 233, 265 Rosary 52, 64, 147, 165 f., 183, 185, 189, 210, 230, 241 Russia 64, 79, 146 Rymarz, Richard 18, 21, 28, 32, 35, 114– 116, 118, 257 sacraments 78, 106, 118, 145, 151–153, 165, 187, 191 sacred (category) 19, 33, 38–40, 42, 47, 56, 63, 65, 71, 78, 80 f., 91, 118, 144, 156, 169, 176, 187, 202 f., 207 f., 217 f., 226, 231, 235 f., 239 sacred sites, sacred space 214 sacrifice 15, 64, 91, 97, 146, 161, 169, 228 Salen, Katie 43–45, 56, 62, 87 salvation 79, 93, 115 f., 119, 125, 169, 210 Sanctuary of the Divine Mercy 196 San Lorenzo Center in Rome 91 Santiago de Compostela 7, 19, 98, 117, 133, 141 science 28, 35, 51, 60, 177 Scripture 76, 222, 224, 228, 241 Shiva 72 singing 30, 52 f., 67, 90 f., 98, 100, 161, 183, 186 Singleton, Andrew 32 Smith, Jonathan Z. 28, 39 f., 44, 58, 81 f., 155, 257, 267 solidarity 97, 99, 101, 103, 121, 124, 149, 165 Solidarnos´´c (Solidarity, Polish trade union) 103 Sony 42 Soviet Union 98, 101, 103, 106, 121, 133 f., 137 f. speech acts 87, 89, 97, 99, 104, 166 spirituality 21, 33, 48, 144, 155 f., 173, 236, 254 Spiro, Melford E. 58 Starfleet 51

Index Stark, Rodney 31, 94, 107, 133, 167 Stausberg, Michael 7, 39 f., 80, 113, 225 f., 262 stigma 44 Stoddard, Robert H. 38 f. Stuckrad, Kocku van 35, 52, 109 suffering 81, 107, 154, 220, 235 f., 242– 248, 251, 253, 258 superheroes 56 superhuman persons (discussion of term) 57–59, 61–67, 69, 72–74, 76, 79, 82, 84 f., 104, 131, 142, 148, 156, 161, 171, 181, 185 f., 203, 215, 218 f., 226, 230, 241, 249, 251–254, 258–260 Sweden 45, 157 Sydney 7, 9 f., 19, 28, 32–35, 63 synchronization 79 Tandberg, Håkon Naasen 7, 62 Taves, Ann 60, 260 Taylor, Charles 58 terrorism 44 testimony 71, 242, 250 Tetris 46, 81 theater 46, 56 Thor 52 thresholds 65 thunderstorm 52 Tolkien, J.R.R. 51 Toronto 7, 9, 19, 22, 29, 110, 135 f., 179, 214, 234 trading 53, 186 trance 64 transcendence 81 f., 155 transportation 40, 147 f., 220, 224 transrealm interaction 42, 47, 57, 61, 63–70, 72–74, 77, 79–81, 84 f., 89 f., 92–95, 98, 100–106, 109 f., 120, 129– 131, 133 f., 136, 145 f., 151–156, 161, 163–165, 169, 172, 175 f., 180 f., 184– 186, 188–190, 193, 195, 201–203, 206 f., 209, 215, 218 f., 224, 228–230, 232 f., 235–237, 239, 241–246, 248–254, 258– 260

307 – discussion of 20 Trinity 22, 93, 119, 168 Turner, Edith and Victor 37 f., 79, 88, 225, 236 Tweed, Thomas A. 7, 60 f., 65, 72, 127, 236, 243, 245 f., 262 Twitter 15, 78 Tylor, Edward B. 58 Tyner, Sophie E. 28, 257 Tyson, Mike 52 UNESCO 91 Unger, Fromme 44 United Kingdom 32 f., 63, 157 United Nations 91, 93, 107, 112 f., 120 f., 133 United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) 9, 18, 143, 148 United States of America 173 unity 88, 101, 122, 149, 186, 199, 202, 230 f., 244 Upper Room 102 f., 149 Ur 40, 141 Uruguay 96 van Gennep, Arnold 65 Vatican 7, 17 f., 21, 89–93, 97, 99, 101, 107, 109–111, 114 f., 119–121, 123, 131, 138–140, 142–145, 157, 160, 168, 179, 188, 193 f. veneration 64, 69, 169, 210 Vietnam 40 Vineyard Movement 74 violence 44, 112, 138, 157, 167 f., 178 virtual reality 40, 56, 247 virtual realms 40, 46 f., 55–57, 62, 66, 82, 156, 258, 262, 267 f. Vishnu 72 visualization 46 vocation 25, 91, 94, 99, 111 f., 114, 191 vulnerability 82, 84 Wagner, Rachel 42–45, 47, 52, 55–57, 62,

308 66, 79, 156, 190 f., 203, 206, 208 f., 238, 240, 242 f. war 46, 52, 64, 92, 97 f., 111, 113, 120, 122, 133, 137, 148, 181, 258 Warszawa 9, 53, 103, 122 f., 126, 263, 265 Washington, D.C. 40, 60, 143, 161, 173 Webber, Ruth 32–35, 257 Weigel, George 17, 21, 28, 92, 100, 103, 109, 114, 122 f., 126, 129, 204 Westad, Odd Arne 98, 120, 137 World of Warcraft 42, 66 f., 194 worlds (discussion of term) 15, 42, 46, 51, 55, 65–67, 76, 80, 84, 109, 208, 247

Index WYD Cross 7, 22, 91, 109, 124–127, 129 f., 172 f. WYF, (communist) World Youth Festival, World Festival of Youth 121, 132 Wysocki, Jan 80 Xbox

80, 231

Zduniak, Agnieszka 31 Zeiler, Xenia 41, 43 Zimmerman, Eric 43–45, 56, 62, 87