by Jay Soldner
Special to The Leaven
Keegan Colbern, a seminarian from Mother Teresa of Calcutta Parish in Topeka, shared with The Leaven memorable moments of his World Youth Day journey.
Q: Why did you go to World Youth Day?
A: As a seminarian, we were invited to come along. So I came with the rest of my brothers.
Q: Can you tell me about a time on the trip when a person’s kindness made a difference for you?
A: There was one day that I was having a bit of a hard time with the way the day went. Another seminarian brother, Dan Mauro, just came and talked to me and it made my day much better.
Q: What was the biggest challenge for you personally?
A: Possibly seeing the lack of other priests not from our diocese of feeding their people, giving them more truth. They watered down our faith a lot and that was hard to see because the people were hungry and excited for more truth, more faith, in the talks. It just wasn’t provided.
Q: Is it too early to name a highlight of the trip?
A: I think the highlight was probably seeing all the faithful and how excited they were for the faith. I didn’t expect there to be much faith in Europe. And so it was good to see that the faith is still alive.
Q: Where did you sleep, and how did you sleep?
A: I slept on a gym floor on top of a small air mattress. I slept pretty good. most nights were pretty straight through.
Q: If you could replay your favorite memories from Portugal, what would they be?
A: I think my favorite memories would be watching the crowd see the pope and the excitement of them, the cheering, just trying to push through to get to see him closer was very cool.
Q: How was the trip different than you imagined going in?
A: It was very different in that there was more time for prayer than I was expecting, and there was some good reflections that I got from it. The graces of it were challenging me to be a better Catholic, live my faith better and hope to bring others to their faith more.
Q: What is a pilgrim nowadays?
A: A pilgrim nowadays is a person who goes out to receive special graces that they can’t receive at home. So they have to make the challenging journey to better receive those graces by increasing their disposition.
To view the album of photos from the pilgrimage, click here.
