World Youth Day

well, what an incredible time we are in. I know I have said this before but I just must stress this again. Here in Australia we have hit economically difficult times with this and that plummeting, shares loosing ground, property on an all time low ebb and petrol prices like no one's business. Just like America, Europe and Asia our financial situation is being dampened.
But what's this? Pilgrims, from around the world converging on Sydney, bringing traffic to a gridlock. Rejoicing, jubilation in the streets. What intense and immense positive energy from 150,000 participants in World Youth Day.
This positive energy is bound to upstage the negativity and doom and gloom that is being taunted by the media. Even Pope Benedict XVI who arrived in Sydney for the first time yesterday looks happy!
I will quote a few lines that were said at the opening of the WYD by PM Kevin Rudd which ring true and encouraging:
He said the young pilgrims were "so much the light of the world at a time when the world has so much darkness". "Too often in the history of the world, when young people travel in great number to other parts of the world, they do so in the cause of war, but you here today are here as pilgrims of peace.
and from Dr Pell, the Archbishop of Sydney these words: "Don't spend your life sitting on the fence, keeping your options open, because only commitments bring fulfillment.
Such positivity and exhuberance is so terrific and can plant a positive outcome for a nation when times are getting tough.