Pope Francis at the World Youth Day in Panama City 2019. (CNS photo/Paul Haring) Bishops in the Middle East have called for a regional youth gathering similar to World Youth Day to be established for young Catholics in Arab countries.
The proposed ‘World Day of Youth of the Arab Regions’ would take place in Jordan as the first host country with the goal of encouraging “mass participation”, according to the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem.
A total of 14 bishops representing Catholics from Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, Israel, Cyprus and Somalia met with Pope Francis in Rome last week.
There they discussed the possibility of an Arab World Youth Day gathering at the meeting of the Conference of Latin Bishops of the Arab Regions (CELRA).
The Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem said more details would be released at the next CELRA meeting in Lebanon in February 2021.
World Youth Day, which takes place every two to three years, was first established by Pope John Paul II in 1985.
The next World Youth Day is scheduled to take place in Lisbon, Portugal in 2022 with the theme: “Mary arose and went with haste.”