Seven of us packed ourselves into a van and headed off to the WYD site office at Randwick. At this point even though we do not have exclusive access yet (another week or so to go) construction and work is underway. The ‘toilet city’ is well under construction (you can see it in the green fenced area in the photos below) in what will be the main axis aisles and the area of the stage/sanctuary is being cleared of scrub (immediately below) in preparation.
We were driven round to the sanctuary area and stood at a height of about 9 metres to see what the Holy Father would see, even though the sanctuary will be a few metres higher. It will be quite a site to look out to this vast area and see it filled with jubilant young people as they arrive on Saturday, sleep there Saturday night and swell in numbers on Sunday for the final Mass.
It was good to finally actually site the Racecourse as this will be the location of that huge logistical task of distributing Holy Communion on the Sunday. And in regards to that I am very happy to let you know that we have brought on board three Franciscan brothers to coordinate the process, organising the personnel and fine tuning the procedures at both Barangaroo for the opening Mass and Randwick for the closing Mass. It is such a blessing to have them join us as they will be able to devote their energies into this mammoth job. No doubt we will be back to Randwick a number of times again very soon to walk the distances and see further progress unfolding.
On the way back we drove through Centennial Park which is the second part of the Southern Cross Precinct. We are expecting an overflow crowd of up to 200000 in this area. They will watch the Mass take place via huge screens and be able to receive Holy Communion from the Park.
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