Three young pilgrims of hope offer powerful testimonies of faith, rediscovery, and love at the pre-vigil of the Jubilee of Youth in Tor Vergata, Rome. Their stories, different in language and life experience, converge in a shared desire to respond to God’s love with their own lives.
By Linda Bordoni
In the warmth of the setting Roman sun, hundreds of thousands of young pilgrims of hope awaited the arrival of Pope Leo XIV in Rome’s Tor Vergata space, giving life to an evening of prayer, music, remembrance and sharing on the eve of the culmination of their Jubilee on Sunday morning.
From different countries, cultures and in different idioms, they all spoke the language of faith and fraternity; and joined in their love for Christ, they effortlessly reached out to their peers from all over the world with the passion of youth and the joy of belonging.
Antoine: “I met Christ and everything changed”
Antoine Saint-Claire, 18, from France, began his story by painting the image of a happy childhood in a loving Christian family. Faith, he said, was always present, yet somewhat routine: Mass on Sundays, catechism, the sacraments shared with friends. It was during his teenage years, he added, that a deeper yearning began to stir in him.
“I looked at other young people and saw something more,” he said. “They wept during adoration, they had favourite Bible verses, they spoke to God like a friend, and I wondered why I didn’t feel that way.”
With these questions within, Antoine attended the FRAT pilgrimage to Lourdes in 2023. There, he said, during a moment of adoration after confession, something shifted: “I knelt before the Blessed Sacrament, and in my heart I heard the Lord say: ‘One day, you will see my love.’” A few months later, in the silence of his home, he continued, he had a profound spiritual encounter with Jesus, a moment of peace, love, and deep joy.
“That encounter gave meaning to my life,” Antoine affirmed. “I now know I am loved, and I want to love in return, with all I am.”
“Let us open our hearts,” Antoine urged at the end of his testimony, “each one different, but all capable of receiving love and spreading it. By God’s grace, we will succeed. Amen.”
Gustavo: “I want to sing the praises of the Lord”
Gustavo Eterno, a Brazilian member of the Shalom Catholic Community, spoke about how, for the past 22 years, he has been consecrated in the Shalom Community.
“Fifteen of those years I lived as a celibate. Today, I walk the path of a seminarian, and with God’s grace, I hope to one day be ordained to the priesthood,” he said, introducing himself.
Gustavo described how music played a significant role in his spiritual and personal journey. In his youth, he said, music was a private refuge, a way to express emotions and find solace amid personal struggles. Over time, he added, this interior world began to lose meaning for him, explaining that as he sought love and freedom in secular experiences, ultimately he felt disoriented and distant from God.
“I came to the point of no longer believing in the possibility of true love,” he recalled. “The songs that once spoke of life and friendship began to speak of death.”
His turning point came during a moment of Eucharistic adoration. “My eyes were opened, like the disciples on the road to Emmaus,” he said. “There, I encountered the love I had been seeking.”Eterno concluded by expressing his desire to share this experience through music and witness: “Every second of my life that God allows me to live on this earth, I want to sing the praises of the Lord and help others encounter the same joy that He poured into my life.”
Olimpia: “Chosen to love”
Olimpia Iacono, a physician from Ischia, Italy, offered a deeply personal witness of her vocation to love, not only as a doctor, but as a Christian woman called to serve with her heart.
After completing her medical degree, Olimpia’s life seemed on track, but she added that a sudden breakup and an unexpected move left her disoriented. A mission trip to Argentina became a turning point. During a moment of prayer, inspired by the Gospel of the blind man of Jericho, she said she heard a message whispered to her: “The Lord has chosen you to love.”
“I had always thought my vocation was to be a good doctor or a good wife,” she noted, “But I had never considered the universal vocation of every baptised person: the call to love.”
This call took concrete form when Olimpia met Francesco, a terminally ill patient in her hospital. Through simple gestures, she narrated how she accompanied him through his final weeks.
“His hospital room became a small church,” she recalled. On his birthday, Francesco entered eternal life, she said: “That day, I understood that what seemed like useless suffering had become a time of grace.”
