From the

Official News Magazine of the Diocese of Spokane

Guatemala youth add to international character of diocese’s WYD experience

by Bill McMillan, for the Inland Register

Photo: Catarina Tulul Tzoc and Juana Tzep Quiche of Guatemala joined the Youth Group from St. Mary Parish, Spokane, for the pilgrimage to World Youth Day in an occasionally rainy Toronto. (IR photo from Bill McMillan)

(Editor’s note: Bill McMillan was one of the adults who accompanied the World Youth Day group from Spokane to Toronto. Among the Spokane pilgrims were two young women from the mission area in Guatemala supported by the Spokane Diocese.)

Returning to Spokane from World Youth Day in Toronto, everyone on the bus listened intently as Catarina Tulul Tzoc and Juana Tzep Quiché told us about their life in the mountains of Guatemala: the hard work, the abuse of women, traveling to Guatemala City at the age of 8 to get a job.

Their stories were interpreted by high-school student Juan Cuevas of Our Lady of the Desert parish in Mattawa, Wash., and now the 40 Youth Group members and their chaperones waited for the answer to the key questions they had wanted to ask:

What did they think of America? What was the biggest difference they saw between their small village of Tzucubal near Ixtuhaucán and our life in the United States? Would it be the mounds of food at Old Country Buffet? The freeways with their fast-moving SUVs? The big cities of Chicago and Toronto?

The answer surprised us: The biggest difference was cultural —the fact that women were treated as equals; that males and females of any age could sit together on the bus, laughing and joking with one another.

The two young women are youth leaders in their village. Father David Baronti, a priest of the Spokane Diocese who serves in the Guatemala mission, selected the two to attend World Youth Day with the Spokane Diocese delegation. Juana and Catarina were sponsored by theYouth Group of St. Mary’s parish in Spokane. Holy Rosary Parish, Pomeroy; St. Patrick Parish, Walla Walla; and individual donors contributed to make their trip possible.

Even though they did not speak English, there were enough people on the bus who spoke a little Spanish that communication was not a problem. They even taught us a few words of the Ki’che language, and would sing the Lord’s Prayer in this native tongue at the end of our daily prayer sessions on the bus.

Juana and Catarina thoroughly enjoyed their trip, were inspired by the words of our Holy Father, and touched us all with their courage and their faith.

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