
Tens of thousands attend youth pilgrimage to Mexico's Cristo Rey shrine
FREE Catholic Classes
More than 37,000 young people made a pilgrimage Saturday to the Christ the King shrine on Cerro del Cubilete in Mexico's Guanajuato state.

Highlights
Catholic Online (https://www.catholic.org)
2/27/2019 (6 years ago)
Published in Americas
Keywords: Tens of thousands, youth pilgrimage, Mexico's Cristo
Leon, Mexico, (CNA) - The Feb. 23 pilgrimage was organized, as it is each year, by the national youth movement Witness and Hope and had as its theme "Youth to politics: Commitment of faith, solidarity and peace."
This year the date of the 10 mile walk was changed from the last Saturday of January to the last of February, due to World Youth Day in Panama, which took place Jan. 22-27.
The aim of the pilgrimage, the organizers said, is "to prepare ourselves to engage in politics, true politics, without labels, without euphemisms, in the true sense of attaining the common good."
The present Cristo Rey which crowns Cerro del Cubilete, a little more than 30 miles southeast of Leon, is 75 feet tall and was erected in 1950 as a tribute to the martyrs of the Cristero War. In the 1920s persecution by the Mexican government against the Catholic faith, which involved the banning of religious congregations, limitations on worship, prohibiting a priest from dressing as such, reached a point at which civilians in various parts of the country took up arms.
The Mexican government responded with even greater repression and the killing of priests and laity. Among the martyrs of the Cristero War was Saint JosĂ© SĂ¡nchez del RĂÂo, who was executed at 14 years of age.
The Cristero forces were known for their cries of "Long live Christ the King" and "Long live the Virgin of Guadalupe!"
The present Cristo Rey statue stands where a smaller one was dynamited in 1928 by the government of Mexican President Plutarco ElĂÂas Calles, during the war.
Archbishop Alfonso Cortés Contreras of Leon celebrated Mass at the shrine and stressed to the young pilgrims the importance of being actively engaged in politics and seeking the common good.
Also attending the pilgrimage was Jerson Velasco, the director of the National Coordination for Adolescents and Young People of the Venezuelan bishops' conference, who shared with the pilgrims about the suffering going on in his country.
"We have lacked food, we have lacked medicine, who have lacked a Christian government, but we have never lacked hope," he said.
The organizers of the pilgrimage sent their "prayers and expressed their brotherhood with Venezuelan young people who are in the midst of fighting for freedom, democracy and the minimal guarantees of a decent life, without violence, without the shortages of the economic catastrophe and with respect for religious freedom."
---
'Help Give every Student and Teacher FREE resources for a world-class Moral Catholic Education'
Copyright 2021 - Distributed by Catholic Online
Join the Movement
When you sign up below, you don't just join an email list - you're joining an entire movement for Free world class Catholic education.
-
- Easter / Lent
- Ascension Day
- 7 Morning Prayers
- Mysteries of the Rosary
- Litany of the Bl. Virgin Mary
- Popular Saints
- Popular Prayers
- Female Saints
- Saint Feast Days by Month
- Stations of the Cross
- St. Francis of Assisi
- St. Michael the Archangel
- The Apostles' Creed
- Unfailing Prayer to St. Anthony
- Pray the Rosary

Pope Leo XIV Reaches Out to Gaza Parish Amid Intensified Violence

When AI Claims to Be God, the Church Must Answer

Turning Crosses into Ladders
Daily Catholic
Daily Readings for Wednesday, September 17, 2025
St. Robert Bellarmine: Saint of the Day for Wednesday, September 17, 2025
Prayer for Holiness: Prayer of the Day for Wednesday, September 17, 2025
Daily Readings for Tuesday, September 16, 2025
St. Cornelius: Saint of the Day for Tuesday, September 16, 2025
- Ave Maria - Hail Mary: Prayer of the Day for Tuesday, September 16, 2025
Copyright 2025 Catholic Online. All materials contained on this site, whether written, audible or visual are the exclusive property of Catholic Online and are protected under U.S. and International copyright laws, © Copyright 2025 Catholic Online. Any unauthorized use, without prior written consent of Catholic Online is strictly forbidden and prohibited.
Catholic Online is a Project of Your Catholic Voice Foundation, a Not-for-Profit Corporation. Your Catholic Voice Foundation has been granted a recognition of tax exemption under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Federal Tax Identification Number: 81-0596847. Your gift is tax-deductible as allowed by law.