"Had WYD been held in North America or Europe the greenhouse gas footprint would not have been so large.

In April 2008, three months before WYD, the Pope announced seven new sins. Number four was “polluting the environment”.

What a closing line! Absolutely clutching at straws here.

Yes, the money could have been used for many worthwhile things. We'd have been better off without WYD. Why so much secrecy, perhaps we are not a democracy but an authoritarian, softly-theocratic, free-market state.

In the same year, I was denied (though it was clinically indicated) endodontic therapy for an abscessed tooth in the public clinic upon which I am reliant, and still to this day do not have it. Though I was advised the problem was treatable, I was offered to have tooth pulled out instead, a sacrifice made to fund the catholics perhaps. Unsurprisingly, I denied the offer of removal. Official complaints have proved fruitless, the complaints body is not really independent or rigorous in its oversight. New liability laws restrict my rights to sue.

Wonder if the church will come forward and pay for my root canal, or one of its supporters? I'm waiting...... still.

As a Sydney resident, I found the whole event, and its handling, to be an insult to the NSW people. It is doubly insulting to be required to pay for it.

Sydney was significantly disrupted, with the seemingly random closing of streets in the CBD, coupled with the impossibility of catching public transport at various times during the day.

Possibly even worse - but that might just be a measure of how already jaundiced I was about the incursion on my daily routine - was the general air of holier-than thou that these kids carried around with them. There were roaming gangs of them, bursting into chants in the middle of George Street, oblivious to the chaos around them, smugly secure in their carapace of self-righteousness.

The reason that neither the government nor the church will ever tell us how much the NSW taxpayer had to fork out for this abomination is very simple. There would be such a backlash that the government would not survive another week, and catholics everywhere would instantly achieve pariah status for sucking so greedily at the public teat.

A disgrace all round.

I always thought our contribution to CYW (Catholic Youth Week) was to pay for our politicians' audiences with the Pope - which it seems cost even more than Olympic medals.

World Youth Day - or should that be 'World Catholic Rip-off Week'.
A disgraceful and tawdy spectacle, complete with cruci(fiction) re-enactments more in keeping with an isolated village in the backblocks of Spain or Italy.
The massive financial blow-out (not to mention the virtually criminal lack of funding accountability) was as predictable as was George Pell's support for this nonsensical farce. It is yet another nail in the coffin of the state Labor government, although it is sad that the wielder of the hammer would seem to be that ubiquitous political harlot Malcolm Turnbull - anyone who would join the Roman Catholic Church (or any other church for that matter) for reasons of political advantage has clearly failed the first test of suitability for high office - ie personal integrity.

a loathsome event staged by a loathsome group, led in australia by a loathsome, sanctimonious troll.