Pope Francis met this Friday, May 24, the feast of Mary Help of Christians, with about 80 young people in a parish in Rome.
According to the Vatican Press Office, “this afternoon, in the parish of Saint Bernadette Soubirous, in the Colli Aniene neighborhood, Pope Francis met with about 80 children and young people.”
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The meeting takes place within the framework of the so-called “School of Prayer”, in preparation for the Jubilee of 2025.
The Holy Father arrived accompanied by Mons. Rino Fisichella, Pro-prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization, and answered some questions, such as that of Titian, who questioned the Holy Father about his vocation.
“Each one of us must ask this question because the Lord has a plan for each of us. “Each one must seek to understand what the Lord wants from us, ask Him,” also in prayer, Pope Francis responded.
Regarding friendship, the Holy Father highlighted the need to “not walk alone” so as not to succumb “in the labyrinths of life” and highlighted the importance of “talking about one’s own situation.”
Pope Francis also gave advice to a young man who said he did not believe in God: “No one condemns themselves for not believing. It is important to be on the road. If I see a young man who does not move, who is sitting there in life, who does not like to move, that is bad. But if I see a young man warming up and moving, I take my hat off. “Move for an ideal.”
Speaking later to a young married couple, the Holy Father reiterated his concern about the low birth rate in Italy and highlighted the need for fertility, “which is always a message of great hope.”
To conclude, Pope Francis recalled that to be credible, the Church “must strip itself of all worldliness,” since its values “are those of the Gospel, not those of a society that calls itself Catholic.”
What is the School of Prayer?
On January 21, Pope Francis officially inaugurated the Year of Prayer 2024, dedicated in a particular way to prayer to prepare for the Jubilee of 2025, which will take place in Rome under the motto “Pilgrims of Hope.”
Bishop Fisichella explained at the beginning of this year that the Holy Father wants to have with this time “an intense year of prayer, in which hearts can open to receive the abundance of grace.”
The Italian archbishop also specified that the “School of Prayer” is one of the various initiatives promoted by Pope Francis, which will have moments of meeting “with some categories of people to pray together including some forms of prayer” with “individuals and families of the Diocese of Rome.”
Walter Sánchez Silva
I have been a husband since 2008. My wife and I have three children here and one who went to heaven in 2023, before he was born. Since I joined ACI Prensa in 2005, I have had the opportunity to cover various events of the Catholic Church. Among them, the World Youth Days in Cologne, Madrid and Rio de Janeiro and the apostolic trips of Pope Benedict XVI to Mexico and of Pope Francis to South Korea. I have been sent to the Vatican to cover the Family synods, in 2015; of the Amazon, in 2019 and that of Synodality, in 2023. I closely follow the situation of the Catholic Church in Nicaragua, which suffers persecution from the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega, as well as current ecclesiastical events in the region.