Pope Francis encourages blind young people to be pilgrims of hope

Pope Francis has received in the Clementine Hall of the Vatican a group of children and young people belonging to the Italian Union of Blind and Low Vision People, whom he encouraged to be pilgrims of hope in the Jubilee Year.

At the beginning of their meeting, the Holy Father encouraged those present to reiterate the motto of the Jubilee 2025, with increasing force, until, satisfied, he congratulated them with a “bravo!”

Pope Francis then wished them to always be “people on the journey” who always have the desire to continue “always on the road, never stopped, never arrived, always with the desire to move forward.”

In his address, the Pontiff recalled that the pilgrim is more than a walker, because he has a particular goal: “A holy place, which attracts him, which motivates him, which sustains him in his fatigue.”

In the case of the ordinary Jubilee of 2025, the goal is a holy door “that allows us to enter new life, free from the slavery of sin, free to love and serve God and neighbor.”

The pilgrim is also distinguished from the wayfarer because he is eager “to find Jesus, to know him, to listen to his Word that gives meaning to life, fills it with a different joy, a joy that does not remain ‘outside’, on the surface. , but it fills the heart and warms it, a joy that is peace, goodness, tenderness.”

Next, Pope Francis proposed examples of saints who demonstrate that “only Jesus can give this joy.” Thus he cited Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati, Saint Francis and Saint Clare of Assisi or Saint Teresa of the Child Jesus.

The Pontiff concluded by stating that pilgrims of hope are “children and young people who have found the Lord Jesus and have walked with him, and he is the hope for every man, every woman and also for the world.”

Following that path, Pope Francis added, “we too will become small signs of hope for those who find us.”