On Saturday evening, Rome became the capital of hope. Pope Leo XIV led a procession of young people from 146 countries carrying the Jubilee Cross. Twenty-five years after John Paul II’s meeting with young people at Tor Vergata during the Jubilee of the Year 2000, Rome once again became the beating heart of the young generation. In the first meeting with young people from around the world at the height of the Jubilee devoted to youth, Pope Leo invited them to transform the world through the gentle yet revolutionary power of faith. The prayer vigil concluded with Eucharistic adoration against the backdrop of the melodies of the devotional song “Eccomi”.
“How much the world needs missionaries of the Gospel who are witnesses of justice and peace! How much the future needs men and women who are witnesses of hope!”.
“In this ongoing commitment”, Prevost held Saint Augustine up as a guiding light for young people and entrusted them with one of his personal prayers: “Thank you, Jesus, for calling me. My desire is to remain as one of your friends, so that, embracing you, I may also be a companion on the journey for anyone I meet. Grant, O Lord, that those who meet me may encounter you, even through my limitations and frailties.” “Through praying these words, our dialogue will continue each time we look at the crucified Lord, for our hearts will be united in him”, the Pope assured, extending the embrace of one of Rome’s beautiful sunsets indefinitely: “persevere in faith, with joy and courage. Thank you!” During the prayer vigil, the Pope responded to three questions in Spanish, Italian and English, which focused on the themes of friendship, courage and spirituality. He then called on everyone to pray for two girls who had died while travelling to Rome for the Jubilee, and for a Spanish boy who is currently hospitalised at Bambino Gesù hospital. “Love one another”, the Pope continued in unscripted remarks, with a call to love one another in Christ:
“Friendship can truly change the world. Friendship is a path to peace.”
“Among the many cultural connections that characterize our lives, internet and social media have become “an extraordinary opportunity for dialogue, encounter and exchange between persons, as well as access to information and knowledge”: the Pope’s opening remarks were followed by an important reminder, in the footsteps of Pope Francis.
“These tools are misleading when they are controlled by commercialism and interests that fragment our relationships.” “It is then that our relationships become confused, restless or unstable” for “when a tool controls someone, that person becomes a tool.”
Our life begins and grows through releationships. In this process, culture plays a fundamental role: “it is like the lens through which we understand ourselves and interpret the world.” And and its vocabulary should be about truth, not lies.
“Only genuine relationships and stable connections can build good lives”,
the Pope assured. He chose Augustine as an example: a man with a turbulent youth who found profound purpose. He “he did not silence the cry of his heart.” “He sought the truth, the truth that does not disappoint and the beauty that does not fade”, and he found it “By finding the one who was already looking for him: Jesus Christ” who had always been his friend. “Friendship with Christ, which forms the basis of faith, is not just one aid among many others for building the future; it is our guiding star”, Pope Leo said quoting Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati: “o live without faith, without a patrimony to defend, without a steady struggle for truth, is not living, but existing.”
Then comes the ultimate choice, the decision that shapes our lives: “What kind of man do you want to be? What kind of woman do you want to be?”
“We learn to choose through the trials of life, but above all by remembering that we have been chosen. A scegliere si impara attraverso le prove della vita, e prima di tutto ricordando che siamo stati scelti”, said Leo XIV: “We received life as a gift, without choosing it! Our existence did not originate from our decision, but from a love that wanted us.” The Pope went on to recall the words spoken by Saint John Paul II in this same place twenty-five years ago: “It is Jesus in fact that you seek when you dream of happiness; he is waiting for you when nothing else you find satisfies you; he is the beauty to which you are so attracted; it is he who provokes you with that thirst for fullness that will not let you settle for compromise; it is he who urges you to shed the masks of a false life; it is he who reads in your hearts your most genuine choices, the choices that others try to stifle.”
Pope Leo mentioned Matrimony, Holy Orders, and Consecrated Life as “radical and meaningful choices.”
To the endless multitude of young people who crowded the esplanade overlooked by Calatrava’s Vela, the Pope shared the secret to encountering Jesus, “the friend who always accompanies us in the formation of our conscience”:
“Listen to his word, which is the Gospel of salvation!” “And seek justice in order to build a more humane world. Serve the poor, and so bear witness to the good that we would always like to receive from our neighbours. Adore Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, the source of eternal life. Study, work and love according to the example of Jesus, the good Teacher who always walks beside us.”
“As we seek what is good, let us ask him at every step: stay with us, Lord!”, Leo’s counsel: “Stay with us, because without you we cannot do the good we desire. You want what our good; indeed Lord you are our good. Those who encounter you also want others to encounter you, because your word is a light brighter than any star, illuminating even the darkest night.” “Those who believe are never alone”, he said quoting Benedict XIV. “We encounter Christ in the Church, that is, in the communion of those who sincerely seek him.”
