ROME (CNS) — Acknowledging how young people have been given a world marked by inequality, injustice, war and environmental degradation, Pope Francis urged those on the lookout for solutions to be concrete, to involve the poor, to take care of the Earth and to create jobs.
“Our generation has left you with a wealthy heritage, but we now have not known learn how to protect the planet and aren’t securing peace,” Pope Francis told some 1,000 young adult economists, entrepreneurs, financial advisers, students, scholars and scientists from 120 countries on the closing session of the Economy of Francesco event in Assisi.
The gathering Sept. 22-24 originally was planned for March 2020 but was postponed due to COVID-19 pandemic. As an alternative, the young people spent greater than two years working online with older experts, studying agriculture and employment, peace and ecology and finance and development within the search for tactics to make the economy higher for more people and for the environment.
“Our generation has left you with a wealthy heritage, but we now have not known learn how to protect the planet and aren’t securing peace.”
The project is known as in honor of St. Francis of Assisi, known for his love of the poor and of creation, and has been supported by the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development.
At the top of the meeting, participants gave Pope Francis a pact, promising to work for “an economy of peace and never of war; an economy that counteracts the proliferation of weapons, especially probably the most destructive ones; an economy that cares for creation and doesn’t plunder it; an economy on the service of the person, the family and life, respectful of each woman, man, child, the elderly and particularly the frail and vulnerable.”
The pope encouraged the young people also to dedicate themselves to preserving and increasing their “spiritual capital,” the religion and values that can give intending to their studies, their work and, especially, to their lives.
The pope encouraged the young people also to dedicate themselves to preserving and increasing their “spiritual capital.”
In spite of everything, he said, “human beings, created within the image and likeness of God, are seekers of meaning before being seekers of fabric goods,” but the trendy world is losing sight of “this essential form of capital, gathered over centuries by religions, clever traditions and popular piety.”
Inspired by St. Francis of Assisi, he said, a latest economic model should be “an economy of friendship with the earth and an economy of peace. It’s a matter of reworking an economy that kills into an economy of life, in all its facets.”
Love for the poor and for the Earth must go hand in hand, he said. But it should require sacrifice and radical change.
“The earth is burning today,” he said. “If we speak of ecological transition but remain within the economic paradigm of the twentieth century, which plundered the earth and its natural resources, then the strategies we adopt will all the time be insufficient.”
“We human beings, in these last two centuries, have grown on the expense of the earth. We now have often plundered to extend our own well-being, and never even the well-being of all.”
“We human beings, in these last two centuries, have grown on the expense of the earth. We now have often plundered to extend our own well-being, and never even the well-being of all,” Pope Francis told the young people. “Now could be the time for brand spanking new courage in abandoning fossil fuels to speed up the event of zero- or positive-impact sources of energy.”
When the pope arrived on the gathering, young adults from Italy, Benin, Argentina, Thailand, Kenya, Afghanistan and Poland shared their stories and projects — from creating farms and educating farmers in regenerative agriculture to creating small businesses or rallying other young people to persuade corporations to stop producing single-use plastic bottles and bags.
Andrea, a young Italian in jail for murder but given permission to attend the Assisi event, spoke about his digital marketing work through a prison-based cooperative, which provides distant employees for corporations in addition to a workshop for repairing espresso machines for coffee bars.
“People coming out of prison should be modified and transformed from a ‘cost item’ to a ‘resource’ for society.”
“I’m not an economist, nevertheless it seems quite logical to me to think that prison, with a purpose to be an excellent investment for society, must achieve concrete results, and these are mainly two: security and nil recidivism,” Andrea said. “People coming out of prison should be modified and transformed from a ‘cost item’ to a ‘resource’ for society.”
Concluding his speech with a prayer, Pope Francis asked God to forgive the older generation “for having damaged the earth, for not having respected Indigenous cultures, for not having valued and loved the poorest of the poor, for having created wealth without communion.”
He prayed that the Holy Spirit would proceed to encourage the young people and that God would “bless them of their undertakings, studies and dreams.”
“Support their eager for the nice and for all times, lift them up when facing disappointments because of bad examples, don’t allow them to turn out to be discouraged but as a substitute may they proceed on their path,” the pope prayed. “You, whose only begotten Son became a carpenter, grant them the enjoyment of reworking the world with love, ingenuity and hands.”
