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Skriven 2006-04-08 19:16:26 av Marc Lewis (1:396/45)
Ärende: Vatican Information Service (Press Release)
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                The following press release is Copyrighted by the
                          Vatican Information Service.
                ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
                               VIS-Press releases

THE POPE MEETS WITH YOUNG PEOPLE IN ST. PETER'S SQUARE

VATICAN CITY, APR 7, 2006 (VIS) - Yesterday evening in St. Peter's Square,
Benedict XVI participated in a gathering of young people from the diocese of
Rome. The meeting was held in preparation for 21st World Youth Day (WYD) which
will be celebrated on Palm Sunday, April 9, in dioceses all over the world on
the theme: "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path."

Prior to the Pope's arrival, orchestras and choirs entertained the crowd, their
music at times accompanied by dances. Italian singers such as Ron and Giuseppe
Povia also participated in the event.

The Pope arrived at 6 p.m. and greeted the young people present. Together with
them, he then welcomed the World Youth Day Cross, carried into the square by a
group of youths from the German city of Cologne, site of last year's WYD.

Maddalena Santoro, the sister of Fr. Andrea Santoro who was murdered in
Trabzon, Turkey in February this year, read out some words recalling the life
and testimony of her brother, who was a priest from the diocese of Rome. After
her reading, Benedict XVI rose to embrace her and thank her for participating
in the event.

The Pope then answered questions from five young people concerning the themes
of Holy Scripture, love, apostolate, vocation, and the relationship between
science and faith.

"The Bible," said the Holy Father to the first of his questioners, an
engineering student who wished to know whether Holy Scripture is always the
Word of God, "cannot be read as if it were a history book. ... The Word cannot
be read as an academic exercise, but by praying and saying to God: 'Help me to
understand Your Word'."

The Pope also recommended Holy Scripture be read while closely following "the
masters of 'Lectio Divina,' ... in the company of the People of God, and in
communion with the Church which transmits the Word down through the centuries."

On the second theme, love, the Holy Father recalled how the first pages of
Scripture say that for love "man will abandon his father and his mother; he
will follow a woman and they will become one flesh, one life. From the
beginning, then, we are given a prophecy of what marriage is, a vision that
will remain the same in the New Testament. ... It is a Sacrament of the Creator
of the Universe inscribed in human beings themselves. ... Thus, it is not an
invention of the Church."

On the subject of the apostolate, the Pope said that it consisted above all in
"bringing God into our societies and our lives. ... God Who showed us His face
in Jesus, Who loved us unto death and Who overcame violence."

Replying to another young person who asked him about vocations, Benedict XVI
then explained his own decision to become a priest. "I grew up in a world very
different from ours," he said, "on the one hand there was a 'situation of
Christianity' and it was normal to go to church, on the other we lived under
the Nazi regime which sought a world without priests. Faced with this brutal
and inhuman culture, I understood that the Gospel and the faith show us the
right path to follow."

Other factors, the Pope went on, also helped him to discover his vocation, such
as theology and the "beauty of the liturgy. ... Obviously there was no lack of
difficulties and I asked myself if I would manage to live my entire life in
celibacy, aware that theology was not enough to be a good priest. ... Courage
and humility are also necessary, as are the trust and openness to ask oneself
what the Lord wants. It is a great adventure, but life can only be lived if we
have the courage to dare and the faith that the Lord will not abandon us."

Finally, the Pope spoke on the subject of science and faith, explaining that
while mathematics is a creation of the human mind that explains the laws of
nature, "there is an intelligence that precedes mathematics and natural laws,
the intelligence of God; in other words, an 'intelligent plan' which created
both nature with its laws and the human mind."

"There are two possibilities," he added, "God exists or He does not exist. In
other words, we recognize the precedence of a creative intellect ... or we
uphold the precedence of the irrational. In the end, we cannot speak of
'proving' one project or the other, but the great option of Christianity is the
option for rationality, for the precedence of reason."

At the end of the meeting, the Pope symbolically handed the Bible to a number
of young people, affirming that it is "a lamp to your feet," he also recalled
John Paul II, "a great witness to the Word of God." Then, accompanied by a
group of young people, he went down to the Vatican Grottoes to pray before the
tomb of his predecessor.
.../YOUTH DIOCESE ROME/... VIS 060407 (850)

SUMMARY

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