CHRIST BRINGS ENERGY, LIGHT, STRENGTH TO DIFFICULT WORLD

VATICAN CITY, JAN 14, 1999 (VIS) - Today, at the end of their four-day meeting, the Holy Father welcomed the participants in the symposium organized by the Pontifical Council for Culture, on the theme "Christ, Source of a New Culture for Europe, on the Threshold of the Third Millennium." The meeting was promoted in preparation for the second assembly for Europe of the Synod of Bishops.

Remarking on Europe's two millennia of Christian culture, the Pope told the participants that they are "today witnesses to a cultural change which, throughout this century, has shaken Europe to its foundations, and to the desire to deepen the meaning of life, legitimately manifested by our contemporaries. The meeting between culture and faith is an exigency of the search for truth."

In seeking the truth, he went on, people will, "with the help of grace, encounter He Who is their Creator and Savior. ... Christ reveals man to himself in his fullness as a child of God, in his inalienable dignity as a person, in the greatness of his intelligence, capable of reaching the truth, and in his will, capable of acting well."

John Paul II pointed out that "borders among States have been opened; new barriers should not be erected among people nor new enmities arise among peoples, because of ideologies. The search for truth must be the driving force behind every cultural process and of fraternal relations within the heart of the continent. ... Our contemporaries must be given a true education based on basic spiritual, moral and civic values."

"In a world where difficulties are numerous," concluded the Pope, "Christ's message reveals an infinite horizon and brings incomparable energy, light for intelligence, strength for the will, love for the heart."

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