Vatican City, 28 November 2015 (VIS) –
The Holy Father's last act in Kenya was his encounter with the young
in the Kasarani stadium, where he set aside his prepared discourse
and instead directly responded to some questions, in his native
Spanish. The following are extensive extracts from Pope Francis'
answers.
“There exists a question at the basis
of all the questions you have asked me. Why are there divisions,
struggles, war, death and fanaticism? Why is there this desire for
self-destruction? In the first page of the Bible, after all the
wonders that God worked, a brother kills his own brother. The spirit
of evil leads us to destruction; the spirit of evil leads us to
disunity, to tribalism, to corruption, to drug abuse. … It leads us
to destruction through fanaticism. Manuel asked me, 'What can we do
to ensure that ideological fanaticism does not rob us of our brothers
or friends?'. … The first thing I would say in response is that a
man loses the best of his humanity, and a woman loses the best of her
humanity, when they forget to pray, because they consider themselves
omnipotent; they do not feel the need to ask the Lord's help when
faced with so many tragedies. Life is full of difficulties, but there
are two ways of looking at difficulties: either you can see them as
something that obstructs you, that destroys you, or you can see them
as a real opportunity. It is up to you to choose. For me, is a
difficulty either a path to destruction, or an opportunity to
overcome my situation, or that of my family, my community or my
country? … Some of the difficulties that you have mentioned are
challenges”.
“One challenge that Lynette mentioned
is that of tribalism. Tribalism destroys a nation: … it can be
defeated by using our ear, our heart and our hand. With our ears, we
listen: what is your culture? Why are you this way? Why does your
tribe have this habit or this custom? … With the heart: after
listening, the answer is to open your heart; and finally, to extend
you hand so as to continue the dialogue. … I would now like to
invite all you young people … to come here and to take each other
by the hand; let us stand up and take each other by the hand as a
sign against tribalism. We are all a single nation! … Conquering
tribalism is a task to be carried out day by day: it is the work of
the ear, in listening to others; the work of the heart, opening one's
heart to others; and the work of the hand, extending one's hand to
others”.
“Another question is that of
corruption. … Corruption is something that enters into us. It is
like sugar: it is sweet, we like it, it's easy, but then, it ends
badly. With so much easy sugar we end up diabetic, and so does our
country. Every time we accept a bribe and put it in our pocket, we
destroy our heart, we destroy our personality and we destroy our
homeland. … What you steal through corruption remains … in the
heart of the many men and women who have been harmed by your example
of corruption. It remains in the lack of the good you should have
done and did not do. It remains in sick and hungry children, because
the money that was for them, through your corruption, you kept for
yourself. Boys and girls, corruption is not a path for life, it is a
path of death”.
“Manuel too asked some incisive
questions. … What can we do to prevent the recruitment of our loved
ones [by militias]? What can we do to bring them back? To answer this
question we need to know why a young person, full of hope, lets
himself be recruited or indeed seeks to be recruited: he leaves
behind his family, his friends, he drifts away from life, because he
learns how to kill. And this is a question that you must address to
the authorities. If a young person, a boy or a girl, a man or a
woman, has no job and cannot study, what can he or she do? … The
first thing we must do to prevent the young from being recruited or
seeking recruitment is to focus on education and work. If young
people have no job, what future awaits them? … This is the danger.
It is a social danger, that comes from beyond us, from beyond the
country, because it depends on the international system, which is
unjust, and which places the economy and the god of money at its
centre, rather than the person”.
“Another question was: how can we see
the hand of God in the tragedies of life? … Men and women all over
the world ask themselves this question in one way or another, and
they find no explanation. There are questions to which, no matter how
much we try to respond, we are unable to find an answer. How can I
see the hand of God in a tragedy of life? There is just one answer:
no, there is no answer. There is just one route, looking at the Son
of God. God delivered Him to us to save all of us. God Himself became
a tragedy. God let Himself be destroyed on the cross. And when the
moment comes when you do not understand, when you are desperate and
the world seems to fall down around you, look to the Cross! There we
see God's failure, God's destruction. But there is also the challenge
of our faith. Because the story did not end with this failure: there
was then the Resurrection, which renewed us all”.
“A final question … What words do
you have for young people who have not experienced love in their own
families? Is it possible to come out of this experience? There are
abandoned children everywhere: either they are abandoned at birth, or
they were abandoned by life, by the family and parents, and do not
feel the affection of the family. This is why the family is so
important. … There is just one cure to emerge from this experience:
give what you have not received. If you have not received
understanding, be understanding with others; if you have not received
love, love others; if you have felt the pain of loneliness, draw
close to those who are alone. Flesh is healed with flesh! And God
made Himself flesh to heal us. Let us too do the same towards
others”.
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