At 12:20pm this morning (6:20am EST), in the Clementine Hall at the Vatican Apostolic Palace, the Holy Father, Pope Francis received in audience the members of the Rondine-Cittadella Association for Peace, on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of their activity.
Dear brothers and sisters,
I welcome you with joy on the 20th anniversary of the Rondine-Cittadella Association for Peace. I greet your President, Mister Franco Vaccari and I thank him for his introduction. I greet Cardinal Gualtiero Bassetti, who from the beginning has sustained this reality, smelling in it the perfume of the venerable Giorgio La Pira, and the Archbishop of Arezzo-Cortona-Sansepolcro, Riccardo Fontana. In a special way I greet you young people, who come from countries where conflicts have degenerated into various forms of violence and war; in Rondine, you are living the experience of the International Student House. And you, young men from all regions of Italy, with your teachers of the Fourth Year School. And you too, former students, members, supporters and friends. Welcome!
Your educational commitment is to host young people who, in various parts of the world, are stuck in cultures which are poisoned by pain and hatred; instead, you offer them a bold challenge: to verify in person if the other, he or she who is beyond a closed boundary, of reticulates or impassable walls, is really an enemy as everyone claims. In these twenty years you have developed a method for transforming conflicts, getting young people out of this deception and giving them back to their peoples for a full spiritual, moral, cultural and civil development: generous innocent young people who are born with the weight of failures of previous generations weighing them down.
You have founded this work on two great spiritual roots of your region: Saint Francis of Assisi, stigmatized in La Verna, and Saint Romualdo, founder of Camaldoli. You have chosen well!
I, too, when I chose the name of Francis, I thought of the poor and of peace. Poverty - in the negative sense - is linked with war in a vicious circle that kills people, fuels untold suffering and spreads hatred that does not stop. By choosing to dedicate yourselves to young people, you also commit yourselves to fighting poverty and building peace, as a work of justice and love. An action that nourishes hope and places trust in mankind, especially in young people.
La Pira wrote that La Verna is the launching pad for peace enterprises. On that mountain there is a mystery of pain and transfiguring love and you, who have elaborated the Rondine Method for the creative transformation of conflicts, receive continuous inspiration to progress in the service of the common good. And so you have the privilege of seizing the buds of a flowering of peace for all of humanity.
I have listened to the appeal that you have written and which you will present at the UN on 10 December, on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Listening to a young Palestinian and a young Israeli who together ask the governments of the world to take a step that can reopen the future, transferring the cost of a weapon from the defence budget to the budget of education in order to form a peace leader, a rare thing, something bright! How could you disagree? But we adults can not get away with a 'well done!', No. I feel I have to give you all my support, my sympathy and my blessing.
In fact, your appeal contains and proposes a concrete vision. In the Message for the next World Day of Peace, on 1 January 2019, which has as its theme Good politics is at the service of peace, I reiterate that political responsibility belongs to every citizen, in particular to those who have received the mandate to protect and to rule. This mission consists in safeguarding the law and encouraging dialogue between the actors of society, between generations and between cultures. Listening to you I add: between the parties in conflict. Because trust is created only in dialogue.
When the human being is respected in his fundamental rights - as Saint John XXIII recalled in his Encyclical Pacem in Terris (1963) - the sense of the duty to respect the rights of others sprouts in him. The rights and duties increase the awareness of belonging to the same community, with others and with God (cf PT, 45). We are therefore called to bring and to proclaim peace as the good news of a future where every living being will be considered in his dignity and his rights.
You, dear young people, have chosen to meet together when everything around you and inside you was saying: why? What is it for? Will it be right? And, after the two years of formation at Rondine, you have overthrown your feelings, your thoughts, you have given rise to mutual trust and now you are ready to take professional, civil and political responsibilities for the good of your peoples. You are already those young leaders who in the Appeal are asking States and peoples to commit themselves to forming together!
You ask us to join your appeal. For my part, I will do it, and I ask the Heads of State and Government to do the same. Your voice - weak, but strong in the hope and courage of youth - will be heard on December 10th at the United Nations. They serve leaders with a new mentality. Those who do not know how to dialogue and confront each other are not leaders of peace: a leader who does not try to meet the enemy, to sit with him at the table as you do, can not lead his people to peace. To do this we need humility and not arrogance: Saint Francis helps you to follow this path with courage. Listening to young people, even in the recent Synod in which young people were protagonists, I learned a lot from them. I hope your leaders come to Rondine, and see how young people are preparing peace.
I rejoice that you have chosen the encyclical Laudato si' as a fundamental text for your school: in fact, integral ecology offers the prospect for humanity to conceive itself as the only family and to consider the Earth as a common home. It is good that with your method you want to reach citizens and political leaders, representatives of national and international institutions at the same time. Indeed, peace is the responsibility of each one. This is why, together with the Cardinal Secretary of State, you have met the Diplomatic Corps at the Holy See. Through the efforts of all those involved, we must definitively remove war from the planet and from the history of humanity.
Dear friends, this twenty-year anniversary of your Association renews the momentum to spread your simple and strong testimony, your method, your desire for change in the world, which, starting with relationships, pervades every aspect of life. May you help break down the higher walls, build bridges and wipe out the impassable borders, the legacy of a world that is ending. You have already overcome the most challenging barriers, those within each of you, dissolving the enemy's deception, and you are amazed at yourself when you have re-opened the boundaries blocked by wars. Please do not ever lose your amazement and humility. Dear young men of Rondine, guard the trust you have gained among you and transform it into a generous task of service to the common good. Mister President, may the work you have begun continue! With this I bless all of you, with all my heart, and I also bless your loved ones and I assure you of my prayer. You too, please, remember to pray for me. Thank you.
(Original text in Italian)
Greetings of the Holy Father, Pope Francis
addressed to the members of the
Rondine-Cittadella Association for Peace
Dear brothers and sisters,
I welcome you with joy on the 20th anniversary of the Rondine-Cittadella Association for Peace. I greet your President, Mister Franco Vaccari and I thank him for his introduction. I greet Cardinal Gualtiero Bassetti, who from the beginning has sustained this reality, smelling in it the perfume of the venerable Giorgio La Pira, and the Archbishop of Arezzo-Cortona-Sansepolcro, Riccardo Fontana. In a special way I greet you young people, who come from countries where conflicts have degenerated into various forms of violence and war; in Rondine, you are living the experience of the International Student House. And you, young men from all regions of Italy, with your teachers of the Fourth Year School. And you too, former students, members, supporters and friends. Welcome!
Your educational commitment is to host young people who, in various parts of the world, are stuck in cultures which are poisoned by pain and hatred; instead, you offer them a bold challenge: to verify in person if the other, he or she who is beyond a closed boundary, of reticulates or impassable walls, is really an enemy as everyone claims. In these twenty years you have developed a method for transforming conflicts, getting young people out of this deception and giving them back to their peoples for a full spiritual, moral, cultural and civil development: generous innocent young people who are born with the weight of failures of previous generations weighing them down.
You have founded this work on two great spiritual roots of your region: Saint Francis of Assisi, stigmatized in La Verna, and Saint Romualdo, founder of Camaldoli. You have chosen well!
I, too, when I chose the name of Francis, I thought of the poor and of peace. Poverty - in the negative sense - is linked with war in a vicious circle that kills people, fuels untold suffering and spreads hatred that does not stop. By choosing to dedicate yourselves to young people, you also commit yourselves to fighting poverty and building peace, as a work of justice and love. An action that nourishes hope and places trust in mankind, especially in young people.
La Pira wrote that La Verna is the launching pad for peace enterprises. On that mountain there is a mystery of pain and transfiguring love and you, who have elaborated the Rondine Method for the creative transformation of conflicts, receive continuous inspiration to progress in the service of the common good. And so you have the privilege of seizing the buds of a flowering of peace for all of humanity.
I have listened to the appeal that you have written and which you will present at the UN on 10 December, on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Listening to a young Palestinian and a young Israeli who together ask the governments of the world to take a step that can reopen the future, transferring the cost of a weapon from the defence budget to the budget of education in order to form a peace leader, a rare thing, something bright! How could you disagree? But we adults can not get away with a 'well done!', No. I feel I have to give you all my support, my sympathy and my blessing.
In fact, your appeal contains and proposes a concrete vision. In the Message for the next World Day of Peace, on 1 January 2019, which has as its theme Good politics is at the service of peace, I reiterate that political responsibility belongs to every citizen, in particular to those who have received the mandate to protect and to rule. This mission consists in safeguarding the law and encouraging dialogue between the actors of society, between generations and between cultures. Listening to you I add: between the parties in conflict. Because trust is created only in dialogue.
When the human being is respected in his fundamental rights - as Saint John XXIII recalled in his Encyclical Pacem in Terris (1963) - the sense of the duty to respect the rights of others sprouts in him. The rights and duties increase the awareness of belonging to the same community, with others and with God (cf PT, 45). We are therefore called to bring and to proclaim peace as the good news of a future where every living being will be considered in his dignity and his rights.
You, dear young people, have chosen to meet together when everything around you and inside you was saying: why? What is it for? Will it be right? And, after the two years of formation at Rondine, you have overthrown your feelings, your thoughts, you have given rise to mutual trust and now you are ready to take professional, civil and political responsibilities for the good of your peoples. You are already those young leaders who in the Appeal are asking States and peoples to commit themselves to forming together!
You ask us to join your appeal. For my part, I will do it, and I ask the Heads of State and Government to do the same. Your voice - weak, but strong in the hope and courage of youth - will be heard on December 10th at the United Nations. They serve leaders with a new mentality. Those who do not know how to dialogue and confront each other are not leaders of peace: a leader who does not try to meet the enemy, to sit with him at the table as you do, can not lead his people to peace. To do this we need humility and not arrogance: Saint Francis helps you to follow this path with courage. Listening to young people, even in the recent Synod in which young people were protagonists, I learned a lot from them. I hope your leaders come to Rondine, and see how young people are preparing peace.
I rejoice that you have chosen the encyclical Laudato si' as a fundamental text for your school: in fact, integral ecology offers the prospect for humanity to conceive itself as the only family and to consider the Earth as a common home. It is good that with your method you want to reach citizens and political leaders, representatives of national and international institutions at the same time. Indeed, peace is the responsibility of each one. This is why, together with the Cardinal Secretary of State, you have met the Diplomatic Corps at the Holy See. Through the efforts of all those involved, we must definitively remove war from the planet and from the history of humanity.
Dear friends, this twenty-year anniversary of your Association renews the momentum to spread your simple and strong testimony, your method, your desire for change in the world, which, starting with relationships, pervades every aspect of life. May you help break down the higher walls, build bridges and wipe out the impassable borders, the legacy of a world that is ending. You have already overcome the most challenging barriers, those within each of you, dissolving the enemy's deception, and you are amazed at yourself when you have re-opened the boundaries blocked by wars. Please do not ever lose your amazement and humility. Dear young men of Rondine, guard the trust you have gained among you and transform it into a generous task of service to the common good. Mister President, may the work you have begun continue! With this I bless all of you, with all my heart, and I also bless your loved ones and I assure you of my prayer. You too, please, remember to pray for me. Thank you.
(Original text in Italian)
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