"Dear Young People .. You are my hope."
"The World Youth Days have become a great and fascinating witness that young people give of themselves. They have become a powerful means of evangelization. In the young there is, in fact, an immense potential for good and for creative possibility. Whenever I meet them in my travels throughout the world, I wait first of all to hear what they want to tell me about themselves, about their society, about their Church. And I always point out: ‘What am I going to say to you is not as important as what you are going to say to me. You will not necessarily say it to me in words; you will say it to me by your presence, by your song, perhaps by your dancing, by your skits, and finally by your enthusiasm.’
We need the enthusiasm of the young. We need their joie de vivre. In it is reflected something of the original joy God made in creating man. The young experience this same joy within themselves. This joy is the same everywhere, but it is also every new and original. The young know how to express this joy in their own special way.
It is not true that the Pope brings the young form one end to the world to the other. It is they who bring him. Even though he is getting older, they urge him to be young, they do not permit him to forget this experience, his discovery of youth and its great importance for the life of every man. I believe this explains a great deal.
The very day of the inauguration of my papal ministry, on October 22nd 1978, at the conclusion of the liturgy, I said to the young people gathered in St. Peter’s Square:
‘You are the hope of the Church and of the world. You are my hope.’
I have often repeated these words."
- Pope John Paul II, in Crossing the Threshold of Hope (1994)
"Your desire is that the world should be changed. I say: You should change the world." - Pope John Paul II to young people in Morocco.