X Anniversary of the Associazione Rondine-Cittadella della Pace (Swallow-Citadel of Peace Association): “Helping the young to fight poverty and build peace”

Young people were the protagonists of Pope Francis’ s address a few days ago to the members of the Associazione Rondine-Cittadella della Pace whom he welcomed in an audience to celebrate the Association’s twenty years of activity.

“Your educational commitment” – he said – “is to host young people who, in various parts of the world, live stranded in cultures poisoned by pain and hatred, and to offer them a bold challenge: to verify in person whether the other, he or she, who is beyond a closed boundary of barbed wire or impassable walls, is really what everybody claims: an enemy. During these twenty years, you have developed a method capable of transforming conflicts, of bringing young people out of this deception and restoring them to their peoples for a full spiritual, moral, cultural and civil development: generous young people who, innocent, are born with the burden of the previous generations’ failures.”.

“By choosing to dedicate yourselves to young people”, Francis continued referring to the members of the Association, “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 man, above all in young people.  […] Dear young people of Rondine, safeguard the trust you have gained among you and transform it into a generous task of service to the common good.”