Vatican – Synod, Msgr. Mendes, SDB: "It is necessary to offer space to young people so they feel welcome"

18 October 2018

(ANS - Vatican City) – We'd like to present below an excerpt of the speech presented on October 17 at the Synod of Bishops by Salesian Msgr. Joaquim Mendes, auxiliary bishop of Lisbon and President of the Episcopal Commission of the Laity and Family of the Portuguese Episcopal Conference:

It is necessary, in our ecclesial environments, to offer young people spaces of welcoming and care, sharing and co-responsibility within the pastoral plan of parishes, Catholic movements and schools, inserting them in pastoral groups, in the pastoral organs of communion and participation, such as parish councils, and assign them roles of responsibility and leadership.

It takes courage to break down the barriers and prejudices according to which young people are "not very expert in making decisions and that from them one can only expect errors." (cfr Instrumentum Laboris, no. 33).

The Synod is an opportunity for a pastoral and missionary conversion of Christian communities, so that they can give young people what they are entitled to, what they want and hope for: a family Church, in which to feel themselves to be a living part, a Church-home, where everyone finds space, where everyone takes care of everyone, where the Christian fraternity that springs from the faith and love of Jesus is experienced.

The education and evangelization of the young and the revitalization and the future of our communities inevitably pass through the offer to young people of ecclesial environments permeated by a true family spirit.

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