The Holy Father ( John Paul II ) then spoke with the
young people and answered some questions.

This is the first question:
Since the beginning of your pontificate you have defined
young people as the hope of the Church. What does this
mean for our life?
The Pope answered:
Life for young people means to discover man's resources: this is peculiar to youth and it is done especially in the early years of life. The hope for the future is tied to this discovery.

If young people of our time have discovered man's resources in the right way - because you can discover them even in evil - if they have discovered them in truth, in love, then we can be full of hope in the future.


The second question:
Living daily our problems in our family, at work, at school, we see great problems. But even the economical and social problems of our time imply a deep existential insecurity. What does all this mean for Christians?
This is the Pope's answer:
It is a deep and indeed very right perception: the perception of the drama of human existence. And we can and must think about it, as it is a phenomenon that has many facets. There are several reasons, I could say that the very essence of the human drama is different.

But if we reflect about the different aspects of this drama of human existence, we arrive at a central point: the basic human drama is the failure to feel the meaning of life, not to possess the meaning of one's life, to live without meaning. Here we touch again upon the theme of resources.

Not to discover the meaning of human life means not to know what man's resources are. All the resources, those offered to man by external nature, those offered by human nature, his personality, and finally the supernatural resources open to man in Christ. That is the way we can help others.

Many times we find ourselves without possibilities; we cannot find the way to help others in the different dramas of human life. But I think that, in this drama which seems to me central and basic, we can perhaps do more, we can try to give to others the meaning of life, we can try to make them discover man's resources and, in this way, give them the meaning of life. I think this is also your apostolate: to help others to discover the meaning of human existence.


Here is the third question:
Your Holiness, since the beginning of your pontificate you have tirelessly spurred peoples and nations to peace. Today, what are the basic elements for this construction?
The Holy Father answered:
Well, first of all a methodological observation. I was told: "Come to Rimini and we will listen to you." But indeed the reality is a bit different: "You have to come to Rimini, we are listening to you but we are examining you as well!"

I have spoken many times about peace. Of course words are not the most important things, but they are still important. I would repeat what was perhaps essential in my speech at the United Nations where, following the traditional teachings of the Church especially of the recent popes, Pope John and Pope Paul, I tried to convince the great assembly: if we want to achieve peace we must fully respect the various human rights. They have different aspects: they are strictly speaking rights of the person, but then they become larger and become rights of the family, the rights of peoples.

According to a good theory, by observing all these rights you exclude war, you create peace. So there is a program. On the other hand we know that, although the program exists, there are still wars and threats.


The fourth and last question was:
Holy Father, our basic concern has been and is that of giving testimony to the Christian fact. Why and how does an initiative like this one of the Meeting contribute to this witnessing?
The Pope answered as follows:
I am convinced that it contributes to giving a Christian witness. I would even say, it contributes to showing a dimension of the Church, precisely that dimension on which we have meditated so much in the teaching of Vatican II and which we left for the future.

We used to think of the Church in a rather static way as of something definitively constituted: this was and still is true. The Church is a divine institution. Yet Vatican II has shown us the Church as a people on a journey, the people of God. It has shown us the Church above all as a mission that comes from the Holy Trinity and enters into each baptized, into each Christian, as a part of him, even, in a certain sense, into each man of good will.

This great mission of the truth, of good and of love has become what constitutes our vision of the Church. I think that you who are a movement, and who with this Meeting give an expression to your movement, to the aims of this movement, try to express with this Meeting the Church's particular character, the mission proper to her.

The mission proper to the Church is always an historical one, although transcendent, although divine. It is historical, part of the history of our time. With your Meeting you are trying to show the journey of the Church of our time. You are trying to express the meaning of the mystery of salvation, the work of salvation. You mean, with the different methods and especially with this Meeting, to incarnate this work of salvation, to make it present among men. Here, in short, like this, not to say too many words.