This fundamental dynamic has precise consequences for the way the mission is conducted jointly with young people, which requires us to engage, frankly and without compromise, in a dialogue with all men and women of good will. As Saint Paul VI stated: “The Church… has something to say, a message to give, a communication to make” (Ecclesiam Suam, 65). In a world marked by diversity of peoples and a variety of cultures, “walking together” is fundamental if the initiatives of solidarity, integration and promotion of justice are to be credible and effective, and to show what is meant by a culture of encounter and gratuitousness. It is the young who live day by day in contact with their peers from other Christian confessions, religions, convictions and cultures, who stimulate the entire Christian community to practise ecumenism and interreligious dialogue. This calls for the courage of parrhesia in speaking and the courage of humility in listening, taking up the asceticism – and sometimes the martyrdom – that this implies.
TheoFonsAt the sources of the faith