Hundreds of thousands of young people from all over the world will gather in Rome this weekend for the Jubilee. But what reason can young people have to rejoice in a world in crisis, which is experiencing a world war in stages and which offers them no opportunities for the future?
Jesus Christ, who is the one who has actually summoned them through Peter, has the answer. In fact, Jesus Christ is the answer to the young people's lack of hope and, in the Gospel, he encourages them not to be afraid.
He demonstrates this in his encounter, for example, with the rich young man, a formal boy, we would say today, who had obeyed his parents, who fulfilled his religious obligations to the letter, who helped others and who even had the desire to want to be more perfect and therefore approached Jesus to ask him what good thing he had to do to obtain eternal life.
No matter how many prejudices there are against youth, the truth is that many young people are very good people, like the boy Jesus met. They study, they work, they help at home and their friends, they volunteer, they are committed to the care of creation, some (sadly, the fewest) practice their faith and are united to the Church through their parishes, schools, confraternities, associations and movements... They are good people. My applause for all of them. But, returning to Luke's Gospel, Jesus is not satisfied with all these merits because he wants the best for the boy. That is why he tells him: "If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions, give the money to the poor -then you will have treasure in heaven- and then come and follow me". The reading says that, "when the young man heard this, he went away sad, for he was very rich".
The Gospel wants to explain to us that it is not a matter of "doing good things", because "one is good", but that authentic happiness, "eternal life", is given by the fact of following the One who is Good with everything we have, putting him in first place and renouncing, therefore, the goods of this world. In this case, the young man was rich, but Jesus speaks for everyone and each one of us has our "treasure". For some it will be money, for others affections, for others their image, their career or their intelligence. Jesus cannot be an ornament in the lives of young people, but the foundation on which to build their human and Christian vocation. For this reason, no matter how much Jubilee they win, many will return sad and will even leave the Church, like the one Luke told us, because they cannot give themselves completely.
Jesus is also the answer to many young people today who live in the death of depression, anxiety, addictions, the emptiness of dehumanizing ideologies or the meaninglessness that in many cases ends in suicide. Faced with the death of being, because the materialistic world has robbed us of our soul, Jesus is capable of restoring life as he did with that young man, the son of the widow of Nain. Jesus met him when he was being taken to be buried. He touched the coffin (which made him impure according to the Mosaic law) and said "Young man, I say to you, arise!". And indeed, "the dead man sat up and began to speak".
Jesus is not disgusted by the sin of young people, no matter how many colors they have, and he is ready to pull them out of that pit. Knowing oneself to be loved to the extreme by a love capable of getting dirty is fundamental for the mental and spiritual health of our young people (take note pastors). The imperative that Jesus uses to resurrect the boy speaks to us of the importance of the figure of the guide-accompanier: parents, catechists, educators, priests... A young person today does not need people who falsely applaud him (they already give him applause in Tiktok), but who push him upwards, who awaken him from the lethargy of death that has paralyzed him, even if it means making him uncomfortable. All of us older people remember some figure in our youth who helped us, making us come out of our inert passivity with a "get up!". No matter how dark the horizon of life may seem, the Gospel invites us to take the leap into the void, to trust in God.
But following Jesus seems a titanic undertaking: to renounce everything that binds us, like the rich young man; to awaken from the death of the being that incapacitates us, like the young son of the widow... Isn't being a saint a vocation only for gifted young people? The Gospel denies it in the narrative of the encounter with another young man; this time, with the boy who presented to the apostles the five loaves of bread and two fish that he had carried in his knapsack. It is not necessary to have extraordinary powers, but to place what little we have at the Lord's disposal. He will be in charge of performing the miracle, He will enable the young man to do what he does not believe possible: to feed five thousand men and their families with that little food and have twelve baskets left over. He wants them for great things.
In the face of war, in the face of the injustices of our world, in the face of the lack of opportunities, Jesus invites young people to roll up their sleeves, to put their gifts - big or small - at the service of the common good, working for peace, building their own future with simplicity, contributing to society and to the Church, and always knowing that, even if it seems that there are no solutions, history is in God's hands.
This is exactly what happened to another young woman who appears in the Gospel and who understood, very early on, the illogical logic of God placing his gifts at the service of the world. May many of the pilgrims of hope participating in this Jubilee of the Youth, on their return from the Jubilee, be able to sing jubilantly, like Mary: "My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked upon the lowliness of his handmaid. From now on all generations will congratulate me, for the Mighty One has done great deeds in me".
Journalist. Graduate in Communication Sciences and Bachelor in Religious Sciences. He works in the Diocesan Delegation of Media in Malaga. His numerous "threads" on Twitter about faith and daily life have a great popularity.
