The vast field of Tor Vergata on the outskirts of Rome was transformed on 2 August 2025 into a city of youth. About one million pilgrims from around the world had gathered for the climax of the Jubilee of Youth. Prayer, songs and expectation filled the air until the central moment of the evening arrived: the encounter between Pope Leo XIV and the young people.
Three young people were able to put their questions to the Pope. They dealt with true friendship, the great choices of life and where Christ can be encountered. Each question led the Pope to pause and speak in a way that was not only a reply to the individual questioner but an encouragement addressed to an entire generation.
Friendship that does not remain superficial
The first question was asked by the young Mexican Dulce María. She spoke of her experience: social media brings people together, but often only superficially. When contacts remain fleeting, they leave behind emptiness and loneliness.
The Pope replied by returning to the very beginning of life: “Our life begins with a bond, and it is through relationships that we grow.” He noted that tools and instruments can begin to dominate people and turn them too into tools. “When a tool controls someone, that person becomes a tool: a commodity on the market. Only genuine relationships and stable bonds build a good life.”
Then he turned directly to the young people: “Dear young people, every person naturally longs for a good life just as lungs long for air, but how difficult it is to find it! How difficult it is to find true friendship!” Yet the Holy Father did not leave it at that. He directed the young to seek a friendship that is more than casual contacts. He spoke of Saint Augustine, whose restless heart found peace only in God, and of Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati, who lived his faith through friendship, prayer and service.
Friendship in Christ, the Pope said, is not just a private help in building the future, but a compass for life as a whole. Therefore he appealed directly to the young: “Love one another in Christ, learn to see Jesus in one another.” Such friendship can truly change the world and open the way to peace.
The courage to choose
The next question was asked by Gaia from Italy. She wanted to know where one can find the courage to make life’s decisive choices in a world full of uncertainty.
The Pope pointed out that choices are not only about things but about the person himself or herself: “Looking closely, we realize that it is not just a matter of choosing something, but of choosing someone. When we make a choice in the full sense, we decide who we want to become.”
He reminded them that courage does not arise from nothing, but is based on love: “Our existence did not originate from our own decision, but from the love that wanted us.” From this it follows that the courage to choose springs from God’s love: “The courage to choose springs from the love that God shows us in Christ… The encounter with Jesus corresponds to the deepest desires of our hearts, for Jesus is God’s love made man.”
After these words Leo XIV recalled the historic moment 25 years earlier, when Saint John Paul II spoke to young people on the same field. Pope Leo read his predecessor’s words in full: “It is Jesus you seek when you dream of happiness; he is waiting for you when nothing else satisfies you; he is the beauty that attracts you; he stirs in you the thirst for fullness that will not let you settle for compromise; he urges you to remove the mask of a false life; he reads in your hearts your most genuine choices, the choices that others try to stifle.”
The Holy Father continued this reflection and reminded them that God’s fidelity is recognized in human love and in life’s great choices: “We recognize his faithfulness in the words of those who truly love, because they have truly been loved. ‘You are my life, Lord’: this is what a priest and a consecrated sister say, full of joy and in complete freedom. ‘I take you to be my wife, and I take you to be my husband’: this is the phrase that transforms a man’s and a woman’s love into an efficacious sign of God’s love in marriage. These are radical, meaningful choices: marriage, priesthood and consecrated life. They express the free and liberating gift of self that makes us truly happy. That is where our happiness is, when we learn to give ourselves, to give our lives for others.”
The call to do good
The third question, by Will, led the discussion to where Christ can be encountered and how his example can change daily life. The Pope’s answer led the young to the centre of the Church’s life: “Be united with Jesus Christ in the Eucharist. Adore Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, the source of eternal life.”
This was not only an exhortation to prayer, but also a call to practical life. The Pope encouraged the young to seek the good, to do good and to make their lives a gift to others. Christ, who made his life a gift, is the model of every Christian and the call to live for others.
As the evening ended, the Pope did not deliver a long closing speech. He simply said: “Please rest now. We will meet tomorrow morning here for Holy Mass. Best wishes to you. Good night!”
KATT