Young Catholics should bring faith to their social media chats and remember that God does not archive sins in a hard drive, Pope Francis said on Sunday. Speaking during a Mass in Krakow attended by up to two million people, Francis stressed that God is not “rigid and insensitive” but instead “believes in us more than we believe in ourselves.”
His homily marked the end of World Youth Day - a global gathering of young people - with the Pope announcing at the end of the liturgy that the next gathering would take place in Panama in 2019.
The Pope’s words today were tailored to the digital generation with Francis urging the congregation to bring the “golden thread of prayer” to their “chats” and “contacts” each day.
But he also cautioned against the selfie culture of social media by telling the young people to distrust the “worldly cult of appearances” and reject the superficial.
“In his eyes the clothes you wear or the kind of cell phone you use are of absolutely no concern” the Pope said. “He doesn’t care whether you are stylish or not; he cares about you! In his eyes, you are precious, and your value is inestimable.”
Francis insisted that following Jesus required more than sitting around texting and he urged the young people to be risk takers by courageously adopt a vision that rejects hatred between people and “refuses to see borders as barriers.”
The Pope added that God does not dwell on personal faults and is always looking to good that can be done in the future.
“Trust the memory of God,” Francis said. “His memory is not a ‘hard disk’ that ‘saves us’ and ‘archives’ all our data, but a heart filled with tender compassion, one that finds joy in ‘erasing’ in us every trace of evil.”
The Mass on Sunday comes at the end of the Pope’s five-day visit to Poland to attend a gathering of young Catholics who came from across the globe including around 4,000 pilgrims from Britain.
He urged them to build on the experience in Poland and bring it to every aspect of their daily lives.
“We can say that World Youth Day begins today and continues tomorrow, in your homes, since that is where Jesus wants to meet you from now on,” Francis said. “The Lord doesn’t want you to remain in this beautiful city, or in memories alone.”
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