Pope Francis with a surprise visitor on stage at the General Audience in the Vatican on Aug. 17, 2022 / Pablo Esparza / CNAWednesday, Pope Francis underlined the need of good connections and communication between the young and the elderly within the family.
“The alliance — and I am saying alliance — the alliance between the elderly and children will save the human family,” the pope said at his weekly audience Aug. 17. “If this dialogue does not take place between the elderly and the young, the future cannot be clearly seen.”
A small boy approached Pope Francis when he was seated on the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall stage towards the end of the public audience.
Pope Francis spoke to him in Italian, greeting him and asking his name, though the little boy did not respond. “During the audience, we spoke of the dialogue between the elderly and the young,” the pope said to those watching, as he gestured to the boy. “He was courageous, this one.”
The boy with sandy hair remained close to Pope Francis for the duration of the audience, including the singing of the Our Father in Latin and the concluding benediction. Francis then drew a cross on the boy’s forehead.
On August 17, Pope Francis, who often stands for prayer and blessing, stayed seated. Several months ago, he had a knee injury that has forced him to use a wheelchair or a cane.
While the pope was welcoming the various language groups at the conclusion of the audience, one of the two Swiss Guards on stage with him seemed to suddenly lose his balance and fall to the ground. According to photographer Pablo Esparza, who observed the incident, the Swiss Guard instantly got back up.
In his address, the pope said “it is painful — and harmful — to see that the ages of life are conceived of as separate worlds, in competition among themselves, each one seeking to live at the expense of the other: this is not right.”
“Old age,” he said, “must bear witness — for me, this is the core, the most central aspect of old age — old age must bear witness to children that they are a blessing.”
“This witness consists in their initiation — beautiful and difficult — into the mystery of our destination in life that no one can annihilate, not even death. To bring the witness of faith before a child is to sow that life. To bear the witness of humanity too, and of faith, is the vocation of the elderly.”
According to the pope, “the witness of the elderly is credible to children,” and “young people and adults are not capable of bearing witness in such an authentic, tender, poignant way, as elderly people can.”
He praised when an old person can lay aside any resentment he or she feels at growing old in order to bless life as it comes.
“There is no bitterness because time is passing by, and he or she is about to move on. No. There is that joy of good wine, of wine that has aged well with the years. The witness of the elderly unites the generations of life,” he said.
“May the elderly have the joy of speaking, of expressing themselves with the young, and may the young seek out the elderly to receive the wisdom of life from them,” the pope wished.