He met with youth today – a group from Australia, to pass on the WYD cross for 2008, as well as youth from Rome and the Lazio district. (I think these were the same event) – photos here. There have been a few articles on this, but here’s a translation of the Italian transcript of the question and answer session

Holiness, I am Vittorio, from the parish of S. Giovanni Bosco in Cinecitta. I am 20 years old and a student of the science of education at the University of Tor Vergata.

Always in your messages you invite us not to be afraid to respond generously to the Lord, especially when he proposes that we follow him in the consecrated life, in the priesthood. You tell us not to be afraid, to trust in him, and we will not be disappointed. Many of us, present here or who are at home watching this on TV, are convinced that they are thinking of following Jesus into a life of special consecration, but it is not always easy to understand if that is the right life for each of us as an individual. Could you tell us how you came to understand what was your vocation? Can you give us some advice so we may understand better if the Lord is really calling us to follow him in the consecrated or priestly life? Thank you.

I was born in a world very much different from today, but in the end, the situations are similar. On the one hand, there was still in those days a situation of “being Christian,” in which it was normal to go to Church and accept the faith as a revelation of God, to seek to live according to that revelation. On the other hand, there was the Nazi regime, which declared loudly: “In the new Germany there will be no more priests, no longer a consecrated life – we will no longer need any such persons. Find another profession.”

But precisely in listening to these “strong” voices, and the brutality of that system that had an inhuman face, I understood that on the contrary, there was a great need for priests. This contrast – seeing that anti-human culture – confirmed my conviction that the Lord, the Gospel, the Faith, showed us the correct path and that we should commit ourselves to insure that this path survived. In this situation, the vocation to priesthood grew in me and with me naturally, without any great moments of conversion. Moreover, two things helped me on this path: even as a boy, aided by my parents and my parish priest, I discovered the beauty of liturgy and I always loved it more and more, because I felt that divine beauty appears to us through liturgy and it opens us up towards heaven. The second element was discovering the beauty of learning, to know God, and Sacred Scriptures, thanks to which I was introduced to the great adventure of dialog with God, which is what theology is. And so it was a joy to enter into the millenary work of theology, into the celebration of liturgy, in which God is with us and takes part in the feast along with us.

Of course, I didn’t lack for difficulties. I asked myself if I really had the capacity to be celibate all my life. And being a man of theoretical rather than practical training, I also knew that it was not enough to love theology to be a good priest, but it was necessary to be always available and accessible to the young, to the old, to the sick and the poor, a need to be simple with the simple. Theology is beautiful, but one also needs the simplicity of words and (to live) a Christian life. So I asked myself: am I up to living all this and not being simply unilateral, just a theologian, for instance? But the Lord has helped me, above all through the company of friends, good priests and teachers.

Turning back to the question, I think it is important to be attentive to the signs from our Lord along the way. He talks to us through events, through persons, through encounters – we just must pay attention.