Let the Children Come …

Each week we let Saint Pope John Paul II share meaningful signposts to spark socio-economic resolves through justice and righteousness combined with mercy and compassion; in short, love.

             ¹³ Some people brought children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and to pray for them, but the disciples scolded the people. 

             ¹⁴ Jesus said, "Let the children come to me and do not stop them, because the Kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."

             ¹⁵ He placed his hands on them and then went away.

             Matthew 19:13-15 (Good News Translation)

             "In the presence of the representatives of so many nations of the world gathered here, I wish to express the joy that we all find in children, the springtime of life, the anticipation of the future history of each of our present earthly homelands.

             No country on earth, no political system can think of its own future otherwise than through the image of these new generations that will receive from their parents the manifold heritage of values, duties, and aspirations of the nation to which they belong and of the whole human family.

             Concern for the child, even before birth, from the first moment of conception and then throughout the years of infancy and youth, is the primary and fundamental test of one human being's relationship to another. 

              And so, what better wish can I express for every nation and the whole of humankind, and for all the children of the world than a better future in which respect for human rights will become a complete reality throughout the third millennium, which is drawing near."

Excerpted from:

APOSTOLIC JOURNEY TO THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS JOHN PAUL II
TO THE 34th GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE UNITED NATIONS*

New York
Tuesday, 2 October 1979

http://www.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/speeches/1979/october/documents/hf_jp-ii_spe_19791002_general-assembly-onu.html