Pope Francis says "Indeed, the birth of children is the main indicator for measuring the hope of a people."

SPEECH OF THE HOLY FATHER FRANCIS
TO PARTICIPANTS IN THE III EDITION OF THE
GENERAL STATES OF BIRTHS

Auditorium in Via della Conciliazione (Rome)

Friday, May 12, 2023
________________________________________
Madam President of the Council,
distinguished Authorities and Representatives of civil society,
dear friends, brothers, dear friend Gigi,
I apologize for not talking standing up, but I can't tolerate pain when standing.

I greet all of you and thank you for your commitment. Thanks to Gigi De Palo, President of the Foundation for the Birth Rate, for her words and for the invitation, because I believe that the theme of the birth rate is central for everyone, especially for the future of Italy and Europe. I would like to give only two "photographs" that happened here in [St. Peter's] Square. Two weeks ago, my secretary was in the square and a mother came with a baby carriage. He, a tender priest, approached to bless the child... he was a little dog! Fifteen days ago, at the Wednesday Audience, I was going to say goodbye, and I arrived in front of a lady, more or less fifty years old; I greet the lady and she opens a bag and says: "Bless me, my child": a little dog! There I didn't have patience and I scolded the lady: "Madam, so many children are hungry, and you and the little dog!". Brothers and sisters, these are scenes from the present, but if things go like this, this will be the habit of the future, let us be careful.

Indeed, the birth of children is the main indicator for measuring the hope of a people. If few are born, it means that there is little hope. And this not only has repercussions from an economic and social point of view, but undermines confidence in the future. I learned that last year Italy reached an all-time low in births: just 393,000 new born. It is a fact that reveals great concern for tomorrow. Today, bringing children into the world is perceived as a family business. And this, unfortunately, conditions the mentality of the younger generations, who grow up in uncertainty, if not in disillusionment and fear. They live in a social climate in which starting a family has turned into a titanic effort, rather than being a shared value that everyone recognizes and supports. Feeling alone and forced to rely exclusively on one's own strength is dangerous: it means slowly eroding common life and resigning oneself to solitary existences, in which everyone has to do for themselves. With the consequence that only the richest can afford, thanks to their resources, greater freedom in choosing what shape to give to their lives. And this is unfair, as well as humiliating.
Perhaps never as in this time, between wars, pandemics, mass displacements and climate crises, the future seems uncertain. Friends, it is uncertain; it not only seems, it is uncertain. Everything goes fast and even the certainties acquired pass quickly. Indeed, the speed that surrounds us increases the fragility that we carry within. And in this context of uncertainty and fragility, the younger generations experience more than anyone a feeling of precariousness, so that tomorrow looks like a mountain impossible to climb. The Madam Prime Minister spoke of the keyword "crisis". But let us remember two things about the crisis: we don't get out of the crisis alone, either we all get out or we don't; and we do not emerge from the crisis the same: we will emerge better or worse. Let's remember this. This is today's crisis. Difficulty finding stable work, difficulty maintaining it, prohibitively expensive housing, skyrocketing rents and insufficient wages are real problems. These are problems that challenge politics, because it is there for all to see that the free market, without the indispensable corrective measures, becomes wild and produces ever more serious situations and inequalities. A few years ago, I remember an anecdote of a queue in front of a transport company, a queue of women looking for work. They had told one of her that it was her turn…; she presents the data… “Okay, you will work eleven hours a day, and the salary will be 600 (euros). All right?". And she: “But how, but with 600 euros… 11 hours… you can't live…” – “Madam, look at the queue, and choose. She likes it, she takes it; she doesn't like it, she goes hungry ”. This is kind of the reality you live. It is a culture that is not a friend, if not an enemy, of the family, centered as it is on the needs of the individual, where continuous individual rights are demanded and there is no mention of the rights of the family (cf. Apostolic Exhortation Amoris laetitia, 44). In particular, there are almost insurmountable conditionings for women. The most damaged are they, young women often forced to crossroads between career and motherhood, or crushed by the weight of caring for their families, especially in the presence of frail elderly and non-autonomous people. Right now women are slaves to this rule of selective work, which also prevents them from having motherhood.

Of course, Providence exists, and millions of families testify to it with their lives and their choices, but the heroism of so many cannot become an excuse for everyone. Forward-looking policies are therefore needed. We need to prepare fertile ground for a new spring to blossom and leave this demographic winter behind us. And, given that the ground is common, as are society and the future, it is necessary to face the problem together, without ideological barriers and preconceived positions. The whole is important. It is true that, even with your help, a lot has been achieved and I am grateful for this, but it is still not enough. We need to change mentality: the family is not part of the problem, but part of its solution. So I ask myself: is there anyone who knows how to look ahead with the courage to bet on families, children, young people? Many times I hear the complaints of mothers: "Eh, my son graduated some time ago... and he's not getting married, he's staying at home... what should I do?" – “Don't iron the shirts, ma'am, let's start like this, then we'll see”.
We cannot accept that our society ceases to be generative and degenerates into sadness. When there is no generativity sadness comes. It's an ugly, gray malaise. We cannot passively accept that so many young people struggle to make their family dream come true and are forced to lower the bar of desire, settling for private and mediocre surrogates: making money, aiming for a career, travelling, jealously guarding free time... All good things and right when they re-enter a larger generative project, which gives life around itself and after itself; if, on the other hand, only individual aspirations remain, they dry up in selfishness and lead to that inner tiredness. This is the state of mind of a non-generative society: inner tiredness that anesthetizes great desires and characterizes our society as a society of tiredness! Let's give breath to the wishes of happiness of young people! Yes, they have wishes for happiness: let's breathe our breath, let's pave the way. Each of us experiences what is the index of our own happiness: when we feel filled with something that generates hope and warms the soul, and it is spontaneous to share it with others. Conversely, when we are sad, gray, we defend ourselves, we close ourselves off and perceive everything as a threat. Here, the birth rate, as well as hospitality, which should never be contrasted because they are two sides of the same coin, reveal to us how much happiness there is in society. A happy community naturally develops the desire to generate and integrate, to welcome, while an unhappy society is reduced to a sum of individuals who try to defend what they have at all costs. And many times they forget to smile.

Friends, after sharing these concerns that I carry in my heart, I would like to give you a word that is dear to me: hope. The challenge of the birth rate is a matter of hope. But be careful, hope is not, as is often thought, optimism, it is not a vague positive sentiment about the future. “Ah, you are a positive man, a positive woman, bravo!”. No, hope is something else. It is not an illusion or an emotion that you feel, no; it is a concrete virtue, an attitude of life. And it has to do with concrete choices. Hope is nourished by everyone's commitment to goodness, it grows when we feel involved and involved in giving meaning to our lives and those of others. Feeding hope is therefore a social, intellectual, artistic, political action in the highest sense of the word; it is putting one's skills and resources at the service of the common good, it is sowing the future. Hope generates change and improves the future. It's the smallest of virtues - Peguy said - it's the smallest, but it's the one that takes you further! And hope does not disappoint. Today there are many Turandots in life who say: "The hope that always disappoints". The Bible tells us: "Hope does not disappoint" (cf. Rom 5:5).

I like to think of the "General States of Births" - now in its third edition - as a building site of hope. A construction site where we don't work on commission, because someone pays, but where we all work together precisely because everyone wants to hope. And so I hope that this edition will be an opportunity to "extend the building site", to create, on several levels, a great alliance of hope. Here it is nice to see the world of politics, business, banking, sport, entertainment and journalism gathered to discuss how to move from winter to demographic spring. On how to start being born again, not only physically, but internally, to come to light every day and illuminate tomorrow with hope. Brothers and sisters, let us not resign ourselves to dullness and sterile pessimism, to a compromise smile, no. We do not believe that history is already marked, that nothing can be done to reverse the trend. Because - allow me to say it in my favorite language, that of the Bible - it is precisely in the driest deserts that God opens new paths (see Is 43:19). Let's look for these new roads together in this arid desert!

Indeed, hope calls us to get going to find solutions that give shape to a society worthy of the historical moment we are experiencing, a time of crisis crossed by so many injustices. War is one of them. Reviving the birth rate means repairing the forms of social exclusion that are affecting young people and their future. And it is a service for everyone: children are not individual assets, they are people who contribute to the growth of all, bringing human and generational wealth. Bringing creativity also to the heart of parents. To you, who are here to find good solutions, the result of your professionalism and your skills, I would like to say: feel called to the great task of regenerating hope, of initiating processes that give impetus and life to Italy, to Europe, to the world , who bring us many children. Thank you.