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Chapter 33. Ninth Commandment: Practice Purity of Heart • 445
• The Gospel can renew and purify what is decadent in our culture and
gradually displace the attraction of sin. Asserting Christ’s Gospel by
word and witness helps to transform the moral tone of our culture.
This approach fosters virtue in the human heart and its development
through the grace of the Holy Spirit.
MEDITATION
At the conclusion of the Jubilee Year 2000, Pope John Paul II reflected
on his meetings with young people throughout that year:
And how could we fail to recall especially the joyful and inspir-
ing gathering of young people? If there is an image of the
Jubilee of the Year 2000 that more than any other will live on
in memory, it is surely the streams of young people with whom
I was able to engage in a sort of very special dialogue, filled
with mutual affection and deep understanding. It was like this
from the moment I welcomed them in the Square of Saint John
Lateran and Saint Peter’s Square. Then I saw them swarming
through the city, happy as young people should be, but also
thoughtful, eager to pray, seeking “meaning” and true friend-
ship. Neither for them nor for those who saw them will it be
easy to forget that week, during which Rome became “young
with the young.” . . .
Yet again, the young have shown themselves to be for Rome
and for the Church a special gift of the Spirit of God. Sometimes
when we look at the young, with the problems and weaknesses
that characterize them in contemporary society, we tend to be
pessimistic. The Jubilee of Young People however changed that,
telling us that young people, whatever their possible ambigui-
ties, have a profound longing for those genuine values which
find their fullness in Christ. Is not Christ the secret of true
freedom and profound joy of heart? Is not Christ the supreme
friend and the teacher of all genuine friendship? If Christ is pre-
sented to young people as he really is, they experience him as an
answer that is convincing and they can accept his message, even
when it is demanding and bears the mark of the Cross. For this
reason, in response to their enthusiasm, I did not hesitate to ask