Pope speaks to children of friendship and Jesus

Pope Benedict yesterday evening welcomed children from nearby elementary schools in Castelgandolfo. In the courtyard of the Papal Summer Residence the Holy Father told the students that learning was important as it teaches us about the thoughts of others and we learn about events in times past.

"Dear children", said the Pope in his remarks, "you go to school and you learn naturally, and I am recalling that seventy-seven years have now passed since I began school. I lived in a small village of three hundred inhabitants, ... yet we learned the essential things. Most importantly, we learned to read and write. I think it is a great thing to be able to read and write, because in this way we can know other people's ideas, read newspapers and books. We can also know what was written two thousand or more years ago; we can know the spiritual continents of the world and communicate with one another. Above all there is one extraordinary thing: God wrote a book, He spoke to us human beings, finding people to write the book containing the Word of God. Reading that book, we can read what God says to us".

The Holy Father went on: "At school you learn everything you need for life. You also learn to know God, to know Jesus and thus you learn how to live well. At school you make a lot of friends and this is a beautiful thing because in this way you form one big family, but among our best friends, the first we meet and know should be Jesus Who is a friend to everyone and truly shows us the path of life". Listen: