Pope Francis to Young People: Keep Shouting and Never Stay Quiet

Pope Francis appeared to offer his support to the young student activists fighting to stop gun violence a day after the streets of D.C. and other U.S. cities filled with March for Our Lives demonstrators. In his Palm Sunday mass in St. Peter’s Square, the pontiff said that it is the duty of the next generation to “cry out” even when the older generation wants to “sedate” them and “keep them from getting involved.” “There are many ways to silence young people and make them invisible. Many ways to anesthetize them, to make them keep quiet, ask nothing, question nothing. There are many ways to sedate them, to keep them from getting involved, to make their dreams flat and dreary, petty and plaintive,” he said. “It is up to you not to keep quiet. Even if others keep quiet, if we older people and leaders, some corrupt, keep quiet, if the whole world keeps quiet and loses its joy, I ask you: Will you cry out?”