“It was the finest birthday present I had”: that’s how Aylin commented on the audience granted by the Holy Father on 26 April to the participants in the 10th Symposium of European bishops recently held in Rome. Aylin comes from Istanbul and was one of the 11 young journalists chosen by the various episcopal conferences to report on the work of the symposium. Apart from Gigliola, Enrica and Michelangelo who were “playing at home”, the others came from various corners of Europe: Zuzana was the one from furthest east from Bratislava, in Slovakia; Henar and Paulo, those from furthest west respectively from Madrid and Lisbon. Joost and Marloes are Dutch, Peter is Belgian and Brigitte German. Together they listened to the symposium’s reflections on the relations of European youth with the faith and covered the event for their own papers, populating the press room with various languages. Together they also reported on the symposium on the website www.eurhope.info created on the initiative of some young Italians with the support of the national service of youth apostolate to offer a forum of discussion to the youth of Europe who wish to share reflections on Christian values with their contemporaries. The idea was born as a way of ideally continuing the meeting of European youth held in Loreto in 1995, from which the site takes its name: Eurhope, the Europe of hope. The site, in the process of being completed, comprises a section dedicated to courses on spirituality and to international volunteer service, a page containing the Gospel of the day in five different languages, a section devoted to e-learning, a page for international meetings and a forum for dialogue among the young.
