“Your mission consists in acting in such a way that all men and women may become, every day more so, a people of brothers and sisters, where each will be recognized not for what he has but for what he is”. That’s the hope expressed by John Paul II in his message to the youth who will flock to Hamburg (Germany) from 29 December to 2 January to take part in the next European meeting promoted by the Taizé community. “May you always rest on others, as on yourselves the Pope also writes to the young the gaze that Jesus himself rested on each human being, a gaze compounded of tenderness, compassion and forgiveness”, and that “opens up a future full of hope”. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, and Patriarch Alexis II of Moscow have also sent messages to the “friends of Taizé”.
