THERE IS STILL HOPE

 

  Despite the obvious and troubling crisis of values that, in these turbulent times we live, is seriously affecting all sectors of society, we still have margin for hope. The breath of fresh air that Spain has lived all over the country, mainly concentrated in Madrid, on the occasion of World Youth Days, with the peaceful invasion of hundreds of thousands of young people from five continents that,  loaded with enthusiasm and hope, with the utmost respect, giving a real lesson in civics behavior, came to the call of Pope Benedict XVI, is reason enough to feel optimistic and believe again that, despite everything, we still have some basis for believing the future.

  Is worthy of admiration, from any impartial point of view, that the nearly two million people that participated in the events held in the capital of Spain from 18 to 21 August of 2011, filling to the brim so wide spaces as the Place of Cibeles and the aerodrome of Four Winds, places where they lived the most exciting moments of the last edition of the WYD, stoically enduring long hours of waiting in severe weather, they lost no time in the smile and joy overflowing who publicly stated in his meeting with the Pope, spreading optimism to all those that directly or indirectly attended or witnessed these celebrations. All this despite the attempts of radical extremist groups that had organized the march lay, with the sole intention of bursting, or at least tarnish, what they thought was going to be an event of international importance and that, ultimately defeated by evidence of the facts, have been forced to retreat,  move away  all their banners, and go to home with tails between legs. Curious these individuals that, carrying the banner of the independence from any organization or religious confession, against all that really and truly are opposed, with unhealthy fixation, is against everything that has anything to do with the Catholic Church, although some usually pass them by the dining-room of Cáritas, or live by the social work of this organization.

  Regardless of the faith that professes each individual, the philosophy of  agnostics, or the radical stance of atheistic, even all other attitudes and opinions about the  religious movements that each one want to have, there is something unquestionably due to all: respect the beliefs of the others; a condition sine qua non for to express freely, individually or collectively, our own criteria. The intolerance, radicalism, sectarian intransigence and any other form from which someone wants to impose on others a certain way of thinking and acting are very bad for our coexistence, can have no place in a healthy society and must be necessarily rejected by any responsible citizen. Can not accept that groups, or factions, encouraged by forces that acting from the shadows and with obscure interests, from a malicious interpretation of democracy and  a perverse concept of the freedom, with violent attitudes, often obscene, want to impose their law itself through fear and intimidation, and, much less, that  do so protected by the passivity of the authorities whose duty is precisely to prevent that.

C. Díaz Fdez.

Oviedo august 26,2011