The Guardian - UK September 17, 2010
Pope's visit: Benedict warns of cult of celebrity
Money 'is not enough to make us happy' he tells 4,000 pupils and young people at Twickenham school on second day of visit
John Hooper and Sam Jones
The pope today warned against the cult of celebrity and wealth, on the second day of his British tour.
Visiting about 4,000 school pupils and young people at St Mary's University College, Twickenham, he told them that "money is not enough to make us happy".
Instead of modelling themselves on sport or entertainment stars, he urged them to find happiness in God.
In contrast to his strongly worded addresses yesterday, the pope struck a more informal tone as he adrressed Catholic schoolchildren.
"I hope that among those of you listening to me today there are some of the future saints of the 21st century," he said.
Benedict is known for baffling lay audiences with abstruse dissertations on the faith. But on this occasion, he made a point of talking in a language that was calculated to reach his listeners.
In an address that was relayed to Catholic schools around the country, he said: "Perhaps some of you think being a saint is not for you. Let me explain what I mean. When we are young, we can usually think of people that we look up to, people we admire, people we want to be like.
"We live in a celebrity culture and young people are often encouraged to model themselves on figures from the world of sport or entertainment."
But by inviting his listeners to become saints, the pope said he was asking them "not to be content with second best".
He urged them not to be swayed by the motivations of wealth: "Having money makes it possible to be generous and do good in the world, but on its own, it is not enough to make us happy.
"Being highly skilled in some activity or profession is good, but it will not satisfy us unless we aim for something greater still. It might make us famous, but it will not make us happy."
Benedict said "one of the great tragedies of this world" was that so many people did not find happiness. That was "because they look for it in the wrong places".
"The key to it is very simple – true happiness is to be found in God."
Speaking earlier to Catholic teachers and educational officials including the education secretary, Michael Gove, he made a rare use of the first person when he recalled his education: "I myself as a boy was taught by the 'English Ladies' and I owe them a deep debt of gratitude."
This was a reference to the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary, an order which traces its origins to a congregation modelled on the Jesuits and founded in the 17th century by the Venerable Mary Ward.
Yorkshire-born Ward had her community suppressed – and was herself imprisoned – by the inquisition, an institution whose direct successor, the congregation for the doctrine of the faith, was to be headed for 24 years by the pope when he was a cardinal.
The pope will continue his four-day state visit today with a meeting with the archbishop of Canterbury designed to demonstrate the unity between the two churches.
He will meet Rowan Williams privately at Lambeth Palace before the only ecumenical service of the state visit, at Westminster Abbey. It will be the first time any pope has been to either venue.
Before the service, he will travel by popemobile to parliament to address an 1,800-strong audience in Westminster Hall on the role of faith in society.
Among the guests will be the former prime ministers Margaret Thatcher, John Major, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.
Archbishop Vincent Nichols, leader of Catholics in England and Wales, told a news conference earlier this week that the pope would pay tribute to the democratic traditions of British society.
"I think while he fully on the record recognises the importance in modern democratic societies of institutions being secular, he expects secular institutions to have an open and positive attitude towards religious faith," he said.
History could also be made when Rev Dr Jane Hedges, canon steward of Westminster Abbey and a campaigner for women bishops, greets the pontiff as he arrives, as he is not thought to have shaken a clergywoman's hand in public before.
The Catholic church will be hoping the pope's second day in the UK is as successful as the first in Scotland, where 125,000 people took to the streets of Edinburgh to welcome the pontiff, and 60,000 worshippers congregated in Glasgow's Bellahouston Park for an open-air mass.
The pope addressed the child abuse scandal as he flew into Scotland, telling reporters on board his private plane that the priests in question had not been dealt with decisively or quickly enough.
However, the first day of the visit was dominated by his attack on "atheist extremism" and "aggressive secularism".
He used a speech at the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh to bemoan the damage that "the exclusion of God, religion and virtue from public life" had done in the last century, and to call on Britain to respect its Christian foundations.
"Today, the United Kingdom strives to be a modern and multicultural society," he said. "In this challenging enterprise, may it always maintain its respect for those traditional values and cultural expressions that more aggressive forms of secularism no longer value or even tolerate."
The pope returned to the theme in Glasgow, saying: "The evangelisation of culture is all the more important in our times, when a 'dictatorship of relativism' threatens to obscure the unchanging truth about man's nature, his destiny and his ultimate good. There are some who now seek to exclude religious belief from public discourse, to privatise it or even to paint it as a threat to equality and liberty. Yet religion is in fact a guarantee of authentic liberty and respect, leading us to look upon every person as a brother or sister."
This article was found at:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/sep/17/popes-visit-benedict-children-celebrity
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