Pope: Teaching youths skills, moral values key to fighting violence

Published: 2007-12-13

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Teaching young people the skills they need to support their future families and the moral values to inspire them to work for the common good is essential in the fight against violence and despair, Pope Benedict XVI told seven new ambassadors to the Vatican. The pope also spoke about halting the spread of HIV/AIDS, eradicating sex traffickers' "unspeakable human exploitation" and conquering the global drug trade. The pope spoke separately Dec. 13 to ambassadors from Thailand, Singapore, Seychelles, Namibia, Gambia, Suriname and Kuwait as he accepted their credentials. In a group talk the same day, he asked that each country make education a priority. Giving young people the power to read and marketable skills is an important way to break the cycle of poverty and "fight against the despair that may lie in young people's hearts and be the source of numerous acts of violence," the pope said.

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