What sort of role models are we?
A Catholic bishop said that young people are looking for role models in society worth emulating like never before, reported CBCP News.
Speaking at the Philippine Conference on New Evangelization in Manila on July 19, 2019, Bishop Rex Andrew Alarcon of Daet said that they’re not just looking for someone to put on a show, but someone who acts as moral witnesses.
“In communities, schools, youth groups, and parishes, young people are so happy when they meet role models,” he said in his homily during the opening Mass of PCNE at the UST Quadricentennial Pavilion.
“They are not looking (for) a perfect one but someone who strive (to be role model)… and someone who would accept, listen and guide them,” said Alarcon, who is also the incoming head of the bishops’ Commission on Youth.
More than 5,000 local and foreign participants joined this year’s PCNE with the theme “Filipino Youth Walking with Jesus”.
Now on its 6th year, the topics and activities for the conference also take light from this Year of the Youth.
According to Alarcon, many Filipino youths are also looking for role models to help them in their spiritual growth.
“We are all invited to walk with the youth,” he said. “To love is to walk with each other, to accompany each other.”
Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle of Manila introduced PCNE in 2013 as a local response to the call of the new evangelization.
This year’s PCNE was preceded with “a day of encounter” for clergy and consecrated persons.
