39th World Youth Day | November 23-24, 2025
“Do Not Set Out as Mere Tourists, but as True Pilgrims” Says Pope to Young People
According to the Vatican News Service, Pope Francis has released a message for the 39th World Youth Day which encourages young people to embrace life's challenges with hope and perseverance. As previously announced the next World Youth Day will take place on November 23-24, 2025, the Feast of Christ the King. It is intended as a celebration of youth and young adults in local Catholic communities.
The papal message, entitled Those Who Hope in the Lord Will Run and Not Be Weary, focuses on the themes of hope and endurance. Pope Francis writes “Dear young people, I am inviting you to set out on a journey, to discover life along the path of love, and to seek the face of God. My advice to you is this: do not set out as mere tourists, but as true pilgrims.” While encouraging young people to see life as a pilgrimage, a quest for happiness, the pope admits that such a journey is also tiring. But “it is precisely in this journey that hope must shine brightest,” said the Pope.
Referring to the Jubilee of 2025, the pope expressed his hope that the year’s celebrations would be seen by young people as an opportunity to deepen their relationship with God and to experience His mercy and love. But he asked that they come to Rome not “as mere tourists, but as true pilgrims," speaking of the Jubilee preparations as a spiritual journey as well as a physical one.
He concluded by encouraging the young people to “Take courage.” He quotes from St. Paul’s letter to Timothy, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. From now on, there is reserved for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give me on that day; and not only to me, but also to all those who have longed for his appearing” (2 Tim 4:7-8). The example of so many saints, men and women, impels and sustains us.
Exclaiming “courage” the pope entrusts the young peoples’ journey to Mary so that they can “persevere in their journey as pilgrims of hope and love.”
