Vatican City, February 27, 2016 – For the first time in 106 years of history of Confindustria entrepreneurs meet the pope . About seven thousand entrepreneurs in the Paul VI Hall in the Vatican, they listened to the words of Pope Francis that asked companies to open up to young people and to put man at the center, but not the abstract, but with the real needs and dreams. To open the event the choir Youth Orchestra of Santa Cecilia Conservatory who played music by Mozart.
SQUINZI – The Pope listened to the testimonies of entrepreneurs on the combination of faith and enterprise. The president of Confindustria, Giorgio Squinzi , is the first to speak in front of Pope Francis: “The commitment of business is a valuable asset, an important skill to build on. Today, here, I say, sense of humility and an awareness of our limitations, we have no immediate answers to the great planetary questions, but we have a valuable asset: our engagement and our enterprises. This is important dowry, to build on. ”
Faith and enterprise: a central pairing in a uncertain companies , Squinzi emphasizes: “Your Holiness, you strongly urged us in Evangelii Gaudium reminding us that the financial crisis that we are experiencing makes us forget that at its origin there is a profound anthropological crisis: the denial of the primacy of the human being “. Looking for this new central dimension of man, says Squinzi, “faith, in an uncertain society, is an element of extraordinary importance and vitality and a reference point for those who do not believe, as the enterprise and free enterprise are central components of a society capable of substantive solidarity, to which everyone should appeal. Thank you very much from all of us for listening to us. ”
So the roots of the company lie in the hard work and the right profit, continued the president of Confindustria: “Alessandro Manzoni wrote that God forgives so many things and we know to be men, who make mistakes like everyone . However the many stories, adventures and successes on which our businesses have their deepest roots in hard work and the right profit were built, without which solidarity is a sense empty word. ”
MARCEGAGLIA – Then it happened to Emma Marcegaglia , president of the ‘Eni , which claimed responsibility for the company’s commitment, particularly in Africa , to accompany the development of the country and give access to energy, with many interventions, investing in schools and in training.
The Marcegaglia thanked the Holy Father for this meeting. “Holiness, I greet with emotion and thank you for this meeting on behalf of Eni, which I am honored to chair, the chief executive officer and all employees in the room, which represent our 34,000 people working all over the world. With his encyclical Praised Yes, she indicated the border of the common good for the third millennium: an equitable distribution of resources in respect of creation, through sustainable development. ”
“His teaching – said the president of Eni – encourages us to continue as responsible business which operates in a competitive market where they must not prevail, as she often recalled, short-term individualistic attitudes, but a long-term approach for the common good “. “The ” factory must therefore be the first place where one realizes the creation of economic value, but where are kept alive and grow their values of work, integrity, respect and responsibility towards the person”. “We owe it to our children and to future generations,” he concluded.
POPE FRANCIS – then took the word Pope Francis who immediately invited the audience of entrepreneurs to “strengthen the focus on value that allow a concrete alternative to the consumerist model of profit at all costs”. The values, the Pope explained, “are the backbone of the training projects, to promote the area and the promotion of social relations”.
So companies must put “man at the center : not the abstract, ideal, theoretical, but the concrete, with his dreams, his needs, his hopes and his labors. ” The Pontiff explained. “The focus on concrete person carries a number of important decisions: it means giving to each his own, snatching mothers and fathers of families from the anguish of not being able to give a future or even a present to their children; it means knowing how to direct, but also know how to listen, sharing with humility and trust projects and ideas; means making sure that the work you create another job, the responsibility create other liability, hope creates other hope, especially for the younger generation, who today more than ever need ” .
His Holiness then commented on the slogan “working together” selected by Confindustria for the extraordinary meeting: “All these forces together can make a difference. It means investing in projects that involve subjects that are often forgotten or neglected. Among them, first of all, families, outbreaks of humanity, in which the experience of the work, the sacrifice that powers it and the fruits which they give rise find meaning and value. and, along with families we can not forget the categories most ‘weak and marginalized, such as the elderly, who may still express resources and energy to an active collaboration but are too often discarded as useless and unproductive “.
“The simple proclamation of economic freedom does not prevail on the concrete freedom of man and his rights, that the market is not an absolute, but honors the demands of justice and, ultimately, of the dignity of person”. He asked Pope Francis to entrepreneurs. The Pope recalled that “there is no freedom without justice and no justice without respect for the dignity of each person.” “Your high road is always the Justice, that rejects the shortcuts of recommendations and favoritism, and the dangerous deviations of dishonesty and of easy compromise.”
The companies are opened to young “potential workers” tomorrow. But today they are “prisoners of precariousness – said Bergoglio – or long periods of unemployment, are not consulted by a work request to give them, as well as a fair wage, even the dignity with which to sometimes they feel deprived. ”
Francis, then, dreams of “a company that focuses on the person, the quality of its reports, the truth of his commitment to building a more just world, a truly all the world.” “With this meeting, that represents a first in the history of your Association you have proposed – he concluded the Pope – to confirm a commitment: to help with your work in a more just society and close to needs of ‘ man . you want to reflect together on the ethics of doing business. thank you for your commitment and for all the good you do and you can do. the Lord bless you. and I ask you, please, do not forget to pray for me. “
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