You tell me: Can you live crushed under the weight of the present? Without a memory of the past and without the desire to look ahead to the future by building something, a future, a family? Can you go on like this? This, to me, is the most urgent problem that the Church is facing.

We must not reduce the bosom of the universal church to a nest protecting our mediocrity.

Young people are just as attracted to the truth as they are convenience and expediency.

We need to be creative with young people. If they have no opportunities, they will get into drugs and be vulnerable to suicide.

Obeying God is listening to God, having an open heart to follow the path that God points out to us.

The confessional is not a torture chamber, but the place in which the Lord's mercy motivates us to do better.

From the peak of Chimborazo (volcano) to the Pacific coast, from the Amazon rainforest to the Galapagos Islands, may you never lose the ability to thank God for what he has done and is doing for you, may you never lose the ability to protect what is small and simple, to care for your children and your elderly, to have confidence in the young, and to be constantly struck by the nobility of your people and the singular beauty of your country.