Pope Francis Tasks Families to Embrace Positive Communication Skills
Disturbed by the increasing level of global violence, the Catholic pontiff, Pope Francis, at the weekend, enjoined families to embrace positive communication attributes that can usher in improved perspectives.
The pope stated this in his 2015 World Communications Day message delivered on his behalf by Very Rev. Fr. Patrick Tor Alumuku, the Director of Social Communications of the Catholic Archdiocese of Abuja.
According to the pope, with growing global violence, the family remains the best mode for communicating “authentic and humane messages that could guarantee protected environment.”
He advised that the level of communication between family members should improve and become more closely knit, especially in a more fragile society with attendant consequences.
According to him: “We should not be fearful of imperfections, weaknesses or even conflict, but rather learn how to deal with them constructively.
“The family, where we keep loving one another despite our limits and sins, thus becomes a school of forgiveness. Forgiveness is a process of communication.
“A child who has learned in the family to listen to others, to speak respectfully and to express his or her view without negating that of others, will be a force for dialogue and reconciliation in society.
“In a world where people often curse, use foul language, speak badly of others, sow discord and poison our human environment by gossip, the family can teach us to understand communication as a blessing.
“In situations apparently dominated by hatred and violence, where families are separated by stone walls or the less impenetrable walls of prejudice and resentment, where there seem to be good reasons for saying ‘enough is enough’ , it is only by blessing rather than cursing, by visiting rather than repelling, and by accepting rather than fighting, that we can break the spiral of evil, show that goodness is always possible and educate our children to fellowship,” the Pontiff stressed.
