 Good evening and a very cordial welcome to the 44th annual meeting of the World Economic Forum. Your Majesties, Excellencies, Ladies, Gentlemen, friends, members of the World Economic Forum community, I give you just a small advice for the meetings this year. You have to bring with you four different things to make it really successful. First, bring your brains. It will be an intellectually most stimulating meeting. So many strategic insights. But that's not enough. Bring your soul, because despite all the work we will do, despite all the networking, despite all the business you may do, despite all the political discussions which may go on here. But at the end, the soul is important. Values are important, because we want to live up to the mission of the World Economic Forum, improving the state of the world. The third thing which you have to bring with you to make it a successful meeting is your heart, passion, compassion. And finally, I think you need good nerves. When you bring together 2,500 people, it will require from time to time good nerves. This evening is less determined to appeal to your brains. It should appeal to your soul, to your hearts. And the arts is probably the best language of the heart. But before we are starting with the concert and with the celebration of the Crystal Award, I'm very proud and pleased that we will listen to the voice of a man who had been nominated, the man of the year 2013, who is considered everywhere in the world as the voice of morality, the voice of the soul. And it gives me great pleasure to ask his Eminence, Cardinal Turksen, who is the head, the president of the Pontifical Council for peace and justice, to come to the stage and to read a message of the Holy Fathers of the Pope for this audience. Please join me here. Thank you, Professor Schwab. I need to say that Professor did travel to Rome in the course of last year to invite the Holy Father Pope Francis to this forum. Not being able to come himself, he sent a small message to Professor Schwab and all participants of this forum. And it reads, to Professor Schwab, Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum, I'm grateful for your kind invitation to address the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, which is customary, will be held at Davos Closters at the end of this month. Trusting that the meeting would provide a location for deeper reflection on the causes of economic crisis affecting the world these past few years, I would like to offer some considerations in the hope that they might enrich the discussions of the forum and make a useful contribution to the important work of the forum. Ours is a time of notable changes and significant progress in different areas which have important consequences for the life of humanity. In fact, we must praise the steps being taken to improve people's welfare in areas such as health care, education and communications in addition to many other areas of human activity. And we must recognize the fundamental role that modern business activity has had in bringing about these changes. By stimulating and developing the immense resources of human intelligence, nonetheless, the success which have been achieved, even if they have reduced poverty for a great number of people, often have led to widespread social exclusion. Indeed, the majority of the men and women of our time still continue to experience daily insecurity often with dramatic consequences. In the context of your meeting, I wish to emphasize the importance that the various political and economic sectors have in promoting an inclusive approach which takes into consideration the dignity of every human person and the common good. I am referring to a concern that ought to shape every political and economic decision but which at times seems to be little more than an afterthought. Those working in these sectors have a precise responsibility towards others, particularly those who are most frail, weak and vulnerable. It is intolerable that thousands of people continue to die every day from hunger, even though substantial quantities of food are available, and often simply wasted. Likewise, we cannot but be moved by the many refugees seeking minimally dignified living conditions who not only fail to find hospitality but often and tragically perish in moving from one place to another. I know that these words are forceful and even dramatic, but they seek both to affirm and to challenge the ability of this assembly to make a difference. In fact, those who have demonstrated their aptitude for being innovative and for improving the lives of many people by their ingenuity and professional expertise can further contribute by putting their skills at the service of those who are still in dire need and in dire poverty. So what is needed then is a renewed profound and broadened sense of responsibility on the part of all. Business is in fact a vocation and a noble vocation, provided that those engaging at see themselves challenged by a greater meaning in life. Such men and women are able to serve more effectively the common good and to make the goods of this world more accessible to all. Nevertheless, the growth of equality demands something more than economic growth, even though it presupposes it. It demands first of all a transcendent vision of the person because without the perspective of eternal life, human progress in this world is denied a breathing space. It also calls for decisions, mechanisms and processes directed to a better distribution of wealth, the creation of sources of employment and an integral promotion of the poor which goes beyond a simple welfare mentality. So I'm convinced that from such an openness to the transcendent and new political and business mentality can take shape. One capable of guiding all economic and financial activity within the horizon of an ethical approach which is truly humane. The international business community can count on many men and women of great personal honesty and integrity whose work is inspired and guided by high ideas and integrity of fairness, generosity and concern for the authentic development of the human family. And so I urge you to draw upon these great human and moral resources and to take up the challenge with determination and far sightedness. Without ignoring naturally the specific scientific and professional requirements of every context, I ask you to ensure that humanity is served by wealth and not ruled by it. Dear Mr Chairman and all of you my friends, I hope that you may see in these brief words a sign of my pastoral concern and a constructive contribution to help your activities to be ever more notable, noble and fruitful. I renew my best wishes for a successful meeting. As I invoke divine blessings on you all and the participants of this forum, as well as on your families and on your work. Send from the Vatican on the 17th day of January 2004, 14 and signed by Pope Francis. Thank you.