That a pope should devote attention to the arts is not very exceptional: Paul VI did it in his homily of May 7, 1964, John Paul II in his Letter to Artists and Benedict XVI in On Beauty. Sons of a Vatican II inspired among others by Hans Urs von Balthasar (with his theology of the pulchrum), they were called to open this door. The Chair of St. Peter's welcomes headliners of very different styles, including theatrical performers, music lovers and professors of literature.

This time it was the latter's turn: in his recent Letter on the role of literature in the training, Francis maintains that frequenting good books "forms in decentralization, in the sense of limit, in the Withdrawal to the domain"; that the reader of good books is "more active" than the Username of audiovisual media; and that, since the center of Christianity is a person and not an abstract idea, literature reminds us with its plasticity "the union of the Word and the word".

The first argument reminds us that, in addition to fill in our own experience, reading opens us to a contemplative attitude, so necessary today: books like the Odyssey or the Divine Comedy show aspects of the human condition with an insight that is hard to match. The second suggests that, although living with the media and networks is imperative today, paying attention to other discourses not only removes us from "poisonous fake news" but also makes us more responsible and less uncritical subjects. The third argument adds something that concerns only Christians: that the Truth must be poured into vessels that are constantly changing.

But, one might object, what does literature give that other expressions do not? The book is a mirror and tells us who we are, but the same can be said of cinema, for example. The core topic is perhaps in the vehicle: the experience of language, which takes us out of the inarticulate immediacy. Man is a being who speaks, and speaking means producing meaning: unlike in life, where that meaning often does not appear, in literature things must have it, and that is why novels, poems, dramas or stories testify to the human hunger for meaning. A question, if not an answer, which is something.

So it is precisely in the weakness of literature in the face of these other media that its strength lies: slowness. Reading supposes, among other things, the experience of a slowness that is increasingly precious because it is scarce in the world of irrelevant speed. And that - ask Alonso Quijano, but also Ignatius of Loyola - can change your life. Today, when we have discovered the Mediterranean that an indiscriminate use of the seductions of the Internet can lead to dispersion and be so pernicious, breaking a lance in favor of reading is perhaps more than a toast to the sun. Thank you, Francisco.