While addressing one million pilgrims near Krakow, he called on young people to do more about terrorism, rather than being “couch potatoes” glued to “the screen of a cellphone", The New York Times reports.

“Today’s world demands that you be a protagonist of history, because life is always beautiful when we choose to live it fully, when we choose to leave a mark.

Some situations seem distant until, in some way, we touch them. We don’t appreciate certain things because we only see them on the screen of a cellphone or a computer.

The times we live in do not call for young couch potatoes, but for young people with shoes or, better, boots laced. It only takes players on the first string, and it has no room for bench warmers", he added.

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The Pontiff made this passionate appeal on July 31, 2016.