- The Catholic Thing - https://www.thecatholicthing.org -

Youth in despair

Our young people’s sadness, hopelessness and suicidal thoughts are a desperate cry for this attentive love in the midst of their existential and ever-urgent questions. In 2021, 42 percent of U.S. high schoolers said they felt persistently sad or hopeless, 22 percent seriously considered attempting suicide in the previous year, 18 percent had come up with a concrete plan on how they would end their life, and 10 percent actually tried to carry out that plan (and thankfully failed). This crisis of hope is linked to a crisis of faith. [1]