It was not the typical pilgrim community that was received by Pope Francis in the Vatican on Monday: the Papal States had the Italian industrial association Confindustria hold its general assembly in the Paul VI assembly hall for the first time and combined this with an audience with the Holy Father.

More than 5,000 entrepreneurs and managers, who were allowed to bring their families, streamed into the great hall.

Crowds crowded around Francis, who was in a wheelchair, to touch his hand.

Christian Schubert

Economic correspondent for Italy and Greece.

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In his speech, the head of the church got straight to the heart of his doctrine.

"How can entrepreneurs get into heaven?" Wealth can serve the common good, but also generate "envy, malice, not infrequently violence and badness".

"Jesus himself tells us that it is very difficult for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God" - but "not impossible," added the Pope.

Sharing is the royal road to paradise.

That goes through philanthropy, whereby one does not have to give everything away like the merchant Francis of Assisi, the Pope added and thanked the audience for donations for Ukrainian children.

He also described taxes and levies as a form of sharing, whereby the taxes had to be “fair and just”;

the tax system and administration had to be "efficient and not corrupt".

The creation of jobs is also practiced sharing - especially for young people and migrants.

"Every newly created job is a piece of dynamically shared prosperity." Technology, on the other hand, is a threat if it destroys jobs.

Gap between top salaries and wages

Just as the economy needs workers, the nations need their offspring.

The "demographic winter" has to be overcome in Italy and other countries.

"There is a reality - I'm not saying in your country - that women get kicked out if you see their stomachs," lamented the Pope, calling on entrepreneurs to end this discrimination.

He also appealed to them not to let the gap between top salaries and workers' wages grow immeasurably.

"Today, the share of the value attributed to the workers is too small." In general, the loss of contact between top and bottom in companies is very worrying.

The managers "spend their lives in offices, at meetings, on trips, at congresses, and they no longer visit workshops and factories".

Employer President Carlo Bonomi asked the pontiff for “a blessing that we so desperately need” in view of the difficult times.

He got it.

And the corporate world gave a standing ovation.