The European Union is the masterpiece of our century. It has united the peoples, secured peace, opened up markets and protected us as consumers. Now, what is left is to make the citizen a major player in its evolution.

The EU is founded on a set of fundamental values and projects that brought the people together after WWII. Seven decades later our collaboration is broadened and I believe, with a united Europe, we will have a better future!

Europe was built on ruins of war as a symbol of peace, solidarity, friendship and tolerance and as a victory over nationalism, extremism, racism and xenophobia. Today’s Europe is stronger because we all stand together and only together we can overcome today’s global challenges. But we can only do it, if we listen to European citizens and if we discuss our common future with them. And what better way to do it if not as 9th of May through Europe day.

 

Europe is the first initiative in mankind’s history aiming at a cooperation between states in order to stop war and to bring prosperity to their citizens. Despite the difficulties, let’s keep in mind this proverb which applies very well to the Union: Alone you can go faster, but together you can go further.

Europe is your home. Make it your own.

A commom memory and a common celebration for all the people of Europe are cohesive elements for our shared project, and they help us to bet for another seventy years of peace.

To place value on the Union as a protective shield against fanaticism, extremism and exclusionary and toxic nationalisms can save us from new conflicts and setbacks in terms of human, social and political rights.

A common European holiday commemorating the birth of the European Union and celebrating 70 years of peace in Europe is long overdue. More than its symbolic character, it would bring European citizens closer together and forge a stronger European identity. Every nation celebrates its founding myth, why not the EU?

We need Europe Day as a day that claims the real protagonists in the European construction process: its citizens. In the face of the current threats to the EU, we must take initiatives which strengthen our European identity.

I am pleading that 9th of May should be a true holiday throughout the European Union. That day would, more accentuated than before, promote the values on which the European Union rests, and contemplate the economic, security and other challenges facing the Union and its citizens.

As European citizens we have lots of reasons to be proud of our common project, the European Union. The Europe Day as a public holiday will remind us of it every year.

The EU has a solid daily legitimacy, but it has not been able to build a sense of belonging, neither a democratic legitimacy that supports a solid sense of belonging.

Europe is the promise of a better life based on the coexistence of different peoples. To be European is to stand up for what is right in every corner of the world.

On May 9 we celebrate the road towards a better Europe of free and equal citizens.

Celebrating Europe Day in the future will help us to be more European, but also to build a stronger Europe.

Symbols are important because they socialize, mobilise and create identities. Europe must foster its symbols to strengthen its union.

To have a common European public holiday is valuable.
The European Union needs to give visibility to its union.

As Jean Monnet wrote, ‘… only the people can change and enrich things in the institutions and transmit them to future generations’. Let’s stand together, as Europeans we can change them for the better.

Europe is the natural space for our generation.
It is fundamental to make this visible.

The union of Europe does urgently need shared symbols and emotions, apart from treaties and regulations that many Europeans see as an imposed and distant bureaucracy. A common public holiday, a Europe Day that bring us together, is a good idea in that direction.

Europe Day would help to unite all European citizens to celebrate and remember the strength and need of the EU as an instrument for facing together the global challenges of the 21st century.

The European Union needs to strengthen our common identity. Symbols and celebrations, like this public holiday, would be useful to remember all that we share.

I believe in a strong Europe, with greater influence in political decision-making and better known by its citizens. I therefore think this initiative and its achievement would be a good way to contribute to the knowledge of Europe.

If Europe wants to be closer to its citizens, it should strive to be more than just an union of economic interests. People are the soul of the European project, and solidarity is the instrument for unity. More Europe is needed, a social and fair Europe, which is less conditioned by the financial powers.

European identity is not what sets us apart from the rest, but our willingness to live together, to improve and to work for a project that is from all of us. Europe is a source of inspiration beyond its borders. We have to look to the past with pride, and to the future with hope.

Initiatives such as “Europe Day” can do much more for the spirit of the European citizenship than other a lot more expensive programs. In order to unite the people, progress is needed towards the field of culture and education.

We celebrate what we are and what we believe in. We celebrated what happened to be what we are and who we are now, and what we are to remain.

From a socially responsible journalism, Cambio16 faces the alerts that nowadays trigger the alarms of a society that is overwhelmed by the daily human rights violations and, to the same extent, it wonders if there will be a tomorrow, when global warming and climate change are announcing a terrible planetary holocaust.

Europe is ethical, otherwise there will not be Europe.

Europe is a symbol of values, of peace and of unity in its diversity. Let us feel proud of this project unique in the world and build together a more sustainable, more social and more united Europe!

Europeans must stand united and the best way to show how committed we are to our unity would be to implement a common European day to recognise our European ideas and values.

Today Europe lacks symbols and emotion. A EU-wide bank holiday on Europe day would allow the project to equip itself with both elements. It would be an opportunity to explain the Union better in positive terms.