At 12:15pm today (6:15am EDT) in the Hall of Popes at the Vatican Apostolic Palace, the Holy Father, Pope Francis received in audience a delegation from the Emouna Fraternité Alumni Association.
Dear friends,
With joy I welcome you on the occasion of your visit to Rome. While thanking you for presenting your Association, I express my cordial greetings to all your members, as well as to the persons of different religions and spiritualities with whom you are connected.
I give thanks to God for the existence of your association, born in the framework of the Emouna-L'Amphi des religions, which was proposed and initiated by the Institut d'études politiques in Paris, with the participation of the great religions present in France. In fact, I rejoice at the inspiration that has been shared by your association which seeks to strengthen the ties of fraternity among the members of various religions, while deepening the work of research. In fact, in the course of your studies, for which I wish to greet all those who have begun this work and those who continue to share their insights, you attest to the possibility of living healthy pluralism, respecting differences and values that each person contributes.
And you also bear witness, in a spirit of openness, to the capacity of religions to participate in the public debate at the heart of a secularized society (cf Evangelii gaudium, 183 and 255). You also demonstrate, through the fraternal connections established between you, that dialogue among believers of different religions is a necessary condition in order to contribute to peace in the world. I therefore encourage you to continue your work, having at heart the task of seeking always to understand three fundamental attitudes which can help your dialogue: the duty of identity, the courage of concern for the other and the sincerity of your intentions (cf Speech to participants taking part in the International Conference for Peace, Cairo, 28 April 2017).
You know, indeed, that true fraternity can only be lived in this attitude of openness to others, which is never aimed at a conciliatory syncretism; on the contrary, it always sincerely seeks to enrich itself with differences, with the will to understand them in order to respect them better, for the good of each person resides in the good of all. I invite you to testify to this fact by the quality of your relations that religion is not a problem but that it is part of the solution: it reminds us that we must raise the soul to the high to learn to build the city of men (International Conference for Peace, Cairo, 28 April 2017).
Thus, you can support each other to be like well-planted trees, rooted in the terrain of history and in your respective traditions; and in doing so, you will contribute, with men and women of good will, to transform the polluted air of hatred into the oxygen of fraternity every day (International Conference of Peace, Cairo, 28 April 2017). I encourage you to grow a culture of encounter and dialogue, to promote peace and to defend, with gentleness and respect, the sacredness of all human life against all forms of physical, social, educational or psychological violence. Exhorting you to pray for one another, I ask God for this gift of peace for each one of you. And I invoke the Father of all men to help you to progress as brothers on this path of encounter, dialogue and harmony in a spirit of collaboration and friendship.
With this hope, I call the divine blessings on each one of you and on the members of the Emouna Fraternité Alumni Association, as well as on all the people who participate in the Emouna-L'Amphi des religions program. Do not forget to pray for me. Thank you.
(Original text in Italian)
Greetings of the Holy Father, Pope Francis
addressed to a delegation from the
Emouna Fraternité Alumni Association
Dear friends,
With joy I welcome you on the occasion of your visit to Rome. While thanking you for presenting your Association, I express my cordial greetings to all your members, as well as to the persons of different religions and spiritualities with whom you are connected.
I give thanks to God for the existence of your association, born in the framework of the Emouna-L'Amphi des religions, which was proposed and initiated by the Institut d'études politiques in Paris, with the participation of the great religions present in France. In fact, I rejoice at the inspiration that has been shared by your association which seeks to strengthen the ties of fraternity among the members of various religions, while deepening the work of research. In fact, in the course of your studies, for which I wish to greet all those who have begun this work and those who continue to share their insights, you attest to the possibility of living healthy pluralism, respecting differences and values that each person contributes.
And you also bear witness, in a spirit of openness, to the capacity of religions to participate in the public debate at the heart of a secularized society (cf Evangelii gaudium, 183 and 255). You also demonstrate, through the fraternal connections established between you, that dialogue among believers of different religions is a necessary condition in order to contribute to peace in the world. I therefore encourage you to continue your work, having at heart the task of seeking always to understand three fundamental attitudes which can help your dialogue: the duty of identity, the courage of concern for the other and the sincerity of your intentions (cf Speech to participants taking part in the International Conference for Peace, Cairo, 28 April 2017).
You know, indeed, that true fraternity can only be lived in this attitude of openness to others, which is never aimed at a conciliatory syncretism; on the contrary, it always sincerely seeks to enrich itself with differences, with the will to understand them in order to respect them better, for the good of each person resides in the good of all. I invite you to testify to this fact by the quality of your relations that religion is not a problem but that it is part of the solution: it reminds us that we must raise the soul to the high to learn to build the city of men (International Conference for Peace, Cairo, 28 April 2017).
Thus, you can support each other to be like well-planted trees, rooted in the terrain of history and in your respective traditions; and in doing so, you will contribute, with men and women of good will, to transform the polluted air of hatred into the oxygen of fraternity every day (International Conference of Peace, Cairo, 28 April 2017). I encourage you to grow a culture of encounter and dialogue, to promote peace and to defend, with gentleness and respect, the sacredness of all human life against all forms of physical, social, educational or psychological violence. Exhorting you to pray for one another, I ask God for this gift of peace for each one of you. And I invoke the Father of all men to help you to progress as brothers on this path of encounter, dialogue and harmony in a spirit of collaboration and friendship.
With this hope, I call the divine blessings on each one of you and on the members of the Emouna Fraternité Alumni Association, as well as on all the people who participate in the Emouna-L'Amphi des religions program. Do not forget to pray for me. Thank you.
(Original text in Italian)
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