{"id":327836,"date":"2015-12-14T12:30:48","date_gmt":"2015-12-14T11:30:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/muslims-and-christians-step-onto-the-field-for-fraternity\/"},"modified":"2024-05-16T15:02:20","modified_gmt":"2024-05-16T13:02:20","slug":"muslims-and-christians-step-onto-the-field-for-fraternity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/muslims-and-christians-step-onto-the-field-for-fraternity\/","title":{"rendered":"Muslims and Christians Step Onto the Field for Fraternity"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"20151213DonneMusulmane\"<\/a>\u201cCarry on! Carry on with courage along the road of dialogue and brotherhood, <\/strong>because we are all children of God!\u201d Pope Francis forcefully told the hundred people from the Focolare and several Italian Muslim communities at the end of the December 13th Angelus<\/a>. They had come together to testify to their common journey that has been underway for many years, \u201cChristians and Muslims Together in Building Peace,\u201d as the banner they held read on Saint Peter\u2019s Square. There were imams with their communities from Rome, Trieste, Teramo, and Catania, young women and teenagers from the Mosque of Centocelle in Rome, families and children, scholars and journalists. There was also a delegation from the Buddhist, Risho Kosei Kai Movement, and representatives from Religions for Peace and from other religions. From the festive atmosphere on Saint Peter\u2019s Square, <\/strong>the group of 400 people moved to the seat of the Augustinianum which is just a few hundred metres from the colonnade surrounding Saint Peter\u2019s Square. The lunch they shared provided a setting for some jovial interaction that everyone was looking forward to; there was a prayer room for Muslims; Mass for Catholics \u2013 such an unusual event that it was widely covered in the press.

\"20151214Imam\"

From left: Imam Maher Akkad, Antonio Olivero, Michele Zanzucchi, father Egidio Canil<\/p><\/div> Legal expert on religious freedom, Vincenzo Buonomo, <\/strong>professor of International Law at the Pontifical Lateran University, kicked off the afternoon with a geopolitical overview: \u201cwar is the only answer that Europe has been able to give to terrorist action,\u201d he affirmed, \u201cwhile other tools exist \u2013 negotiation, accords between countries in the region, dialogue \u2013 all of these are of course more demanding but without doubt also more efficacious in the mid and long term.\u201d There was an equally incisive declaration by Imam of Catania, Abdelhafid Kheit, <\/strong>(directional member of the [Union of Islamic Communities of Italy] (UCOIL) who had just walked through the Holy Door of Mercy with several Christian friends: \u201cNot everyone thinks that diversity is an enrichment, but it is the Lord God who made us different, otherwise we would be one community.\u201d Italian Catholic Associations called for an investment in peace education, <\/strong>as a response to the clear challenge of dialogue. This is the direction in which the Spirit of Assisi <\/strong>is blowing, which was made present by Egidio Canil, Franciscan from the Sacred Convent, who exhorted everyone to: \u201ccross through the armies again today \u2013 like Francis at the time of the Crusades, to encounter the Sultan \u2013 and bring peace.\u201d <\/strong> Then there was the actual experience: <\/strong>Imams and Christian from Italian cities gave their live witnesses. The imam from Centocelle, Mohamed Ben Mohamed, relies heavily on the witness of young people \u2013 many of them present \u2013 to bring forward the war against evil;\u201d Cenap Aydin, director of the Tevere Institute, joyfully exclaimed \u201cToday even the Pope joined us!\u201d This was followed by experiences from Centro La Pira <\/em>in Florence which, since 1978, has been a place of fraternal welcome for people from other countries, and of encounter amongst different cultures. The community of Trieste was described by Imam Naher Akkad; the \u201cDifferent but ONE\u201d project, begun 20 years earlier and spread throughout Abruzzi, was presented by Imam Mustapha Batzami; and from the community of Catania where dialogue between Muslims and Christians has been lived out for some time in after-school programmes in Mosques; meetings amongst families that led to two large-scale public events, which were presented by an imam and Giusy Brogna who is in charge of the Focolare\u2019s interreligious dialogue in Italy.

\"20151214GiovaneSiriano\"

Amjad Zedan, a Syrian student from Sophia University Institute<\/p><\/div> The presence of Amjad Zedan, a young Syrian student from Sophia University Institute<\/a>, and Pascal Bedros, a Lebanese resident of Aleppo, brought to the hall, amidst the coldness of the war, that thread of hope of those who believe that \u201cdespite it being almost too late, the situation could still change,\u201d and warning to the West that has not understood how dangerous the stakes would be. The <\/strong>pact of closeness and collaboration<\/a> that was signed by the Focolare Movement and by the Muslim Communities in Italy marked the conclusion of the event, and was a commitment to be lived out in everyday life, a responsibility \u201cso that no one will give up in situations where life together is difficult, but that everyone would work for the \u201cirrevocable rejection of violence\u201d and in favour of religion that is a \u201csource of social cohesion and of peace.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

450 people from different Muslim and Christian communities have given life to a common witness of peace building. They stood together on Saint Peter\u2019s Square, welcoming the words of Pope Francis that was followed by an afternoon of dialogue. A pact of closeness and collaboration was also signed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[893],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-327836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-focolare-worldwide-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=327836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327836\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=327836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=327836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.focolare.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=327836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}