A contribution to dialogue ” “

“The new Europe must not shut itself off from the good spirit of religions”. This appeal brought to a close the symposium held in Brussels on 14-15 October, with the title “Giving a chance to dialogue: the contribution of the religious and philosophic convictions to reciprocal understanding in the European cities of our time”. Attended by some seventy exponents and delegates of religions and humanistic thought in Europe, as well as representatives of EU institutions, the conference was promoted jointly by the lay association “A Soul for Europe” and the group of political Advisers of the European Commission with the aim of throwing light on the “concrete expressions” of dialogue and collaboration between different credos, institutions and movements of civil society in Europe. European network of dialogue. Precisely because the EU still seemed reluctant to concern itself with religious and humanistic questions, fifty years after its foundation, the then president of the Commission, Jacques Delors, in the early 1990s, launched the project “A Soul for Europe”. “Our association – explains its coordinator, Wim Burton – is a network that brings together representatives of the three confessions, Christianity, Judaism and Islam, as well as humanists, and proposes to be a forum for dialogue; we try to ensure that everyone has a place at the table of discussion, where religious leaders, exponents of the philosophical creeds, and representatives of the European institutions may recognize their common responsibility towards civil society”. Some examples. The symposium was also an occasion to review the experiences of interreligious dialogue and multicultural collaboration between communities of faith and thought in Europe. Ataullah Siddiqui, head of the Islamic Foundation in Leicester, spoke of the functioning of the “interfaith councils”, while David Stevens from Belfast, former chairman of the Interfaith Forum of Northern Ireland, presented some examples of cooperation between social services and Catholic, Presbyterian and Methodist religious communities in various areas of the capital of Ulster to regenerate run-down areas and stimulate mutual trust on the basis of the 1998 peace accord. Werner Shultz from Berlin, referring to some “structural problems with the Moslem communities”, emphasized the need to reform religious education, on a “multireligious” basis, because only “knowledge” can foster mutual respect and peaceful co-existence and “prevent forms of extremism”. The chairman of the central committee of Moslems in Germany, Nadeem Ataa Elyas, asked Europe to listen to “the problems of the Islamic minorities” but he also energetically appealed to the 34 million Moslems who live in Europe to remain “faithful to the values and the moral code of their religion”, and at the same time to “emerge from their self-isolation” and “participate in the democratic process” of Europe. The Austrian delegates Peter Grabensberger and Karl Kumpfmüller presented Graz as an exemplary “bridge between south and east of Europe”, listing the numerous initiatives for ecumenical and intercultural dialogue that have taken place in the Austrian city. Graz was in fact chosen as the seat of the “Interfaith Europe” project that led to a series of cities and religious and international organizations joining together to promote a conference on the diversity and richness of cultures and faith in European cities, scheduled to be held in July 2003. The voice of civil society. The objective of the conference, summed up Michael Weninger, political adviser to the European Commission, was to contribute to the “creation of a European identity within the European infrastructure” and “in this forum of dialogue, civil society plays an essential role”. The opportunity was very favourably perceived by the assembly, said David Greenberg, delegate of the Council of European Rabbis: “We expressed the common desire that at the practical level, and not only that of theological dialogue, there should be a more structured and continuous system that may permit problems of interreligious relations to be solved and occasions for dialogue to be grasped, to the advantage of faith itself and of the social polities of Europe as a whole”.