A Christian-Islamic social meeting was held in recent days at the archbishop’s palace in Vienna. At the invitation of Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, archbishop of the Austrian capital and president of the Austrian Bishops’ Conference, the representatives of Islamic organizations and senior churchmen of the archdiocese met for an “evening of getting to know each other”, organized by the new office of contact for Christian-Islamic dialogue of the archdiocese of Vienna. Representing the archdiocese at the meeting, apart from Cardinal Schönborn himself, were the deans of Vienna, the directors of the diocesan offices and the representatives of Catholic organizations. The Islamic participants included representatives of Turkish mosques and organizations, led by Turkish Ambassador Selim Yenel, and the chairman of the Islamic faith community Anas Schakfeh. The director of the archdiocesan office, Martin Rupprecht, declared that the invitation represented “a great step forward for relations between Christians and Muslims in Vienna”. Rupprecht, active for many years in the field of interfaith dialogue, works in an area of the city inhabited by many Muslims of Turkish nationality and has already in the past organized meetings between parish priests and Muslim imams. Some contacts and meetings between Christian and Moslem families have also been held. What seems increasingly clear, he underlined, is the fact that “we know too little about each other”.
