The three dialogues

“The dialogue of reason; the important if not exclusive dialogue with Muslims in Europe; the open, transparent and regular dialogue of the Church with the European institutions are each in their own way the realisation of the Church’s dialogue with the world, which the Council was so keen to assign to us. Here, we should be guided by the imperative of clarity, the invitation to be meek, the counsel of trust and the virtue of prudence. Wherever the Church engages herself, she is not interested in special rights and privileges”. This is a passage of the prolusion with which the bishop of Rotterdam and Comece President msgr. ADRIANUS VAN LUYN , (the European Community’s Episcopates Commission) introduced the works of the plenary assembly which ends today. We hereby publish the full text of the address delivered by msgr. Van Luyn on the dialogue between the Church and European Institutions.I would like to conclude with a third form of dialogue, namely the dialogue with the political authorities of the European Union. Even though there is a long tradition of friendly contact between the Catholic Church and representatives of the European institutions via and alongside Comece, it is only recently that this dialogue has been somewhat formalised. Alongside the seminars which the European Commission has been arranging for years on fundamental issues with church representatives in Brussels and the traditional talks between these representatives and the church in question with governments in the framework of their six-monthly Eu Council Presidency, I am thinking here first and foremost of the three key talks of the last three years, to which leading religious representatives were invited by the presidents of the European institutions. The last of these key talks took place on 15 May this year and for the first time, the presidents of the Parliament, Council and Commission took part. Next year, a similar summit is planned for the end of April, beginning of May.I would like – contrary to some previous criticism – to give a clear welcome to these talks. They bear testament to the way the Eu has come to value representatives of the Church and religious communities more, and those who – like me – have been working for some years at Comece, no doubt remember the difficulties of earlier years, which were marked by the institutions not acknowledging us. This does not mean that the key talks could not be even better organised and, for example, some thought given to the number of church representatives and religious communities. These talks are indeed necessary but they alone are in our view not enough to satisfy the offer of an open, transparent and regular dialogue. Dear brethren, an entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty will enhance recognition of the relationships between Church and state at Member State level and the Eu’s dialogue with churches and religious communities at the primary law level of the European Union. This is why one should now start giving real thought to the form of this dialogue. This is first of all the task of the European institutions and the Commission in particular. However, as Comece we are of course prepared to discuss our views and ideas as well as our questions in preparatory talks on the dialogue of the Eu with churches and religious communities.