An invitation to scholars, university students, laymen and priests "from every country, involved somehow or other in the exploration of the cultural and religious roots of the old continent": the calendar of the twenty-eighth European Week, due from 5th to 9th September, about "Religious history of Islam in the Balkans" has been presented at Fondazione Ambrosiana Paolo VI in Gazzada (Varese – Italy). "Going on in the exploration of the religious and cultural roots of Europe, started in 1979, the Fondazione, in cooperation with Milan’s Università Cattolica, after putting forward in the past the states with a Catholic majority (Croatia and Slovenia) and those with an Orthodox majority (Serbia and Bulgaria), reviews the steps, methods and results of the conquest and spreading of Islam during the Ottoman rule over a large part of south-eastern Europe, especially in the lands of Albania, Bulgaria, Serbia and Croatia, Greece". Luciano Vaccaro, director of the promoting board, explains to SIR the contents and plans of the International Meeting. "With the end of the Ottoman rule, the territorial expansion of Islam came to a halt; but its presence remained numerically significant, culturally strong and now it has also a political side to it, coming up as a phenomenon that should not just be tackled as a religious entity". (to be continued)
