"Seeing where we stand with the way the European Churches are facing the problem of dialogue with Islam, in an atmosphere which has become heated after the cartoons of Muhammad". This is one of the items on the agenda of the meeting of the European Directors of the National Offices for Missionary Cooperation and the Papal Missionary Institutions (Pom), which will start tomorrow, March 10th, in Palermo (Italy) (it will last until 14th). This was reported to SIR by mgr. Giuseppe Andreozzi, Director of the Cei office for missionary cooperation among the Churches, who explained that one of the sessions of the Sicilian meeting will concern the 50th anniversary of the "fidei donum", for an "exchange of ideas among different countries about a form of missionary cooperation, which is decreasing in terms of missionaries sent abroad, because of the decreased number of priests, but which is growing in terms of foreign priests coming to Europe". Another anniversary that will be celebrated at the meeting of Palermo (Italy) is the 40th anniversary of the council decree "Ad gentes", of which Gianni Colzani, theologian, will illustrate the "pastoral perspectives" in the missionary domain on March 13th. The venue of the yearly European meeting of the POMs, explains Andreozzi, has been chosen to deal with the subject of the "Christian judgement" of Islam, in the light of the "current experiences of dialogue" and a recent document of the Churches of Sicily called "We and Islam"; it will be illustrated (still on March 13th) by Mario Crociata, professor at the Theology Faculty of Sicily.
