Pope Francis sends personal greetings to world's Muslims

August 02, 2013

Pope Francis has sent a message to Islamic world, calling for mutual respect between Christians and Muslims.

The Pope’s message, released by the Vatican on August 2, is timed for the Muslim feast of Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of Ramadan. Since 1967, the Vatican has issued an annual greeting to the world’s Muslims on that date.

Ordinarily the Vatican message is released by the Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue. But Pope Francis said that he chose to convey the greetings personally in this, the first year of his pontificate. Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, the president of the Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue, confirmed that this year’s message was the Pope’s “personal initiative.”

Addressing Muslims as his “dear friends,” and making his appeal especially to Islam’s religious leaders, the Pope calls for education to promote mutual respect. He defines those terms explicitly:

“Respect” means an attitude of kindness towards people for whom we have consideration and esteem. “Mutual” means that this is not a one-way process, but something shared by both sides.

Stressing that “we are called to respect the religion of the other, its teachings, its symbols, its values,” the Pope says that respect is especially due to religious leaders and to houses of religious worship. “How painful are attacks on one or other of these!” he writes.

In his message the Pope tells the world’s Muslims that he took his name, Francis, to honor “a very famous saint who loved God and every human being deeply, to the point of being called ‘universal brother.’” He also reminds his Islamic audience that in his annual address to the Vatican diplomatic corps he emphasized the importance of inter-religious dialogue, and said that he was “thinking particularly of dialogue with Islam.” The Pope closes the message with his “my prayerful good wishes, that your lives may glorify the Almighty and give joy to those around you.”

Although it is a break from the usual Vatican practice for the Pope personally to sign the annual message to Muslims, it is not unprecedented. In 1991, Pope John Paul II personally signed a message in which he expressed his anguish for the “beloved Muslim brothers and sisters” who were suffering because of the war in Iraq.

 

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Further information:

• Teaching Mutual Respect (L'Osservatore Romano)
• Pope to Muslims for end of Ramadan: Promoting Mutual Respect through Education (Vatican Radio)
• Pope sends message to Muslims to wish them for the end of Ramadan (Vatican Insider)
• Pope Francis calls for mutual respect in Ramadan message to Muslims (CNN)