When
Pope John Paul II convened leaders of twelve different
faiths, including Jews and Muslims, in Assisi, Italy,
on January 24 to pray for peace in the world, there
were mutterings in his own church.
Observant Roman Catholics do
not ordinarily criticize the pontiff. If they disagree
with any of his teachings or gestures, dissent is usually
muted.
The interreligious
prayer meeting in the
town of Saint Francis--the
champion of nonviolence,
simple living and love
of nature--upset some
traditionalist Catholics.
The event, they warned,
came close to syncretism:
it suggested, at least
by implication, that
all faiths are essentially
equal.
Syncretism is a religious-philosophical
system blending the
beliefs of various
peoples and cultures
that found many followers
in the late period
of the Roman Empire,
A.D. 200-400. People
then indistinctly worshipped
Mithras, the Persian
god of Light; Zeus
of the Greeks and Jupiter
of the Romans; diverse
other divinities; and,
at times, also coopted
the God of the Jews
and Christians. Modern
religious syncretism
holds that a superior,
transcendental intelligence
dominates the universe
and that the different
faiths deserve equal
esteem and dignity
as human attempts to
approach and understand
it.
The Church of Rome
has for centuries maintained
that it offered the
sole way toward salvation.
This claim was dropped
after the Second Vatican
Council (1962-1965).
The Vatican created
special departments
for Christian Unity;
for Religious Relations
with Judaism; and for
Inter-Religious Dialogue.
Although neither John
Paul II nor the Vatican
ever declared that
all faiths are equal,
the prayer meeting
in Assisi with its
condemnation of war,
violence and terrorism
by all participating
groups was significant
in the current climate
of religion-inspired
passions, especially
in the Middle East,
Asia and Africa.
Among
the Christian leaders
present in
Assisi were the Ecumenical
Patriarch of Constantinople,
Bartholomew I (whom
the pope addressed
as "Your Holiness"),
a vicar of the Russian-Orthodox
patriarch of Moscow,
as well as ranking
Lutherans and delegates
from many other Protestant
denominations. Rabbis
from Israel, the United
States, France and
other countries represented
Judaism. Imams and
various religious personages
from Saudi Arabia,
Egypt and a dozen other
countries made up the
Muslim delegation.
There were, furthermore,
Buddhists, Hindus,
Sikhs, Jains, Zoroastrians,
Confucians, Shintoists,
members of Tenri-kyo
(a 163 year-old Japanese
sect), and three African
tribal cultists.
Between the two plenary
sessions the more than
200 religious leaders
prayed separately--all
Christians together
with the 81 year-old
ailing pontiff in the
Lower Basilica of Saint
Francis above the tomb
of the saint; the Muslims
in the adjacent Franciscan
convent in a hall that
looks out in the direction
of Mecca; and the other
groups in various rooms
of the convent. All
participants traveled
from Rome to Assisi
and back with the pope
in a special train,
and shared vegetarian
meals with him in Assisi
and in the Vatican.
The
event of January
24 was preceded by
a similar, smaller
interreligious meeting
in Assisi in 1986,
attended also by the
Dalai Lama. Over the
last few years, John
Paul II has made other
interfaith gestures.
He prayed before the
Western Wall in Jerusalem;
he visited the al-Azhar
University in Cairo,
Islam's center of higher
learning; and he took
his shoes off to enter
the Mosque of the Omayyads
in Damascus, Syria.
Each time, conservative
Catholics betrayed
puzzlement; their whispers
of "creeping syncretism" became
quite audible after
the recent Assisi affair.
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