Cooperation among peoples, religions, and cultures is urgent, says Cardinal

Vatican City, Sep 12, 2004 / 22:00 pm

On Saturday September 11, Cardinal Paul Poupard, president of the Pontifical Council for Culture, stressed the “pressing urgency” of cooperation among cultures towards the goal of world peace, during an event entitled “In Memory of Spetember 11 – Dialogue for Peace.”

The cardinal said that he was "deeply moved" to participate in an event that "brings us together in the name of dialogue for peace ... in memory of September 11, a date that tragically marked our memory and continues to mark our memory and our common history."

"September 11," he said, "represents the beginning of a new phase of cruelty and lack of humanity, characterized by the killing of innocent people. We were all horrified by the images of the children in Beslan. ... It seems that humanity has regressed by centuries or millennia in recent months and days."

After recalling the kidnapping of two young Italian volunteers in Baghdad, which "like that of so many other civilians, has no justification," he said: "We cannot accept this regression of humanity on the part of these cruel and heartless people, for whom men and women do not exist but are only objects to use and to kill without any respect for the sacred nature of human life.”

“We cannot become accustomed to this way of living, to this loss of the meaning of human life, of its sacredness and intangible nature.”

"This evening," he concluded, "we want to reaffirm that cooperation among peoples, religions and cultures is not just a secondary decision but a pressing urgency, a true necessity: we are all called to work together as a human family to achieve world peace."