Vatican City, Jun 9, 2008 / 17:11 pm
The Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue met for its tenth full assembly this past week to focus on the theme: “Dialogue in truth and love. Pastoral orientations.” On Saturday, Pope Benedict spoke to group about the importance of truth being the goal of all dialogue and charity being the motivation behind all dialogue.
Over 60 participants were led in their discussions throughout the session by Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, the president of the council.
The Pope began his speech to the council by expressing his happiness that, “during these days you have sought to arrive at a deeper understanding of the Catholic Church's approach to people of other religious traditions. You have considered the broader purpose of dialogue - to discover the truth - and the motivation for it, which is charity, in obedience to the divine mission entrusted to the Church by our Lord Jesus Christ."
This context of searching for the truth should impact the exchanges that the Church has with followers of other religions, the Pontiff explained. "In the words of my venerable predecessor, Pope Paul VI, the Church's principal responsibility is service to the Truth - 'truth about God, truth about man and his hidden destiny, truth about the world, truth which we discover in the Word of God'."