GREETING OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS
TO PARTICIPANTS IN A MEETING OF THE PERMANENT COMMITTEE FOR DIALOGUE
BETWEEN THE PONTIFICAL COUNCIL FOR INTERRELIGIOUS DIALOGUE
AND THE IRAQI SUPERINTENDENTS FOR
SHIITES, SUNNIS, CHRISTIANS, YAZIDIS, SABEANS/MANDAEANS

Room adjacent to Paul VI Audience Hall
Wednesday, 29 March 2017

Good morning!

I cordially greet you and thank you for your visit and for your presence. This encounter of dialogue and fraternity is a true pleasure for me. We are all brothers, and where there is brotherhood there is peace. We are children of God, everyone. And, as His Eminence [Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran] stated, we have an earthly father in common: Abraham; and since Abraham first “set forth”, up to today, we have come, everyone together. We are brothers and, like brothers, all different and all the same, as the fingers of one hand: there are five fingers; all are fingers, but all are different. I thank God, the Lord, for helping us to be gathered here. Your dialogue among yourselves, your visit, is a true wealth of brotherhood, and through this is a path toward peace, for all. The peace of the heart, the peace of families, the peace of countries, the peace of the world. I ask Almighty God to bless all of you, and I ask you, please, to pray for me. Thank you very much.