“Interreligious dialogue and conviviality” is the theme of the three-day assembly of the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue, and Pope Francis discussed the theme in an address to participants.

“This is your mission: to promote, with other believers, in a fraternal and convivial manner, the journey in search of God; considering people of other religions not in an abstract way, but in a real sense, with a history, desires, sufferings, and dreams,” the Pope said. “Only in this way can we build together a world everyone may inhabit in peace.”

“I encourage all of you to cultivate the spirit and style of conviviality in your relations with people of other religious traditions: there is a great need for this today in the Church and in the world,” the Pope addded. “Let us remember that the Lord Jesus fraternized with all; he associated with people considered to be sinners and impure, and shared without prejudice the table of the publicans. And it was again during a convivial meal that he showed himself to be a faithful servant and friend to the end, and then as the Risen One, the Living one who gives us the grace of universal conviviality.”