IN THE NAME OF ALLAH, THE MERCIFUL, THE VERY MERCIFUL

How beautiful are the words which are consecrated to the cause of God by whom does good and proclaims his submission.

Good and evil should not be confused. Answer to evil by good. Your enemy will soon become your best support.

Such greatness of spirit is the privilege of those who have been touched by an infinite grace and who persevere.

At Satan�s slightest temptation, call upon God. He hears and knows everything.

Glory to God alone Rabat August 22nd, 2001

Dialogue for a civilization of living together

Modern man has created a way of living together based on dialogue in order to live a new era and write a history that puts into the past the wars humankind has lived through to be able to live a new civilization. The richness of values are always the bases that never change in the life of human being. Since the prophets, first of them, ABRAHAM (father of the prophets) and then MOSES, JESUS AND MOHAMMED, civilization is but a dialogue created by human being and blessed by God. It is a very difficult obligation to believe in for the one only reason that man because of his sufferings, his fears and his believes can only find the hope to live and live again his history in God the forgiving, the almighty, and no one can find his way far from God�s will.

The human being in modern civilization has tried to find a cohabitation among men but always far from God�s will. Sometimes, man��� but he always found himself in God�s mercy and forgiveness.

A great Rabbi was telling me one day about cohabitation of human beings, the hidden thoughts of history and that of religious wars : �As wise men of the religions, we are very reserved in front of the creation of a civilization of cohabitation of human beings.

In 1985, in the stadium of honour in Casablanca and in front of 80 000 Moroccan Muslims, Pope John Paul II hoisted the white flag of an innocent dialogue, sacred and Loyal to each identity�s origin. Through his speech, he intended to banish all the wars from the Middle Ages to our days, he drew important lines of a dialogue for a civilization of cohabitation instead of a civilisation of victors and defeated. The Pope has just courageously renewed the notion of dialogue in his famous and recent speech in Jerusalem and in the great Oumayade mosque in Damas.

Who among us does not remember the holy moments in Jerusalem when John Paul II put the letter in the wall between the great synagogue, the great cathedral and the great mosque. My eyes were filled with tears as I saw him covering the short distance all alone and as I saw the Pope�s hand putting down the letter while looking at the road ABRAHAM had travelled from the south of Iraq until his arrival in Jerusalem without delivering any speech. In Cuba, when it was not customary, the Pope spoke about the suffering of people subject to the international embargo which opposes the dialogue of civilization and cohabitation. That day, the Pope said :

�I am not in favour of the embargo against the people�. This attitude has been renewed in Turkey, country of the history of the Ottoman Empire and in Africa to prove that a human being has the right to live in full respect of his race, colour, identity and projects in life.

We want to enter globalisation far from the wars that our history has already marked with blood.

And as religion constitutes a major factor in human life, it�s obvious that everyone of us should strive for tolerance and strengthen the love for his fellow man whoever he may be. Peace in the world is achieved through peace among religions.

Today, we have to make other wars, those against evil, illness, punishment, poverty, ignorance�and we may say that the principles in the manifesto of Assisi, which have been strengthened and consolidated in Rome, in Jerusalem, in Bucarest and today in Barcelona, launch a new school of dialogue of civilized cohabitation. We desire a consolidation of this spirit that empowers the efforts of the Community of Sant�Egidio where humankind will find its religious identity for a world of faith and values. Because religion should not serve anymore as a shield for warriors, nor should be used for destruction, but rather serve its duty which first of all is peace and happiness for humankind.

Professor Mohamed Amine Smaili

Head of the UFR Religions Dialogue in the Muslim thought.

Mohamed V Agdal University

Literature Faculty � Rabat -

Morocco