INTERVIEW OF THE DAY
 

Lombardi on Cyprus: As the first day of Pope Benedict XVI’s Apostolic Voyage, to Cyprus draws to a close we hear from the Vatican Press Office Director, Fr Federico Lombardi:

“A journey marked by ecclesial communion , ecumenical dialogue and patient efforts towards peace. These the aspects of  this visit to Cyprus that  the pope highlighted as he spoke to journalists on his flight towards this island.
The Synod of Bishops for the Middle East scheduled for October will be a great opportunity for us to encounter and get to know each other better and therefore for mutual comfort, common research for ways to witness, as large and small, minority communities of different rites and traditions.
For Catholics therefore a message of communion and encouragement , an invitation not to look inwards but to become more capable of witness and service , readier to give visibility to the wealth of the millennium old  Christian presence in lands where the seed for our faith was sown .
The encounter with members of  the Orthodox Church will be marked by steps forward on a path full of promise so that our common witness , the Christian vision of man and life , emerges more strongly than ever in today’s world where fundamental values are not only challenged but often radically contested.
Theological differences mustn’t allow us to forget that unifying factors are much more important than those that still divide.
Finally the patient efforts to announce peace , despite situations and episodes which provoke anxiety and discouragement. The spiritual and religious mission of the Pope continues in the same spirit as his last year’s journey to the Holy Land . The Gospel remains an inexhaustible source of hope to break down the barriers of the deepest of divisions”.