Scholars Consider Unique Mission of Holy City
By Chiara Santomiero
ROME, OCT. 12, 2010 with thanks to Zenit.org
Nothing less than religious liberty can be accepted for Jerusalem, says an
auxiliary bishop of the Jerusalem Patriarchate.
Bishop William Shomali affirmed this Friday at a seminar in Rome on Jerusalem
and international law. The seminar was scheduled to coincide with Sunday’s
inauguration of the synod on the Middle East, under way in the Vatican through
Oct. 24.
“Jerusalem cannot belong to one state,” the bishop said. “It
will resist all monopolization and will continue to be a microcosm in which all
religions have the same rights, regardless of the numbers. Nothing less can be
accepted than parity and religious liberty.”
The seminar was sponsored by Italian Catholic Action and other foundations. It
was inspired in Benedict XVI’s affirmation of the “universal
vocation” of the Holy City during his visit there in May 2009.
“Jews, Muslims and Christians alike call this city their spiritual
home,” the Pope said on that occasion. “How much needs to be done to
make it truly a ‘city of peace’ for all peoples, where all can come in
pilgrimage in search of God, and hear his voice, ‘a voice which speaks of
peace.'”
Intertwined
Cesare Mirabelli, an expert in canon and ecclesiastical law from Rome’s Tor
Vergata University, spoke about religious liberty as a prerequisite to peace.
“All the conventions on human rights guarantee religious liberty but there
is no agreement that imposes it specifically, proof that it is a very delicate
matter,” he said.
“Although the right to religious liberty is the first to be affirmed among
the fundamental right s, it is, in fact, violated,” continued Mirabelli.
This can happen, he said, in “obvious and violent ways in some
countries,” but also “in a more subtle way when the religious
dimension is erased from public life and its manifestation is not
allowed. As in all liberties, when the liberty of one is violated the liberty of
all is violated,” he added.
Safeguarding history
In the case of the Holy Land, Mirabelli reflected, the presence of the three
monotheistic religions is significant. Their common presence, he said, “is
not translated into a loss of identity, but into mutual respect and tolerance,
guaranteeing to each one that he can not only live in the Holy Land, but that
he can live there as a believer.”
And the plight of Christians in the Holy Land affects Christians around the
world, Mirabelli affirmed, since “not only the political options are at
stake, but also the safeguardin g of that history of faith contained in the
sacred testimonies.”
Father David Jaeger, professor of canon law and expert in Church-state
relations in the Holy Land, clarified that religious liberty is “not
indifference or relativism: it means that no one can pressure an individual in
this connection.”
A requisite to guarantee religious liberty, he added, is “the secularity
of the state, which all religious communities have the task of
safeguarding.”