INTER-RELIGIOUS MEETING
   AND INSERTION

In harmony with the "spirit of Assisi", the international fraternity of "Notre Dame des Nations" wished to make a preliminary gesture of dialogue with other religions. On the 20th of January last, the fraternity received four representatives of Islam, Turkish and Moroccan, three Jews together with the Rabbi of the city and two Vietnamese Buddhists. The meeting opened with a moment of "inter-religious" prayer (with texts taken from the Koran, the Bible and from Buddhism), followed by a frugal and fraternal meal. The guests, gathered around the table, felt like "brothers" in the same humanity and desire for mutual respect. They expressed themselves with cordiality and openness and manifested the desire to have similar meetings repeated, enlarging and multiplying them.

This meeting is included in the frame-work of the other initiatives of the international Fraternity that is developing insertion into the local church, moving towards realities that are found a little beyond the frontiers of official pastoral activity. There are, for example, services to the poor in collaboration with two local associations, the accompaniment of a group of young Chaldeans, "lectio divina" with some Italian functionaries of the European Community, the pastoral care of "new communities" or groups of families, oo a Christian community of foreigners, the animation of "informal" Franciscan groups and, obviously, the pastoral activity of our parish "Notre Dame des Grāces".

Besides these pastoral services to the poor and to inter-religious dialogue, the Fraternity ­ in collaboration with Missio-Bruxelles ­ has begun a programme of preparation for young lay people who want to go on mission for two or three months, or longer.

 Bruxelles