Promoting Peaceful Coexistence and Common Citizenship

[ 41 ] — RELIGIOUS LEADERS’ PLATFORM — certain things and he gave them to her. He also cured another woman’s son, even though she, too, was not one of his followers. Jesus performed many deeds, all of which exemplify the need for everyone to pray to his/her own God, as well as to live in peace with each other. He gave us many excellent examples of this peaceful coexistence — even when people persecuted him, he still asked God to pardon them. In the same way, if we see that others are on the wrong path, we should pray and ask God to help them return to the right one. Many churches have schools and hospitals. In the schools, children live together as brothers and sisters without con- sidering each other’s religions. In the hospitals, people are treated in the same room as others from different religions. Moreover, we have Christian TV channels that concentrate only on dialogue in order to foster a more fruitful coexist- ence. It was the suggestion of Pope Tawadros II to launch a children’s TV channel to help them understand, from their earliest years, that they need to live together, without looking at each other’s religions. The channel is named Koogi, which is the Coptic expression for ‘little one’ or ‘little darling’. We also have our religious books, the story of Jesus Christ, and numerous sayings in Christianity and in Islam that stress the fact that evil people would not use the words ‘Islam’ or ‘Salaam’. But, if people live in peaceful coexistence, they carry good in their hearts. I wish you all a fruitful conference and pray that God will grant us all success. Each one of us will go home to their community, where we will have the opportunity to meet with new people and spread the message of peace. Those people may then spread these ideas further, in which case societies will live in peace, with love for one another. May God grant us peaceful coexistence. Amen. Children live together as brothers and sisters in school without considering each other’s religions