Pope Benedict XVI was to meet in Naples yesterday with leaders of several of the world's main religions on the sidelines of an inter-faith peace summit.
The pope is making a pastoral visit to the impoverished southern Italian city at the same time as the summit organized by the Sant'Egidio community, in what the lay Catholic association called a "happy coincidence."
The pontiff will lunch with the heads of the delegations to the summit including Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew I, the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, Israel's chief rabbi Yona Metzger and the imam of the United Arab Emirates, Ibrahim Ezzeddin.
Benedict will first celebrate an open-air mass in Naples' main piazza starting at 10am, to be shown on giant screens around the city for the expected spillover crowd.
He will also pay his respects to relics of Saint Januaris, a third-century martyr and patron saint of Naples. For the first time in many years, the urn holding the saint's bones will be opened for the pope to bless them.
Some of Januaris' dried blood, contained in vials, is said to miraculously liquefy twice each year, in the spring and again on his feast day in September -- as well as occasionally during papal visits.
Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi will attend the luncheon and help inaugurate the three-day Sant'Egidio summit, which has the theme "A World Without Violence: Faiths and Cultures in Dialogue" and will include some 200 speakers.
Tanzanian President Jakaya Mikwete, Malawian President Bingu Wa Mutharika and Ecuadoran President of Rafael Correa will also address the gathering.
Topics will include AIDS, immigration, and the plight of Africa. Italian Foreign Minister Massimo D'Alema will speak at a session today on the quest for peace in the Middle East.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS