Editor's Report

Religious Leaders Reflect on Cooperation Inspired by Pope Francis’ Visit

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Last week, I had the good fortune to be in attendance when Cardinal Dolan and two other religious leaders who participated in the multi-faith gathering led by Pope Francis at the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum last September again came together at the museum for an evening panel discussion that evoked memories of that day and considered how such religious cooperation can be a force for good in today’s complex world.

The cardinal was joined by Rabbi Elliot J. Cosgrove of Park Avenue Synagogue in Manhattan and Imam Khalid Latif, executive director and chaplain for the Islamic Center at New York University, for the April 18 panel discussion led by Cliff Chanin, vice president for education and public programs at the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum.

Looking back on the pope’s visit to the site where the multireligious gathering took place, Cardinal Dolan said the idea to hold it at the 9/11 Memorial and Museum seemed like a “providential spot” that would combine two of the pope’s desires for his trip to New York—a visit to the site of Ground Zero, where his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI had prayed during his 2008 visit to New York, and an interfaith gathering.

The cardinal took the audience on a behind-the-scenes journey delivered from his unique vantage point as the pontiff’s host in New York, noting that the Holy Father was candid about the fact that he didn’t possess detailed knowledge about the United States but was open to learning and asked many questions. While traveling to the interfaith gathering following his address at the United Nations, the pope asked about 9/11, the cardinal said. He wanted to know what happens annually on the anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center and about the memorial that stands there today.

Speaking about his travels around the globe during the first two and a half years of his pontificate in relation to the interfaith gathering, Pope Francis told Cardinal Dolan, “There aren’t too many countries where you could do what we’re about to do, namely, for religions to come together, not just tolerating each other but enjoying it and enthusiastically celebrating it.”

Almost as a footnote, but also with a measure of pride, the cardinal said that the Vatican planners had “insisted” that the interfaith gathering at the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum be treated as a “New York event” with local religious leaders participating, which proved no problem given the diversity of religious practice here.

Cardinal Dolan drew an elongated “awww” from his audience when he described how the pope requested the helicopter pilot circle the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor two times while on the way back to JFK Airport. “He was intrigued by the magic of America,” the cardinal said.

Imam Latif described a thoughtful shift in his perspective about the pope’s visit and how his own participation in the multireligious gathering was influenced by the pontiff’s own words and actions. When he was first asked to participate, many people focused on what an amazing opportunity meeting the pope would be for him, how he would have an opportunity to engage the worldwide media, how his words at the service would be transmitted across the globe.

As he reflected more deeply, he considered the pope’s works of love and mercy, such as eating with the homeless instead of the politically connected, encouraging his “global constituency” to take in Syrian refugees at a time when others were seeking to keep them out, and generally understanding and acting as if his life is much bigger than himself. The evening before the interfaith gathering, at Vespers in St. Patrick’s Cathedral, the pope made a strong impression on the imam by going “off script” to begin the service by praying for the 700 Muslims who died while on a religious pilgrimage to Mecca that day.

“He did it because he felt it was the right thing to do,” Imam Latif said.

Bringing so many religious leaders together in a place so associated with the terrorist attacks and the deaths and devastation they wrought, and as the imam said last week, “a place utilized oftentimes to justify staying away from each other,” was no easy task. The task that fell to Pope Francis was to begin to turn the setting “into a place of healing, a place where we start to move forward,” Imam Latif said.

“Our city really needed a moment like this,” added the imam, who is also an NYPD chaplain.

Looking back to his participation in the multi-faith gathering, Rabbi Cosgrove recalled it as a “deeply humbling moment,” and he expressed his public gratitude to Cardinal Dolan and the Catholic community for the “graciousness of spirit” that allowed him to take part.

Echoing the cardinal’s words, the rabbi said the gathering of so many religious leaders with the Holy Father felt like both a global and local event at the same time, especially for New Yorkers.

“This became, for that moment in time, an opportunity by which people of diverse faiths can come together in peace, brotherhood and dialogue,” the rabbi said.

For his own congregation, many of whom had lost loved ones on 9/11, Rabbi Cosgrove’s presence with the other interfaith clergy with Pope Francis at the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum had brought “a modicum of comfort,” if not quite yet a measure of healing, he noted honestly.

Responding to a question about what it meant that such a gathering took place at the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum, Cardinal Dolan spoke movingly of the importance of the place where it occurred. “This place is essential to the soul of New York…it’s almost essential to come if you are to make a visit of integrity to New York.”

The gathering of the wide diversity of religious leaders in a spirit of “friendship and concord” at such a venue was not lost on the Holy Father. “I think that spoke volumes,” Cardinal Dolan said.