Cardinal Koovakad: Religions must speak up when human dignity is threatened

Summary

The article reports on the interreligious gathering “Dialogue in Diversity, a Shared Path Toward Fraternity,” held at Buenos Aires’s Teatro Colón on September 10. Cardinal George Jacob Koovakad, prefect of the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue, delivered the principal address during his September 9–14 visit to Argentina. The event was opened by Buenos Aires Mayor Jorge Macri and attended by approximately sixty representatives of local religious communities. Koovakad urged religious leaders to cooperate across traditions in defending human dignity, protecting vulnerable people, promoting religious freedom and nondiscrimination, caring for creation, and educating communities for peace. He presented peace as a practical, daily responsibility rather than an abstract ideal, and argued that authentic dialogue requires listening without prejudice, respecting differences, and recognizing others as equals. The cardinal also recalled Pope Francis’s commitment to human fraternity and referred to Pope Leo XIV’s stated emphasis on peace and dialogue. He proposed interreligious conviviality groups as local “schools” of dialogue and fraternity. The article also describes Argentina’s long history of interreligious initiatives, including a 2002 public intervention by representatives of ten major religious traditions during debate over the National Education Law. It concludes by portraying Argentina’s expanding interreligious networks as a source of hope and a potential model for further cooperation.