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Pope Francis is scheduled to visit the Great Mosque in Rome at the end of the month, Muslim leaders confirmed this week.
According to Rome Reports, the Islamic delegation, which was filmed visiting the pope earlier this week, told the Catholic leader that it is their "honor to meet you and recognize your moral and spiritual leadership. We are honored to invite you to the Islamic Cultural Center." The pope replied by telling the delegation that it would be "a great pleasure to visit you also, because it would be a great sign of our brotherhood."
The pope's invitation to visit the Great Mosque comes days after he visited Rome's Great Synagogue on Sunday. The pope also described the Jewish religion as the "elder brothers" of the Christian religion. Francis has previously visited four mosques, including a November 2014 visit to the 17th century Sultan Ahmet mosque in Istanbul, Turkey, where the pontiff focused his speech on the importance of religious freedom and acceptance. The pontiff has also visited mosques in the Central African Republic and the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, considered to be a highly important religious site for the Muslim religion. If the pope does accept the invite to visit Rome's Great Mosque, he will be the first pope to do so. The pontiff has repeatedly spoken on the importance of unity between Christians and Muslims, emphasizing this theme during a speech in the Central African Republic in November 2015. "Christians and Muslims are brothers and sisters," he told the audience. |
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