Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Beirut (Agenzia Fides) - "For the good of the nation, as spiritual leaders, our duty is to protect the moral and spiritual values and the fundamental and national constitutional principles". This is what the Patriarch of Antioch of the Maronites, Bechara Boutros Rai said after his meeting on Tuesday, September 23rd with the new Grand Mufti of Lebanon, Abdel Latif Derian, unanimously recognized as a man of dialogue (see Fides 16/09/2014).
In statements reported by the local press, the Primate of the Maronite Church revived the collaboration between Christians and Sunni and Shia Muslims as a factor in the founding of the national identity of Lebanon and wealth to prevent the Land of the Cedars to be again plagued by conflicts afflicting the Middle East. "At a social level - repeated Cardinal Rai – muslims and Christians in Lebanon are a family with a common destiny and a common culture". The Patriarch also stressed the urgent need to promote administrative decentralization as a tool to curb corruption that infests the national institutions.
Meanwhile, yesterday, the Shiite leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah reiterated in a television interview that the Shiite party Hezbollah is contrary to any involvement, even partial, of Lebanon in the US-led coalition which began air strikes on Syrian territory against the positions of the jihadists of the Islamic State (IS). "The United States - said Nasrallah, among other things - are not morally qualified to lead a coalition against terrorism". (GV) (Agenzia Fides 24/09/2014)
