Congress on Cardinal Lustiger in Paris

On the dates October 19 and 20, 2014, a congress on the book “The Promise,” written by the later Cardinal Aaron Jean-Marie Lustiger took place at the College Bernardins in Paris (see here). The congress was entitled “The Promise, from generation to generation”. Among the themes were:

- The background to the 1976 retreat during which the book was “born”, the link between Cardinal Lustiger and the monks of Abu Ghosh

- Elements in the book that might interest or be significant for a Jewish reader

- Jean-Marie Lustiger’s approach to the Scriptures, the expression of this approach in his homilies

- Dealing with the Shoah (with a personal note from Dr. Richard Prasquier, honorary president of the Union of Jewish Organizations in France)

- The question of how to transmit the principles of the approach of Lustiger to the people of Israel, to the Jewish-Christian dialogue and to the younger generation in the Church

On the second day, in the morning, a mass was celebrated in the Notre Dame Cathedral. After that, we divided up into five groups in order to read together some pages from the book, followed by a discussion which gave the opportunity to deal with some of the questions raised by the themes of the book.

The audiences was very heterogeneous, including four generations, friendly and very attentive and interested. It is noteworthy that the audience overflowed from the largest of the halls in the Institute and so those who came last to the registration participated through a video connection in an adjacent hall. Some were also interested in our communities, mentioned in the book, and there were many who sent regards to the members of our kehillot.

In the near future it will be possible to listen to the conferences on the site of the Institute and they will be published in book form.

To sum up: this was a beautiful experience, intense, full of content, with much interest on the part of the audience and a discussion with the active participation of the auditors. Many of us were impressed by the need to continue deepening our understanding of the content of this unique volume.

Much material on Cardinal Lustiger can be found here