"Oscare la pace" Meeting/ Message of His Beatitude John: The plan that ignores the Creator becomes a source of division

2025-10-27 19:36:00, Aktualitet CNA

"Oscare la pace" Meeting/ Message of His Beatitude John: The plan that

The Archbishop of Tirana, Durrës and all Albania, His Beatitude Joani, is participating in the international meeting on the theme: "Osare la pace", taking place from October 26-28, 2025 in Rome.

Today, His Beatitude delivered his speech on the topic "Rediscovering the Path to Christian Unity".

The meeting aims to promote interfaith dialogue, coexistence and solidarity between peoples in times of global tension and conflict, with participants from 55 countries around the world.

During his speech, the Archbishop gave a series of important messages, saying that every human plan for unity, ignoring the Creator, becomes a source of deeper division.

Further, the Archbishop stated that real and lasting unity is one that is based on restoring our relationship with God.

His Beatitude, in his address, called for living a holy life that brings believers closer to God and each other, and invited them to walk the path of Christian unity.

Full speech

REDISCOVERING THE PATH TOWARDS CHRISTIAN UNITY

I. The theme of Christian unity constitutes a courageous act directly related to the search for peace in our world. To understand the journey towards unity, we must first diagnose the root of division. Let us dwell for a moment on the history of division. The first and most tragic division occurred when man turned away from his Creator. The suspicion of our first parents, founded on selfishness, penetrated the human soul through the adversary. This breach of faith in the God of love became the source of every subsequent division.
The history of humanity is filled with continuous divisions that stem from this initial rupture. The first bodily death in biblical history is not natural, but murder. Cain kills Abel. Sin breaks relationships, dissolves bonds, sows hatred where God sowed love.
The turning point of this tragic trajectory is the Tower of Babel. There we witness something astonishing: God himself descends and creates a confusion of languages, dividing humanity into nations. Why? Because man’s attempt to create unity without God, based on pride and self-deification, was doomed to lead to even greater disaster. Babel reveals a fundamental truth: any human plan for unity that ignores the Creator inevitably becomes a source of deeper division.
The division of Babel became the cause of all wars and conflicts in history. Since then, every nation, every language, every culture has become a wall of division. But we must understand more deeply: the division of nations came as a consequence of humanity’s separation from divine communion. When man lost the vertical relationship with God, he inevitably lost the horizontal relationship with his neighbor. This fundamental understanding makes it clear that the Christian perspective does not recognize unity and peace without God. This is the foundation on which we must discuss every attempt at unity if we are to be consistent with what we affirm and proclaim.
The analogy of St. Dorotheus of Gaza expresses simply and clearly the idea that the closer we draw to God, the closer we draw to one another. He writes: Suppose we were to take a compass and set the point and draw the circumference of a circle. The central point is at the same distance from every point on the circumference. Let us suppose that this circle is the world and that God Himself is the center; the straight lines drawn from the circumference to the center are the lives of men. To the extent that the saints enter into the things of the Spirit, they actually draw near to God and to their neighbors. The closer they are to God, the closer they become to one another.
From this vertical relationship of love with God flows the horizontal relationship of true love and union among us.

II. Any attempt at unity and peace, based solely on human efforts that does not presuppose a healthy relationship with the God of love, is doomed to failure. Any action that contains revenge and hatred, even if superficially it seems to unite, in reality brings division. Violence begets violence, hatred begets hatred, imposition begets resistance. When man thinks that he is the absolute master of his life, when he rejects any transcendent reference, when he wants to build heaven on earth without the God of love, then he creates a new hell. This unity will never be realized, because it ignores a fundamental truth: human life is the space and atmosphere that God has given from His own life and only love can truly unite, and love flows only from God.
Pentecost is the anti-Babel. There, the Holy Spirit does not cause confusion, but unites in polyphony. Peoples hear the same Gospel, each in their own language. The Church is born as the Body of Christ, as the space of true communion that has God as its leader, king and guide. And the critical question arises: Why then, after the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, where the Church is born as a communion of communion and relationship with God in Christ, has the final communion not been achieved? We know the answer: Nevertheless, - the Lord rebukes us - I have this against you, because you have left your first love (Rev. 2:4).
Christian communion is not simply a human desire, but the final prayer of our Lord Himself. In His High Priestly Prayer, shortly before His Passion, Christ prays to the Father: that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us (Jn. 17:21). The communion of believers has as its model the communion of the Holy Trinity. This is not an external, administrative communion, but an ontological communion of love. And the Lord adds the reason: that the world may believe that You have sent Me (Jn. 17:8). Our unity is the most powerful witness to the world of the truth of the Gospel.
This is why divisions among Christians are such a great scandal to the world. We do not simply disappoint people - we disappoint the prayer of Christ! How can we proclaim the God of love, when we cannot love one another? How can we speak of peace and unity, when we fight among ourselves for administrative changes? True religion is not only right faith, but also right love. Without love, religion becomes a dead letter that kills instead of giving life.

III. The only real and lasting unity is that which is founded on the restoration of our relationship with God. Only through this restoration can we open the way to Christian unity, because the unity of Christians will not come through political agreements or diplomatic negotiations, but through a common return to the source: humility, repentance and love. When we kneel together before the Cross, when we acknowledge our common sinfulness, when we ask forgiveness from God and from one another, then we will discover that we are already united in the Blood of Christ. Christian unity is not the same as uniformity; it is a deep spiritual bond that respects the diversity within the body of believers.
The true courage for peace and the rediscovery of the path to Christian unity today is not to project another unity, based solely on human efforts, or to try to create a new Babel, but to dare to place God once again at the center of our lives. The unity we seek is not simply a human achievement, but a divine gift. It comes when we open our hearts to His grace, when we become instruments of His love, when we allow the Holy Spirit to transform us, from separate individuals, into members of the one Body of Christ. Let us acknowledge that He is God and that without Him we can do nothing. For without Me you can do nothing, says the Lord (Jn. 15:5).
Dear sisters and brothers! Let us live a holy life that will bring us closer to God and thus closer to one another, and let us dare to walk on the path of Christian unity, which is the fruit of justice and love of God and love for our neighbor. /CNA