Benedict XVI celebrated the first inter-religious meeting of Assisi according to Ratzinger.
And beyond the precautions and persistence taken to avoid the risk of syncretism, the real novelty of this edition is represented by the invitation addressed to non-believers, they too «pilgrims» in the city of St. Francis.
Only those who do not know Joseph Ratzinger may be surprised by this innovation.
The theologian Pope, in contrast to the representation that is frequently given of his pontificate, is not only attentive to dialogue with those who do not believe but at times he seems to prefer it over the more traditional dialogue between religions.
If with the latter, Benedict XVI has wanted to clarify the framework within which to contain it, insisting on culture, respect for human rights and the need to remove any justification for the use of violence and terrorism in the name of religion; with non-believers and agnostics who have not permanently closed the door to the question about God, the Pope shows increasing attention.
In the book-length interview with Peter Seewald, published eleven years ago ("God and the world"), the then Prefect of the former Holy Office, speaking of the Christian faith, said words that are unambiguous and distant from any kind of fundamentalism, "the nature of faith is such that from a certain point you can say: I have it, others do not ... faith is a journey.
Throughout the course of our lives we are journeying, and therefore faith is always threatened and endangered.
It is also healthy to subtract ourselves in this way from the risk of turning into a manipulated ideology. To harden and make us unable to share reflection and suffering with brothers who doubt and are uncertain."
"Faith can mature – he added - only to the extent that you endure and takes responsibility, in every stage of life, for the anxiety and the power of unbelief, and you cross them until they again become viable in a new era."
And last month, on the last day of his trip to Germany, while commenting on the words of Jesus "the publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God," he explained: "Translated into the language of that time, the affirmation may sound more or less like this: agnostics, who on the question of God do not find peace; people who suffer because of their sins and who desire a pure heart, are closer to the kingdom of God than "routine" faithful are, for whom the Church is only a system, but their heart remains untouched by this, by faith."
That is why upon his initiative, yesterday in Assisi, Pope Ratzinger decided to turn also to those "persons who have not been given the gift of being able to believe and yet seek the truth, in their search of God."
These people pose questions to "militant atheists" who "claim to know that God does not exist" and invite them "to become people who search rather than polemical, who do not lose hope that the truth exists."
But above all, those who do not believe and are searching, call into question the followers of religions, "because they must not consider God as a property that belongs to them and feel authorized to use violence against others."
Non-believers are waiting to find answers about the true God, but the image of God that comes from religions which, «because of the way in which they are frequently practiced, they are not rarely concealed."
The Pope told the leaders of world religions, without of course subtracting the Catholic Church from its responsibility, that agnosticism today "also depends on the faithful" and the "reduced or even misrepresented image of God" that they transmit.