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Interreligious Dialogue Café

One of the main events of the Jubilatio Day was a Café of Interreligious Dialogue. The event was planned jointly by Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, and Jews. A plaza along the L'Ill river in the center of town was reserved for Sunday afternoon and tables and tents were set up. Each of the religions invited people to come to start the crowd and scheduled musicians to come and perform.

The Muslims provided a calligrapher who created artwork by transcribing people's names into fancy script Arabic. The Catholics sponsored a middle eastern hospitality tent, with rose scented candy, tea, and pastries typical of the region. Both tents were packed all afternoon.

 The rest of the plaza was filled with tables and a local restaurant served coffee, tea, and such. The goal was to get people of different religions to come together in a relaxed atmosphere to talk, to get to know each other. As you can see from the pictures, it worked. People from very different backgrounds got together over tea and cakes and had great conversations that they never would have had otherwise.

 All day the plaza was open to whomever wandered by, and many people did. The weather was perfect, so it seemed the entire city came to wander around the old section of town, Petite France. But the most happening place in town was the café!

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