Brussels, 03/04/2003 (Agence Europe) - The Bishops of COMECE (Commission of the Bishops' Conference of the European Community), who met in Brussels on 27 and 28 March, have called upon the European Union to show greater unity in order to promote "peace and justice in the Middle East and in the world", and welcomed the EU's commitment to provide humanitarian aid to the people of Iraq. In a declaration entitled "Happy are the peacemakers", the Bishops point out that it is not a conflict "between religions; the name of God should never be used to justify recourse to war or the use of violence". The COMECE members also discussed a project, the "Global Governance Assessment", aimed at promoting world governance via a regular evaluation of measures implemented by the EU.
The Bishops welcomed the fact that discussions have been relaunched at the European Convention on the possible introduction of a reference to Europe's spiritual heritage in the future constitutional Treaty (see EUROPE of 28 March, p.5) of the EU. "Referring to religion in the future European constitution is inevitable", Bishop Joseph Homeyer, President of COMECE, told the Press. "We are launching an appeal for the double dimension of past and future to be taken into consideration and for religion to find a place" in the future Treaty, in order to "reflect the role of religion in the service of society as a whole, without discriminating against communities of faith or conviction", he said.
The Bishops also discussed research on human embryos and stem cells, and asked the EU not to fund "this type of research under the Sixth Framework Programme for Research".
During the course of the meeting, COMECE re-elected Bishop Homeyer (Germany) as President for three years. Bishop Adrianus van Luyn (Netherlands) and Bishop Hioppolyte Simon (France) were respectively re-elected and elected to the posts of Vice-President.