Cardinal Koovakad, Prefect of the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue shares a message for the Feast of Vesak 2025.
Dated: 25 April 2025
Buddhists and Christians in Liberating Dialogue for Our Time
Dear Buddhist Friends,
As in past years, we readily extend our heartfelt greetings and warm good wishes on the joyful celebration of Vesak. This sacred festival, which commemorates the birth, enlightenment, and passing of the Buddha, holds profound spiritual significance for you. Our greetings this year are further enriched by the spirit of the Jubilee, which is for us Catholics a time of grace, reconciliation and spiritual renewal.
As partners journeying in dialogue, we also greet you in the spirit of Nostra Aetate, the groundbreaking Declaration of the Second Vatican Council on the Church’s relation to non-Christian religions, whose sixtieth anniversary we are celebrating this year. Since its promulgation in 1965, Nostra Aetate has deepened our engagement with the followers of other religious traditions. Inspired by its vision, we once more affirm that “the Catholic Church rejects nothing of what is true and holy” in other religions and “has a high regard for the manner of life and conduct, the precepts and doctrines which, although differing in many ways from its own teaching, nevertheless often reflect a ray of that truth which enlightens all men and women” (Nostra Aetate, 2).
Our commitment to dialogue is further confirmed by the positive recognition expressed in Nostra Aetate with regard to your own tradition: “Buddhism in its various forms testifies to the essential inadequacy of this changing world. It proposes a way of life by which people can, with confidence and trust, attain a state of perfect liberation and reach supreme illumination either through their own efforts or with divine help” (Nostra Aetate, 2).
cont’d…
Click here to read the full message (English).