Here is a news article on the meeting of Paul Bhatti and URI Trustee Maulana Khabir with His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI.
Click here for a newscast of the meeting.
ZENIT, The world seen from Rome
News Agency
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Brother of Slain Pakistani Meets With Benedict XVI
Requests Continued Support for Persecuted Christians
VATICAN CITY, APRIL 7, 2011 (Zenit.org).- Paul Bhatti, the brother of the Pakistani Minister for Minorities who was killed last month, met with Benedict XVI and asked for the Pope's continued support of Pakistani Christians.
Shahbaz Bhatti was the only Christian member of the Pakistani cabinet. He was an outspoken opponent of the nation's anti-blasphemy laws, which are used to repress minorities. He was killed March 2.
Paul Bhatti met with the Pope at the end of Wednesday's general audience, asking him to "continue supporting Pakistani Christians' commitment to respect of their rights," reported L'Osservatore Romano.
Paul Bhatti has been given a role in the government as a "special adviser" on minorities, and is thus facing challenges similar to those his brother had.
He said that minority rights are an issue affecting all Pakistanis. "At stake is the peaceful future of the country, through opposition to all forms of intolerance, violence and terrorism," Bhatti said.
He proposed that the main problem Pakistani Christians face is the interpretation of the blasphemy laws, since Christians are not seeking to lack respect for Islam.
"The interpretation of the law must not, therefore, ever cause innocent victims among Christians," Bhatti said. He thus called for a "clear, frank, open dialogue, but in truth and mutual respect."
Regarding those responsible for his brother's death, Bhatti affirmed that he has forgiven them.
"It is a necessary step for a Christian, though it does not erase the pain," Bhatti said. "But I ask that justice be done."
The great imam of Lahore, Syed Muhammad Abdul Khabir Azad, echoed this sentiment. A personal friend of Shahbaz Bhatti and supporter of the collaboration between Christians and Muslims in Pakistan, he assured the Pope of "the commitment to continue the dialogue that Shahbaz's homicide must not interrupt."
He told the Holy Father that "the Pontiff's support of the interreligious dialogue movement is decisive."
In an interview on Vatican Radio, Paul Bhatti spoke of the challenges that await him in the exercise of his new function, beginning with the blasphemy law, which "lately has been used or interpreted subjectively by people for personal ends."
Another important challenge, he said, is "religious discrimination, which is growing by the day." "Not because the faithful can't coexist among themselves, but because there is a campaign of hatred created by a terrorist base that continues to use religion."
"We must fight this hatred," Bhatti stated. "If we don't do so, these victims will continue to exist. It's not just about my brother: In Pakistan there are bombs that explode every day and persons who are killed."
Sant'Egidio
On Tuesday, the Catholic lay Community of Sant'Egidio organized in Rome a conference and prayer service in memory of Shahbaz Bhatti. As a "sign of hope and forgiveness," Paul Bhatti gave his brother's personal Bible to the Sant'Egidio Community. It was placed it a memorial of martyrs of our day, in the Roman church of St. Bartholomew.
In his address at the Sant'Egidio event, Bishop Joseph Coutts of Faisalabad, the new president of the Pakistani Episcopal Conference, recalled that "Shahbaz's mission was to promote peace, harmony, love and understanding in a country that experiences intolerance in the name of religion," reported AsiaNews.
Paul Bhatti said that many, including his relatives, had suggested to Shahbaz that he leave his post or that he protect himself from the threats he received. "He answered that he had placed his life in Jesus' hands and that he would not negotiate his faith."
For Khabir Azad, Shahbaz Bhatti was "an ambassador of peace in the world." His was "a murder against humanity," he said.
Bishop Coutts spoke of a project designed by Bhatti to establish a center for interreligious dialogue surrounded by different places of prayer according to one's faith, but which "would allow everyone to meet together in a single, centrally located building that would be open to all so that everyone could just walk in."
To promote interreligious dialogue is a task of the government, he reminded, and thanks to Shahbaz Bhatti "the first steps have been taken in this direction."
