n his "historic" message to the Christians of the Middle East on the eve marking Christmas celebrations late last year, Pope Francis encouraged them to support what is most beneficial for social life through the testimony of love in order to attain peace needed in the region such as hunger for bread. Due to the fact that the future of love is being tested, he also urged them to upgrade the "culture of encounter'' as well as human dignity and the absolute value of every human being.
How ''rich'' and ''profound'' is the term of "culture of the encounter'' since culture transcends a set of ideas and information to cover the daily behavior and reflect on the intellectual, social and moral sublimity of individuals and groups. As for the ''meeting'', its role transcends dialogue, debate and discussion to include respect for others (the relatives and neighbors) away from the narrow and instantaneous interests, to reach the point of mutual work in order to attain the supreme interest of all humanity.
A person learns this "culture" and experiences it through the culture's components, namely home, school and society. It also includes houses of worship and religious discourse which children listen to, thus form a "roadmap" of what interhuman relations should be. The education process will never come to an end. It is a long-term process that humans embrace at the early days of life and reinforce it daily.
In view of this positive trend, man faces another ''trend'' by which I mean the trend of ''elimination'', which does not deserve to be called ''the culture of encounter'', but rather the ''ineptness of elimination''. This implies the calls for hatred, violence and the desire to annihilate others.
But love will triumph no matter how the contradictory trends increase, especially in our East or in the world as a whole. The culture of encounter is our responsibility--we educators-- in schools, houses of worship, and in the various fields of media and culture where we have to instill it by setting good examples, rather than sweet words, to the new generations.
When the Pope himself condemned the Paris crime, he said: "We must stand with all the people to terminate the spread of hatred, because it is the basis of this entire scourge in life.'' This is a reverberation of His Majesty King Abdullah II's denunciation and his participation in the Paris mammoth march against terrorism, extremism and hatred. During his meeting with members of the diplomatic corps accredited to the Holy See a few days ago, the Pope spoke about two topics. The first is the culture of "elimination" practised by several extremist groups. He said that this culture does not eliminate relatives but rather eliminate the Almighty God. Secondly, he talked about the "culture of encounter. It is a source of pride and pleasure for us in Jordan that His Holiness talked about the positive aspects of what took place last year. He said that his visit to the Kingdom and Jordan's hosting of the displaced brethren sets a live and sublime model of the culture of encounter. Had this issue been a university dissertation, the title would be "the culture of encounter: connotations and denotations, Jordan as a model."
Finally, I recall Fr. Ibrahim Hijazin, a priest who passed away days ago. Thousands of people participated in his funeral. They clapped for him not because of his university degrees but because he loved people and served them. President of the Ecclesiastical Court Fr. Jihad Shwaihat stated that the wallet of the late father was empty, and that he used to borrow money to help poor students.
An empty wallet, and a heart full of love… This is an example of a culture we have to bolster… namely the culture of encounter.
