Pope Francis holds talks with Sunni Islam leader in breakthrough Vatican meeting
VATICAN CITY (RNS) Pope Francis has welcomed the highest authority in Sunni Islam to the Vatican in a significant step forward in relations between the two largest blocs in Christianity and Islam.
“The meeting is the message,” Francis said on Monday (May 23) upon greeting Sheikh Ahmed el-Tayeb, the grand imam of Al-Azhar, a mosque and university complex in Cairo that is viewed as the heart of Sunni Islam, which accounts for about 85 percent, or 1.3 billion, of the world’s Muslims.
While the late Saint John Paul II had met the previous leader of Al-Azhar during a visit to Egypt in 2000, this was the first time a Sunni grand imam had visited the Vatican.