{"id":35556,"date":"2026-03-26T08:40:28","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T07:40:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pluriel.fuce.eu\/videos\/opening-address-of-the-cordoba-congress\/"},"modified":"2026-07-25T08:10:54","modified_gmt":"2026-07-25T07:10:54","slug":"opening-address-of-the-cordoba-congress","status":"publish","type":"videos","link":"https:\/\/pluriel.fuce.eu\/en\/videos\/opening-address-of-the-cordoba-congress\/","title":{"rendered":"Opening address of the Cordoba congress"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Tuesday 10 February 2026 in Cordoba, Michel Youn\u00e8s<\/strong><\/a>, general coordinator of Pluriel and dean of the Faculty of Theology of the Catholic University of Lyon (UCLy), delivered the opening address of the platform’s fourth international congress, devoted to the theme “Ethics and aesthetics in Islam”.<\/em><\/p>\n

Your Excellencies, Mr Mayor, dear Father Paulin, representative of the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue, Madam Vice-Rector of Loyola University, dear colleagues, dear students, dear friends.<\/p>\n

Ten years ago, in 2016, the international platform for research on Islam, Pluriel, held its first congress in Lyon, under the title “Islam in the plural: thought, faith and society”. Born of the initiative of the Federation of Catholic Universities in Europe and Lebanon, Pluriel responded to a need to give value to work on Islam in the spirit of Catholic universities, and to connect researchers from different languages and geographical areas, driven by the will to address the question of Islam in its historical depth and in its interactions with society and the other religions. This is what the Franco-Algerian Islamologist Mohammed Arkoun called applied Islamic studies.<\/p>\n

The reflection continued with new tools: a website that lists research, giving value to research groups and connecting them, along with publications, videos and congress proceedings. In 2018 the network gathered in Rome, at the Gregorian University, around a question of great importance: belonging to Islam. The congress proceedings gained in refinement, with a geopolitical, a societal and a religious, even interreligious, dimension.<\/p>\n

Two years later, because of Covid, the 2020 congress was postponed to 2022, in Beirut, on a delicate and crucial question: Islam and otherness. Here the methodology became more precise. From then on, the scientific committee issues a call for papers and selects authors who now come from all over the world, blind selection, I should say. Pluriel is no longer limited to Europe and Lebanon. It has become an international research group linked to the International Federation of Catholic Universities, whose members come from public and private universities almost everywhere. From one year to the next, the Pluriel network grows. It fosters projects among members who meet at the congresses, and enables collaborations between the various groups. Pluriel becomes a network that connects.<\/p>\n

In 2024, we chose to analyse the Declaration on Human Fraternity, signed on 4 February 2019 by Pope Francis and the Grand Imam of al-Azhar, Ahmad al-Tayyeb, to assess its impact on the social, interreligious and international levels. This earned us a message from Pope Francis<\/strong><\/a>, read by Cardinal Ayuso. Thanking the participants, the Pope underlined the roots of the three evils that are a defeat for humanity: ignorance of the other, the absence of listening and the lack of intellectual flexibility, three flaws of the human spirit that destroy fraternity and that must be identified in order to recover wisdom and peace.<\/p>\n

I am particularly happy to present to you this evening the proceedings of the Abu Dhabi congress in electronic form, since our colleague who was to bring them from Cairo is unfortunately prevented from arriving in time. These proceedings are freely downloadable and the texts accessible in their original language: French, English and Arabic.<\/p>\n

After the internal plurality of Islam, the question of belonging, otherness and fraternity, the choice was made to cast a gaze of elevation and responsibility. The search for the true, the beautiful and the good is one of the transcendentals, the fundamental needs of every human being. I would even say that these three transcendentals could almost be an answer to the three evils that Pope Francis pointed out. Ethics and aesthetics imposed themselves on us as a subject of elevation of thought through sublimation, the sublimation of beauty which is fundamentally linked to ethical responsibility.<\/p>\n

The city of Cordoba and its Mosque-Cathedral were the place par excellence that translates in depth what we wished to think. What a beautiful symbol! But holding this congress in Cordoba would not have been possible without the warm welcome and support of the Cathedral Chapter, which I thank, thanks in particular to Father Joaqu\u00edn Alberto Nieva Garc\u00eda, to whom, in the name of Pluriel, I express all my gratitude.<\/p>\n

I also thank the Bishop of Cordoba, Monsignor Jes\u00fas Fern\u00e1ndez Gonz\u00e1lez, Loyola University and its Vice-Rector Mrs Mercedes Torres Jim\u00e9nez, the Magisterio Sagrado Coraz\u00f3n, the Anawati Chair based in Cairo and its holder Emmanuel Pisani<\/strong><\/a>, himself prevented from being with us because of the disruptions, the Romand Institute of Systematic Theology and Ethics in Geneva, with the support of Beate Bengard<\/strong><\/a>, and Casa \u00c1rabe of Cordoba and its director, Mr Rafael Ros\u00f3n.<\/p>\n

Allow me to welcome the presence of Paolo Fritzi and to thank, through him, the unfailing support of the Foundation which saw, from its emergence, the importance of such a network for today’s world, a network that has reached more than 200 members spread across 25 countries.<\/p>\n

Indeed, in a world where the question of religion in general, and of Islam in particular, is addressed through the lens of tension and war, of fundamentalism and terrorism, to rise higher through ethical demand and aesthetic elevation is like a salutary breath of oxygen. It was no surprise to see the influx of contributions to our call, which circulated in four languages: English, French, Spanish and Arabic. More than 120 proposals, which the scientific committee examined to retain only a third, around forty academic papers.<\/p>\n

I wish to thank the scientific committee for its work, availability and commitment. Several members are unfortunately prevented from being with us; others are present in the room. I would like to greet all the speakers, the scholarship students, and all those who travelled in complex, sometimes tragic circumstances, the train accident, the floods, the strikes.<\/p>\n

We held firm, and thanks to the great quality and investment of the rest of the Pluriel bureau, formed by Emmanuel Pisani<\/strong><\/a>, Jaime Flaquer<\/strong><\/a>, Ali Mostfa<\/strong><\/a>, Rapha\u00ebl Georgy and Lorraine Guitton, assisted during her internship by Xuyen Parsy, we made sure the organisation went as well as possible. May they, together with the scientific committee, receive all my gratitude. I could not conclude without naming Father Antonio Navarro who, two years ago, together with Father Joaqu\u00edn, proposed that Cordoba host our congress. We did well to listen to them. I also wish to include in my thanks all the technical, catering and translation teams who generally work behind the scenes.<\/p>\n

To conclude, if the good and the beautiful are inseparable, the way of holding ethics and aesthetics together says something about the search for the true that animates every human being and every scientific endeavour. And all this research, which particularly animates the spirit of our platform, expresses this concern for a true contribution to a society that we hope will be more peaceful and more demanding in building what helps, day after day, the growth of a beautiful and responsible human fraternity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":33880,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"date_tournage":"","lieu":"Cordoue, Espagne","nature_evenement":"","vt_type":"Allocution","vt_yt_views":344},"video_collection":[854],"class_list":["post-35556","videos","type-videos","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","video_collection-congres-de-cordoue-2026"],"date_tournage":"","yoast_head":"\nOpening address of the Cordoba congress - Pluriel<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/pluriel.fuce.eu\/en\/videos\/opening-address-of-the-cordoba-congress\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Opening address of the Cordoba congress - Pluriel\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"On Tuesday 10 February 2026 in Cordoba, Michel Youn\u00e8s, general coordinator of Pluriel and dean of the Faculty of Theology of the Catholic University of Lyon (UCLy), delivered the opening address of the platform’s fourth international congress, devoted to the theme “Ethics and aesthetics in Islam”. 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