Rimini Meeting: Pope Leo follows in the footsteps of John Paul II

The history of the Meeting for Friendship Amongst Peoples, also known as the Rimini Meeting, dates back to the late 1970s. Among a group of friends in Rimini who shared a Christian experience, a desire arose to discover and bring to others what was beautiful and good in contemporary culture. Thus, in 1980, the Meeting was born.

From the beginning, it was intended to be a place where people from different cultures and religions could meet, a space for building peace, coexistence, and friendship among peoples. At its foundation is the conviction that people are united by a desire for truth, goodness, beauty, and justice. Fr. Luigi Giussani, founder of the Communion and Liberation movement, referred to this common ground as the “elementary experience.”

For more than four decades, representatives of the worlds of politics, economics, science, religion, culture, and sport have traveled to Rimini. Meetings, debates, exhibitions, and performances address both major social and political challenges and topics related to science, art, literature, and economics.

One of the Meeting’s defining characteristics remains its openness to dialogue. Christians from different denominations—Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, and people who do not believe—all take part. Differences between people are not meant to be an obstacle, but an opportunity to meet, get to know one another, and search for the truth together.