CARDINAL 0 Fiaich, Primate of All Ireland, has called for a revival of Christendom.
Preaching at a special European Vespers during the eighty eighth Katholikentag, the biennial German Catholic congress in Munich, he said that the Church in Europe must be in the forefront of a drive for greater European and cultural unity.
The Cardinal said that despite all that divides Europe, "it still retains in some measure a spiritual and cultural unity derived from its common past."
He recalled that in times past "Europe and Christendom were almost synonymous."
Modern communications have strengthened collegiality in the European Church, he added. "But collegiality is not a matter for bishops alone." Local Churches shold be aware of European needs and problems and should be eager to assist their neighbours.
"Perhaps the time is ripe for the Church to think of "the Europe of the parishes."
The Cardinal underlined the loss of the unified liturgical language which had made it all the more necessary to provide cultural and spiritual links of other kinds, for example "the twinning of parishes in different European countries, just as towns are at present twinned in secular affairs." He called for some movement of priests and Catholic laypeojale between countries.