"The CPN is a much-needed way to support the courageous and mostly unheralded efforts of the Church to build peace in war-torn countries from Central Africa to Southern Asia."

Bishop John Ricard
Chairman, U.S. Bishops' International Policy Committee

"The CPN is a space of exchange, encounter and discovery where we help each other understand our peace-work, generated in faith and actualized in history."

Andrea Bartoli
Community of Sant' Egidio,
USA

"CPN is another concrete way of building solidarity among peacebuilders around the world. The energy that it will bring will help us in facing the many difficult challenges of peacebuilding work in our different contexts. My hope is that we are able to bring the same energy eventually to the communities directly affected by war, violence and conflict - creating not only a network of peacebuilders but more imoprtantly a network of communities all over the world."

Myla Leguro
Peace & Reconciliation
Program Manager
CRS-Phillippines

CHURCH LEADERS, SPECIALISTS FROM 20 COUNTRIES
CONVENE IN BURUNDI TO SUPPORT CATHOLIC PEACEBUILDING
IN AFRICA’S GREAT LAKES REGION

Press Release

Program of the Conference

Nearly 100 Catholic Church leaders and specialists in peace and reconciliation convened in the East African country of Burundi for the Third International Conference of the Catholic Peacebuilding Network (CPN), from July 24-28, 2006. 

The conference was sponsored by the CPN, in collaboration with the Conference of Catholic Bishops of Burundi, the Apostolic Nunciature in Burundi, and Catholic Relief Services, and with support from the Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame and the German Catholic aid agency, Misereor.  It was dedicated to the memory of Archbishop Michael Aidan Courtney, the Apostolic Nuncio in Burundi whose work for peace led to his murder on December 29, 2003. His successor, Archbishop Paul Gallagher, arranged for the dedication [pictured above], on July 25, of a new memorial to Archbishop Courtney at the site where he was killed.