Catholic Peacebuilding Network

Catholic leaders, academics, and U.S. government officials addressed Catholic peacebuilding and U.S. foreign policy at a major conference, Peacebuilding 2013: Pacem in Terris at 50, April 9-10, at The Catholic University of America in Washington, DC, attended by over 300.

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PEACEBUILDING 2013: Pacem in Terris at 50
April 9-10, 2013
The Catholic University of America,
Washington, D.C

Plan to join us in Washington, DC for a major conference on peacebuilding and U.S. foreign policy sponsored by the Catholic Peacebuilding Network and over a dozen Catholic universities and agencies as we commemorate the 50th anniversary of the encyclical Pacem in terris and explore Catholic peacebuilding today. Read More >

The recently revived peace talks between the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) are scheduled to begin Oct. 8 in Oslo, Norway.

Whatever progress the government and FARC, the country’s largest guerrilla group, will be able to make in bringing to an end the war that has afflicted Colombia for half a century, the Catholic Church of that country is likely to play a crucial peacebuilding role.

On Aug. 20, a week before Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos announced the new negotiations, the University of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies and the Catholic Peacebuilding Network (CPN), Catholic Relief Services and the Colombian bishops’ Secretariado Nacional de Pastoral Social/Caritas Colombiana (SNPS) co-sponsored a meeting of 17 Catholic bishops from Colombia to discuss peacebuilding strategies and to hear from specialists in the field. Read More >

Catholic leaders from some of the world’s worst conflict zones gathered at the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace in Rome on May 29th and 30th to discuss ways to make peace. Nigeria, Lebanon, Sri Lanka, Uganda, Somalia, Peru, Colombia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo were among the 22 countries represented in a seminar, “New Challenges for Catholic Peacebuilding.” Read More >

The heads of several of the international Catholic organizations most deeply involved in peacebuilding joined scholars in Rome on June 30 for a conference on the Future of Peacebuilding: Contributions from Catholic Theology, Ethics, Praxis. Read More >

A panel convened at the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame on “Becoming a Peacebuilding Church.” Panelists were Scott Appleby, John M. Regan Jr. Director; Professor of History, Kroc Institute, John Katunga, Regional Technical Advisor for Peacebuilding and Justice, East Africa Region, Catholic Relief Services and Kroc Institute Visiting Scholar, John Paul Lederach, Professor of International Peacebuilding, Kroc Institute, Margaret Pfeil, Assistant Professor of Theology, University of Notre Dame. Drawing on a recently completed four-year research project, the panel discussed current examples of effective Catholic peacebuilding in war-torn regions and how the practice of Catholic peacebuilding can inform and be informed by the further development of a Catholic spirituality, theology, and ethic of peacebuilding. Click Read More >

In an unprecedented joint effort, delegates from the six national and two regional bishops’ conferences in the Great Lakes Region of Africa have agreed on guidelines for the elaboration of a common strategic plan for promoting peace and reconciliation. The guidelines were approved at a conference in Bujumbura, Burundi, October 19-21, which included some 125 representatives from Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania, as well as ACEAC Read More >

According to Fides News Service, “On October 19, 2010, a conference began in the Great Lakes Region opened in Bujumbura, capital of Burundi. It will be dedicated to the issues of peace and justice. According to a note sent to Fides, the conference, which ends October 21, is being attended by delegates of the two regional conferences of bishops, ACEAC Read More >

Sudan: Peace in the Balance, a presentation by Sudanese Bishops, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, USA
In January 2011, southern Sudan will hold a referendum on independence from Sudan. Will this lead to peace or new violence and instability? The Sudanese Bishops have issued a message about the referendum Read More >

Manila Archbishop Gaudencio B. Cardinal Rosales has urged the Government of the Philippines to withdraw troops from Mindanao, where there has been decades of inter-religious violence. Filipino troops have resumed operations against the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF Read More >