Award for PRO ORIENTE's Middle East youth workshops

Vienna, 22.12.23 (poi) High distinction for an initiative of the PRO ORIENTE Foundation: The ecumenical Middle East Youth Workshops, which the foundation has been conducting together with the “We choose abundant life” group since 2022, has been awarded the “Intercultural Achievement Award” 2023. Since 2014, the Austrian Federal Ministry for European and International Affairs (BMEIA) has been using the award to recognize projects by civil society organizations that promote intercultural and interreligious dialogue.

The prize is awarded in several categories, with the actual award ceremony having already taken place in Vienna in mid-October. Since the PRO ORIENTE representatives were unable to attend due to a concurrent event in connection with the Synod of the Catholic Church in Rome, Ambassador Franziska Honsowitz-Friessnigg, head of the Department for the Dialogue of Cultures and Religions at the Foreign Ministry, presented the award in person during a visit to the foundation's premises in Vienna on Thursday.

PRO ORIENTE President Alfons M. Kloss expressed his thanks for the recognition that the Ministry associated with the award. “This is an encouragement for the foundation to continue on its path with young Christians in the Middle East. For the future of the countries in the Middle East, the civil society engagement of young people is essential”, said Kloss. “This engagement is to be strengthened.”

During the Middle East workshops, the young people, who come from different churches, reflect on the political, economic, social and ecclesial situation in their home countries and develop future scenarios for improvements.

At the award ceremony, Viola Raheb, program director at PRO ORIENTE and responsible for the project, emphasized that the award also goes to the partners of the “We Choose Abundant Life” group in the Middle East. She said that the program was developed and shaped jointly. Raheb spoke of a “successful and forward-looking partnership”.

At the same time, the award is above all for “all young people in the Middle East with whom we have been privileged to work over the past two years. Especially in these difficult political times, we hope that young people see this as a sign of hope and solidarity.”

According to Raheb, a workshop was held in Syria for the first time in the summer of 2023. Another one followed in Lebanon. Some young people were also able to attend the annual conference of the “Initiative for the Christian Orient” (ICO) in Salzburg at the end of September where they reported on the project and their living conditions. Unfortunately, a transnational workshop in the fall and a local workshop in Palestine had to be postponed due to the war in Gaza.

However, the local workshops are to be continued in January, Raheb announced. The first one is supposed to take place in the city of Erbil in Northern Iraq. In the context of the 60th anniversary of the PRO ORIENTE foundation, a workshop will also be held in Vienna in March, to which young members of Eastern churches living in the European diaspora are invited. “The Eastern churches have long been at home here among us, and working with them is an important concern,” said Raheb.

The recognition prize is endowed with 3.000 euros. PRO ORIENTE will use the prize money to finance the upcoming workshops. Among those present at the award ceremony were also PRO ORIENTE Secretary General Bernd Mussinghoff and, Alexander Rieger, Deputy Director of the Department for the Dialogue of Cultures and Religions at the Austria Foreign Ministry.