Europe

I remember, it must be sixty years ago, a Jesuit priest telling me "Des, Europe is finished, youth must look for its future elsewhere." It is impossible to convey why his comment was no more than an expression of the reality which surrounded us. We were just on the fringes of the devastation, but as you went south it became more and more real: one third of London was in ruins, and God only knows how great was the devastation in Germany and central Europe. Then a miracle happened: one man had a vision. Why don't we knit the iron, steel and coal industries of Europe together, so that no single nation can ever again use them in a quest for national domination. That man was Jean Monnet, and his idea was seized upon by Konrad Adenauer and by Maurice Schuman, for the first step in what would become the European Community.
Europe is far from finished, and people throughout the world still look to it for the initiatives which will bring us all closer to our dreams. It is wrestling now with one of its greatest challenges: how to acknowledge Turkey's European credentials, and integrate one of the most populous Islamic states into the European Community. What an accomplishment that will be, in showing that the future lies not in bombs and suicide attacks, but in partnership and acknowledgement of our brotherhood, and in the charity to accept our different customs and beliefs.