A quote from EUobserver, 6 May 2008

Brussels officials have turned to religious VIPs to help spread the gospel of an environmentally friendly society and increase awareness of climate change in their parishes, as well as promoting tolerance between different confessions in Europe. Twenty high-level representatives – 19 men and one woman – from European Christian, Jewish and Muslim congregations met in Brussels on Monday (5 may) to discuss the sensitive issues of climate change and reconciliation between peoples.

The meeting was co-chaired by European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, Slovenian Prime Minister and current president of the European Council, Janez Jansa, and the president of the European Parliament, Hans-Gert Poettering. […]

Prime Minister Jansa, referring to both the Bible and the Koran, said: "Earth was created and given to man, and man has to be respectful of what he has been given," and called for what the late Pope John Paul II described as an "ecological conversion". […] Mr Jansa also announced that Slovenia plans to set up a Euro-Mediterranean university that will be a meeting place for students from the Christian, Muslim and Jewish world. […]

Bishop Adrianus Van Luyn, the president of the Council of European Bishops' Conferences (COMECE), suggested that the EU appoint a "High Representative for Future Generations". […]

President Barroso underlined the importance of combining freedom of expression and respect for other faiths, in an attempt to sooth both Islamic outrage in recent years and others' fear of Islam.

"Islam today is part of Europe. One should not see Islam as outside Europe. We already have an important presence of Islam and Muslims among our citizens," Mr Barroso said, adding that the inter-faith dialogue proved that the "preachers of a clash of civilisations are wrong."

The grand mufti of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Dr Mustafa Ceric pointed to the EU's policy on Turkey. "Following this logic, Europe has to prove that Islam is part of Europe by not delaying the acceptance of Turkey to the EU," the cleric said. […]

Flanked by a female priest colleague, Swedish archbishop Anders Weyrud [Lutheran] told EUobserver he was disappointed there was only one woman among the religious dignitaries, pastor Letizia Tomassone, the vice-president of the federation of evangelical churches of Italy, who had also raised the point during the inter-religious meeting. "We have neglected both nature and women, that was one of the messages we tried to get across at this meeting," the archbishop said. […]

Meanwhile some MEPs have in the past questioned the presence of religious figures in strictly political fora in Brussels. […] According to a recent Eurobarometer survey, some 48 percent of European citizens claim to be non-confessional.