– Pedro Daniel Oliveira
On November 22-23, the Macau Ricci Institute (MRI) is holding its annual symposium under the theme “Exploring The Silk Road Economic Belt and The 21st- Century Maritime Silk Road: The Challenge of Cross-Cultural Exchange and Communication.”
The event aims to explore the cultural and religious traits inherent to the ancient legacy of the Silk Road. “China’s Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road [B&R], announced in 2013, has clearly become a major focus for the country’s efforts to sustain and further develop cooperative relationships with its neighbors near and far, and to work out mutually beneficial policies of economic development for Asia, Europe, and Africa,” MRI says in its website.
Moreover, to MRI, “the B&R quite properly appeals to the historic legacy of the Silk Road, which for millennia provided opportunities for the exchange, not only of goods and services, but also of ideas as well as spiritual and religious practices, and engagement with the peoples who cherished them.”
“Indeed, save for Daoism, China’s indigenous wisdom tradition, all its other spiritual and religious communities — Buddhism, Christianity, Islam and Judaism — first found a home in China along the Silk Road.”
Furthermore, MRI “hopes to make a significant contribution to the B&R,” while bearing in mind, “the work of Fr [Matteo] Ricci and his companions is itself a significant part of the Silk Road legacy, and the friendship that Matteo Ricci enjoyed with China’s scholars and officials is extended even today through MRI’s mission.”
MRI Director Fr Stephan Rothlin, SJ, told O CLARIM, “the symposium will highlight each of the three dimensions of the MRI mission,” such as the “comparative appreciation of spirituality,” “social innovation” and “moral leadership” within the B&R.
The first “will enable conference participants to present and analyze the history of the Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, and Muslim communities in Macau and in China, and the way these have formed bridges of understanding internationally.”
Regarding the second, “an understanding of how social innovation occurred as a result of the Silk Road can shed a welcome light on the challenges and opportunities that today’s innovators may face, encouraged by the remembrance of China’s deep history of engagement with its neighbors.”
The latter dimension offers many challenges, both theoretical and practical. “The development of effective teaching and learning programs in international business ethics, a special concern of the MRI and its partners, is indispensable if the goals of the B&R, even at the level of economic development, are to be realized.”
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