A Union of Value? In Conversation with Stefan Lunte

The European Union is more than an economic project. It also serves as a union built upon common values. Among those are peace, liberty, democracy, human rights, and the dignity of each person. Recently, Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission made the defence and strengthening of European values a core priority of her term. For that purpose, a conference on the future of the European Union was summoned. Here politicians, organisations and individual citizens had the chance to contribute their hopes and ideas about the future of Europe. Among those was the Catholic Church in the European Union (COMECE), serving as a religious and normative political actor spanning all over the European Union and the world. Many founding people such as Jean Monnet or Konrad Adenauer were confessing Catholics themselves, contributing their Christian upbringing upon the first phase of the integration. We have the privilege to invite and host Stefan Lunte who has studied catholic theology in Münster and political science in Paris. From 1996 to 2001 he served as policy advisor for the COMECE. Since 2001 he fulfils the position as Secretary general of Justice and Peace Europe of the COMECE. Mr. Lunte calls himself a “European by heart and Catholic for life”. In his role he observed and contributed diligently to the trajectory of the Conference on the Future of the European Union. Furthermore, he also speaks on behalf of the Conference of European Churches (CEC).