The inter-religious International Meetings started in the mid-80’s, as an initiative of the Community of Sant’Egidio, with the aim of promoting mutual understanding and dialogue among religions, in a horizon of peace.
The Community of Sant’Egidio has continued living the spirit of the Assisi World Day of Prayer, proposed by John Paul II in 1986, by accepting the Pope’s final invitation of that historical meeting: “Let’s keep spreading the message of Peace and living the spirit of Assisi”. Since that moment, through a network of friendship between representatives of different faiths and cultures from more than 60 countries, the Community has promoted a pilgrimage of peace, that has had several stages in various European and Mediterranean cities year after year.
The two first meetings in Rome in 1987 and 1988, were followed by Warsaw in September 1989 (“War never again”) - on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the beginning of WWII -, Bari in 1990, Malta in 1991, Brussels in 1992 (“Europe, Religions, Peace”, about the unity of Europe and its relation with the South of the world).

In 1993 the pilgrimage stopped in Milan and in the following years, in Assisi and Florence.
The 1995 meeting was a special one: it took place in Jerusalem, in the heart of the Holy City. The title was “Together in Jerusalem: Jews, Christians and Muslims”. After the Rome and Padua-Venice meetings, came the extraordinary meeting in Bucharest in 1988, “Peace is the name of God: God, Mankind, Peoples”. For the first time, the meeting was organized by the Community and the Orthodox Church of Romania.
The presence of several Orthodox patriarchs and cardinals, and mainly the new atmosphere of dialogue opened the way for the first visit of the Pope to an Orthodox country, which took place some months later.
John Paul II, in the message he sent to the XIV Meeting for Peace, organized by the Community of Sant’Egidio in Lisbon, said: “I would like to thank especially the Community of Sant’Egidio for the enthusiasm and the spiritual courage shown in accepting the message of Assisi and bringing it to so many places in the world through the meeting of men of different religions.”

Pope John Paul II wrote in “Novo Millenio ineunte”: “... we face the challenge of inter-religious dialogue, to which we will be committed in the new century (...) Dialogue must go on”.

In 2007 in Naples pope Benedict XVI confirmed: "While respecting the differences of the various religions, we are all called to work for peace and to be effectively committed to furthering reconciliation among peoples. This is the true "spirit of Assisi" which opposes every form of violence and the abuse of religion as a pretext for violence (...) The Catholic Church intends to continue on the path of dialogue in order to encourage understanding between the different cultures, traditions and forms of religious wisdom."