In an audience with members of the Muslim community, including Muhammed Hussein, the grand mufti of Jerusalem, Francis indirectly echoed this concern. He spoke of the role of Abraham in Christianity and Islam and the "fraternal dialogue" between the two faiths, but he closed with a rallying cry that seemed like an expression of mild disapproval: "May we respect and love one another as brothers and sisters! May we learn to understand the sufferings of others! May no one abuse the name of God through violence!"

The remarks are particularly striking in comparison with the comments he made in an audience with the two chief rabbis of Israel, David Lau and Shlomo Amar. Again, he spoke of dialogue and kinship, but he emphasized the shared theological heritage of Jews and Christians. "On the part of Catholics, there is a clear intention to reflect deeply on the significance of the Jewish roots of our own faith," Francis said. "I trust that, with your help, on the part of Jews too, there will be a continued and even growing interest in knowledge of Christianity, also in this holy land to which Christians trace their origins." His language was an explicit allusion to Nostra Aetate, the Church's first doctrine on people of other faiths, which was formulated during Vatican II in the mid-1960s and significant for its mostly conciliatory posture toward Jews. He emphasized the "bond" between Jews and Christians and the importance of working together to create peace and "oppose every form of anti-Semitism and all other forms of discrimination." It was a strong signal of his desire to connect with the Jewish people, but it wasn't necessarily a conciliatory gesture toward Israelis; the pontiff chose to make his first stop in the West Bank, and in his meeting with Abbas, he chastised both Israelis and Palestinians, calling their territorial conflict "unacceptable."

The centerpiece of the pope's trip also had nothing to do with the politics of Palestinian statehood. The Vatican emphasized that the purpose of the journey was a meeting between Francis and Patriarch Bartholomew, the archbishop of Constantinople and primary leader of Eastern Orthodox Christians. This get-together also had Vatican II-era roots; 50 years ago, around the time the Second Vatican Council was closing, Pope Paul VI spearheaded a meeting with Patriarch Athenagoras, marking the first time a Roman Catholic pontiff had met with an Eastern Orthodox patriarch since the Great Schism between the two denominations in 1054.

The language of the declaration signed by Francis and Bartholomew is all about unity and reconciliation. "Our fraternal encounter today is a new and necessary step on the journey towards the unity to which only the Holy Spirit can lead us," they said. "Theological dialogue does not seek a theological lowest common denominator on which to reach a compromise, but is rather about deepening one’s grasp of the whole truth that Christ has given to his Church."