Snub by Sri Lankan Buddhists Mars Pope’s Final Day in Asia : Religion: Leaders say they are protesting pontiff’s insulting characterizations of their faith.

Snubbed by Buddhist leaders, Pope John Paul II climaxed an exhausting, self-testing Asian tour here Saturday with a call for the world’s great religions to unite on behalf of shared moral values.

The refusal of six Buddhist leaders to attend a meeting of the Pope and other religious leaders marred the final day of John Paul’s 11-day, four-nation journey. Otherwise, the trip marked an implicit celebration of self for history’s most traveled pontiff.

Three months after health reasons forced him to cancel a visit to the United States, the 74-year-old Pope went back on the road against the wishes of some advisers and amid his own uncertainties following surgery to repair a broken leg.

It was one of the most grueling trips of John Paul’s papacy. He limped and sometimes winced, he suffered from heat and jet lag, but he seldom faltered. Across 10 time zones and more than 20,000 miles, he offered a tacit rejoinder to all who have been musing over the twilight of a papacy.

Vatican planners now say they are preparing two papal trips in Europe this year, another to Africa, and one rescheduled visit to the United Nations and nearby American cities. At the same time, a task force is working on celebrations to mark Christianity entering its third millennium that John Paul firmly expects to direct in the year 2000.

On this poor island where three-quarters of the 18 million people are Buddhist, leaders of six Buddhist communities were conspicuous by their absence at Saturday’s meeting, protesting what they consider John Paul’s insulting characterizations of their faith in his recent book.

Addressing Hindu and Muslim leaders, John Paul said the local Roman Catholic church--which claims around 1 million members--is committed to “dialogue and cooperation” with other religions.

Reading a speech prepared in the expectation that Buddhist leaders would attend the meeting, John Paul reaffirmed “the church’s and my own deep and abiding respect for the spiritual and cultural values of which you are the guardians.”

He called for a “dialogue of life” in which all believers would “cooperate willingly in order to defend and promote moral values, social justice, liberty and peace.”

Sri Lanka, like other modern societies, the Pope said, is troubled by empty materialism in which people become “more interested in ‘having’ than with ‘being.’ ”

The Pope deplored the civil war between the Sri Lankan government and Tamil separatists that has claimed 30,000 lives over the past 12 years, saying, “The religious resources of the entire nation must converge to bring an end to this tragic situation.”

Wearing a garland of orchids over his vestments at a seaside Mass punctuated by the trill of local instruments, John Paul beatified 17th-Century missionary Joseph Vaz, known to local Catholics as “the apostle of Sri Lanka.”

The Pope’s 63rd foreign trip also took him to the Philippines, Papua New Guinea and Australia. He returned to Rome late Saturday.