‘National Inter-Faith Council to be formed’

July 12, 2010; In a high level meeting at Islamabad, it was decided to form a ‘National Interfaith Council’ to promote brotherhood, harmony and co-existence among various faiths.

More than 50 Ulema, Scholars, religious leaders and intellectuals from various schools of thought attended the Conference organized by the Ministry of Minority affairs. Representatives from the Church of Pakistan were Rt. Rev. Alexander John Malik (Bsihop of Lahore) and Rt. Rev. Humphrey S. Peters (Bishop of Peshawar).

The session unanimously decided to launch a Country-wide Campaign to promote interfaith harmony and ensure peaceful co-existence.

The declaration said, no religion of the world allows taking lives of innocent people by carrying out subversive activities, so we all condemn the acts of extremism and terrorism, declaring them forbidden.

Although the conference was about interfaith harmony but the focus was more on terrorism & Intra-faith harmony, thus declaring the suicide attacks religiously forbidden.

 Nevertheless, it was decided that a hotline would also be setup in the Ministry to listen to the problems of minorities, and that the Prime Minister Gilani would inaugurate the hotline. Besides the hotline formation, committees would be established in all Districts to promote Interfaith, and intra-faith harmony.

 In this conference, Rt. Rev. Humphrey S. Peters, Bishop of Peshawar, in his interview with a TV Channel ‘Dawn News’ appreciated the idea of ‘National Interfaith Council’, “We need to work on legislative issues as well, especially scraping the laws which are discriminatory in nature, as some elements in the majority exploit those clauses of the constitution”, he said. The Bishops statement turned out to be the ‘highlight’ of the news that evening.