By Rimsha Ali Shah
“Airports offer an almost mystical space for retrospection. In the eerie stillness of air travel, confined to my seat, was when I started realizing one of the better weeks of my life was over. I had been in Baltimore at a conference which aimed to inspire interfaith harmony, an opportunity offered to me on my Kennedy-Lugar Youth Exchange and Study (YES) program,” recalls YES alumnus Abdul Moeed Asad as he took us through the journey of organizing his first conference on interfaith harmony in Lahore.
“The central idea of the Baltimore conference was enough to inspire because the issue of interfaith harmony has always been strangely personal. In my opinion, the lack of meaningful interactions with minorities is the key concern. Therefore, I decided to inspire the same passion for interfaith harmony among the youth of Pakistan through an interfaith conference, to kindle the drive in youth to promote peace, harmony and foster friendships untainted by bias.”
The Better Understanding for a Better World (BUBW) conference was held from July 14 – 16, 2016 in Lahore at the Forman Christian College. This intercultural, interfaith and leadership conference engaged 55 high school students from different faiths in dialogue, discussion and cultural visits to the Walled City of Lahore and Katas Raj temples. The event had immense support from the volunteers of Seeds of Peace. This project was made possible with the help of an alumni small grant from the Pakistan-U. S. Alumni Network (PUAN). All alumni of various U.S. government-sponsored exchange programs in Pakistan are eligible to apply for the grant of up to $5,000 USD to enable them to give back to their communities.
High School Students Bond Over Interfaith Harmony
Minaal Minan, a student of Lahore Grammar School, attended the conference because she wanted to learn about interfaith harmony. “It was the first time that I interacted with Christian, Sikh, and Hindu students and had candid discussions with them on interfaith harmony, their culture, customs, and values and vice versa.”
With the aim to enable a meaningful dialogue that gave participants a chance to voice their fears and concerns, the conference planning team designed a program that included group activities promoting teamwork, presentations from the participants on their religious practices followed by a discussion on stereotypes, religious intolerance, and peace promotion. The conference also catalyzed friendships through collaborative artwork and performance art. Participants painted messages of peace and tolerance on canvases, using colors as their medium of expression, and performed together on cultural songs.
Seeds of Peace volunteer for the conference, Shahzaib Kazmi shares, “The idea behind bringing people from different faiths together was to encourage youngsters to think for themselves; understand, empathize, and draw parallels among their varying religious beliefs to give birth to a society that is tolerant and united.”
Maryam Shahzad belongs to the Christian community in Pakistan. “Before BUBW, I had never interacted with Hindus. In my head, I thought they were unfriendly, but I am glad that I was wrong. Over the past three days, I have made new friends who are Hindus and I can safely say these friendships will last a lifetime!”
Rana had enrolled for the conference because he wanted to interact with people from different faiths. “My favorite activity of the conference was the dialogue that allowed us to discuss issues and stereotypes with one another. I was pleasantly surprised when I saw that many participants shared similar views on so many topics. In three days, I have learned about so many similarities between Muslims and Hindus and Muslims and Christians.”
The participants also traveled to Old Lahore for a tour of the Walled City of Lahore. The conference planning team also toured the Katas Raj Temples and learned more about its religious significance. One of the participants commented, “The tour was quite enriching! We saw the mosques, the forts, the Church and the Hindu temple. It gave us a great opportunity to break stereotypes by understanding each other’s world.”
Jessica, a student belonging to the Christian community, spoke about the impact the conference had on her. “On the first day everyone was in their shell and there were groups of students divided by beliefs. But on day two, the ambiance had completely changed! No one was sitting in groups and everyone had formed a cordial relationship. I am hopeful that the bonding created over the past three days will enable us to empower even more youngsters to fight hostility and promote peace.”
For Moeed, the success of the conference was evident in the intellectual and emotional bonding that had taken place over the three-day conference. “At the end of the conference, I could see the passion in the tear-filled eyes and the heartfelt speeches which, for me, was an indicator of the impact that the three days had on the participants.”
For more on BUBW – Pakistan, please visit: https://www.facebook.com/bubwpakistan/
