C.M. Paul
Darjeeling — A lady philanthropist in Darjeeling helped put together for the first time a multi religious group of intellectuals to discuss fundamental questions of life in the current socio-religious scenario.
The program christened “Modern man in the light of eternity” brought together leaders from civil society and army, as well as Buddhist monks, Catholic priests and Christian pastors, Brahma Kumaris, Sai Bhakts as well as proponents of Hinduism and Islam.
The Easter Sunday afternoon program held at heritage hotel Cedar Inn on 16 April had some 50 participants.
“It is indeed, the very first time, that we managed to bring together representatives of various religions and believers of different faiths on a common platform to discuss fundamental questions of life,” said Managing Director of Cedar Inn Ms Geeta Dewan.
Miss Dewan had the collaboration of Shanti Path Buddhist Foundation and Ravi Zacharias International Ministries who facilitated the program with the assistance of Speaker of the day Dr Stuart McAllister, a Global Support Specialist of RZIM Life Focus Society.
Speaker of the day Dr McAllister touched upon popular solutions for issues that vex people. How do we deal with religion, secularism and atheism? He stated that “Some people say that religion is the cause of all problems so let’s remove religion.”
Others say that “only a particular religion is the only solution.”
While a third group insists “living with differences is the only solution.”
McAllister posed fundamental questions like: Who am I? Why I am here? Where am I going?
He further put forward three challenges facing people today: 1) Do we have a reason to live? 2) Can we discover a way to live with differences? 3) Can we settle differences through reason and not resort to violence?
Second part of the day was question and answer session during which McAllister fielded a variety of questions pertaining to the topic under discussion.
Speaking to Matters India after the event Ms Dewan hoped that “we have more such initiatives in the future to bring together people to pursue spirituality beyond religion and religious practices.”