Peace prize awarded to interreligious group

Thursday, February 22nd, 2018

The Lebanese Adyan foundation for interreligious studies and spiritual solidarity has received the 35th Niwano Peace Prize.

The prize was established to honor and encourage individuals and organizations that have contributed significantly to interreligious cooperation.

The Japan-based Niwano Peace Prize Committee says the Foundation has been “a visible and committed actor for peace in Lebanon and elsewhere in the Middle East region.”

It noted Adyan focuses on both high-level and grassroots engagement.

The Committee says Adyan demonstrates “the inclusive and interfaith values/principles the Niwano Award seeks to recognize.”

The Adyan (Arabic for “religions”) Foundation was established in 2006.

Since then it has worked to take interreligious dialogue.

This includes “apologetic debates and populist complacency, to a common commitment in what we call ‘religious social responsibility,’” Maronite Father Fadi Daou says.

Daou, who is the president of Adyan Foundation, is one of its five founding members.

Each founder follows a different denomination of Christianity and Islam.

Daou says the prize has moved Lebanon “a firm step further toward its recognition as a world center for dialogue between cultures and religions.

“Peace has a specific name in Lebanon, and that is ‘living-together,’” he added.

An award presentation ceremony will take place in Tokyo on 9 May.

The Adyan Foundation will be given an award certificate, a medal and a cash prize of 20 million yen.

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