TOWARDS HARMONY

  International Mother Language Day / 21 February 2021 Language a Medium of Inter-cultural Harmony Fr Dr M. D. Thomas ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 21 February is celebrated worldwide as ‘International Mother Language Day’. It could also be called ‘world mother tongue day’. This day was proclaimed so in 1999 in its General Conference, by UNESCO, that is to say, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization . This celebration was launched in the year 2000. The purpose of this observance is to promote awareness of the ‘dignity of language’ as well as linguistic and cultural diversity, crosswise the world. It is too obvious a fact that human culture is basically a question of diverse languages that help the humans to articulate their thoughts and feelings, along with experiences and aspirations, one to another. The background of this declaration is the ‘language movement’ of the st

  Unity among Christians Called For!   Fr Dr M. D. Thomas ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  The month of January, to be precise, the week between 18 and 25, is known in the Christian community, world over, as ‘Christian Unity Week’. This is also known as ‘Unity Octave’ or ‘Week of Prayer for Christian Unity’. This period is specially scheduled for promoting unity among Christian communities of the world, major and minor, on various levels.     Prayer sessions, interactions, discussions, fellowship meals and collaborative ways of reaching out to the least and the lost are some of the major ways of celebrating this week. These programmes are intended to involve persons from all Christian communities. Such events are supposed to be organized on the local, regional, national, continental and international levels, as well. This noble tradition of promoting unity derives from the Second World Catholic Council

  Christian Unity Week / 18-25 January 2021 Oh! Christians, Will you be United?   Fr Dr M. D. Thomas ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  18-25 January has been marked in the calendar of the Christian community, world over, as ‘Christian Unity Week’. This is also known as ‘Unity Octave’ or ‘Week of Prayer for Christian Unity’. This week is specially scheduled for promoting unity among all the Christian communities of the world, major and minor, on various levels.   Prayer sessions, interactions, discussions, fellowship meals and collaborative ways of reaching out to the least and the lost are some of the major ways of celebrating this week. These programmes are intended to be planned in such a way that they involve persons from all Christian communities. Such events are supposed to be organized on the local, regional, national, continental and international levels, as well. This noble tradition of promot

  World Interfaith Harmony Week / 1-7 February 2021 Believers, Be in Harmony with Other Faiths  Fr Dr M. D. Thomas Director, Institute of Harmony and Peace Studies, New Delhi ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1-7 February is observed in the entire world as ‘World Interfaith Harmony Week’. This observance is as per the deliberation of the United Nations on 20 October 2010. This declaration was in response to the proposal of King Abdullah of Jordon in the UN General Assembly on 23 September 2010. The backdrop of the decision on the ‘World Interfaith Harmony Week’ was a series of reflections in the UN General Assembly, between 1999 and 2009. The world direly requires faiths, traditions, ideologies and cultures to stay tuned to each other. This was the great realization that paved the way for a ‘new way of being religious’ in the modern world.   The above ‘Interfaith Harmony Week’ was pioneered by the m

डॉ. एम. डी. थॉमस (01 जून 1953, केरल) सर्व आस्था भाव, सांप्रदायिक सद्भाव, राष्ट्रीय एकता और सामाजिक समन्वय की दिशा में कुछ 40 वर्षों से कार्यरत हैं। आप भाषा, साहित्य, कविता, कला, संगीत, संस्कृति, धर्म, दर्शन, सामाजिक सरोकार, आदि के ज़रिये ‘बेहतर समाज के निर्माण’ के लिए आजीवन प्रतिबद्ध हैं।  आप ‘इंस्टिट्यूट ऑफ हारमनि एण्ड पीस स्टडीज़’, नयी दिल्ली, के संस्थापक निदेशक हैं। ‘खुली सोच से सामाजिक तालमेल की ओर’ आपकी ज़िंदगी का परम आदर्श है, आपके संस्थान का भी।   आप ‘समन्वय धर्म और संस्कृति संस्थान’, उज्जैन, के संस्थापक निदेशक एवम् ‘सर्व धर्म समन्वय आयोग’, सी.बी.सी.आई. (कैथॅलिक ईसाई समुदाय के राष्ट्रीय संघ), नयी दिल्ली, के राष्ट्रीय निदेशक और अर्ध-वार्षिक सर्व-धर्म पत्रिका ‘फैलोशिप’ के संपादक भी रहे। आप ने काशी हिंदू विश्व विद्यालय, वाराणसी, से हिंदी साहित्य में ‘कबीर और ईसाई दर्शन’ पर पीएच.डी. की उपाधि प्राप्त की है। आप ने इंदिरा कला संगीत विश्व विद्यालय, खैरागढ़, से हिंदुस्तानी शास्त्रीय संगीत में प्रथमा, मध्यमा और बीम्यूज़. (7 साल) किया है। आप ने अर्बन विश्व विद्यालय, रोम, से बाइबिल और

Dr M. D. Thomas (01 June 1953, Kerala) is an active promoter of interfaith relations, communal harmony and peace. He has been deeply committed to this mission for the last over forty years , as a scholar, speaker, writer, religious leader and social advocate. ‘Making the society better’ is his esteemed motto of life and he has been ardently pursuing it through language, literature, poetry, music, religion, ethics and social interaction, on a lifetime basis. He holds Ph.D. in Hindi Literature on ‘Kabeer and Christian Philosophy’ from Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi. He has done Pradhma, Madhyama and Bachelor of Music (seven years) in Hindustani Classical Music from Indira Kala Music University, Khairagarh. He holds also Bachelor of Theology in Christianity and Comparative Religion from Urban University, Rome. His area of expertise covers a wide range of disciplines and themes, like religion, religions and harmony among religions, Kabeer, Christianity, education, cross-cultural