LAHORE | A three-day Interfaith Harmony Camp (IFHC) concluded at St. Anthony’s High School on Sunday, with the aim to enabling the young students of different religious backgrounds to develop mutual understanding and trust among each other. The Cultural Affair’s Officer of the US, Lahore Miss Emilia Adams was chief guest of the event.
Around 45 students from 15 government, semi-government and private schools of Lahore, Nankana Sahib, Zafarwal and Narowal Belonged to Muslim, Christian, Sikh and Hindu religions participated to explore the similarities between teachings of all four religions.
Participants played team games and met group challenges where students from Muslim, Christian Sikh and Hindu religions were teamed up together. Furthermore, dialogues were held amongst them, which explored the similarities among all religions. Each day of the camp was divided into two hours team games and two hours of dialogue sessions. During the dialogues sessions, the students used some time to share basic values that each religion holds as important. The students also addressed some of the stereotypes related to their religion and educated the participants about them.
The camp helped the participants to combat the stereotypes, which included why Sikhs wore the turban, why did Muslims not eat pork and how Christmas was celebrated or why Hindus were vegetarians. On the last day a talent show was put together by the participants in which at least one student from each religion teamed up together and presented a poem, skit or performance on theme of the camp. The Cultural Affair’s Officer of the US, Lahore Miss Emilia Adams distributed the certificates of participation amongst the campers.
Sajjad Ahmad, Country Director Seeds of Peace speaking on occasion said that all religions preach tolerance, co-existence and peace and give humanity top priority and we should also highlight similarities that existed among the teachings of all the religion, which is actually, “Humanity is the best religion.”
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