1st of March a series of virtual program organized to unite people for interfaith harmony. Bangladesh is a pluralistic society, with the people following many religions, faiths, norms, values and traditions. The majority of the Bangladeshi population identifies as Muslim, while the other religious groups are Hindu, Buddhist, Christian and few other small religious groups also co-exist. Bangladesh is the brightest example of peace and interfaith harmony. Yet, religious issues are always very sensitive and used as a weapon to create chaos. The most common problem sorted out is religious misconceptions among the present-day youth where they easily get involved in identity and ego crises and grow a tendency to break religious harmony. But today’s youth are future leaders to establish peace. Educating children and youth about religious harmony will help them to mitigate chaos created for religious purpose, bring resilience, increase tolerance, decrease divisions and make them thoughtful about unity. The program “Religious Gurus and Youth Dialogue Exchange” has been organized to clear the clouds of misconceptions among different religious youth groups specially from Bangladesh and give them a new perspective to bring deep thought for the importance of interfaith harmony and how to achieve them.

We invited multi-religious gurus, free thinkers from Bangladesh and other countries to bring the diversified thoughts and knowledge for youth. So that they know the purposes of religion and clear clouds in their thoughts. Invited Speakers were:

1. Md. Sazzad Hossain, who is a Bangladeshi Muslim Speaker for Removing Islamic Misconceptions, Business Analyst, nTier Solutions

2. Mohammad Akhtarujjaman, who is a Muslim from Bangladesh, have completed Islamic Studies, CEO, BDWEBS.com

3. Biswadeb Chakraborty (RDS), who is a Hindu from India and National India Team Coordinator and Regional Coordinator for URI-Asia, India, East Zone.

4. Rev. Kalyan Kumar Kisku, who is a Priest from India, eminent social leader and Global Trustee of URI (United Religions Initiatives)

5. Dr. Junius Silva, who is a Cristian from Sri Lanka, distinguished public speaker, toastmasters, strategist, political advisor, social worker and a businessman.

6. AMB. Faith Hung Lin Lin, who is a free thinker from Singapore and Goodwill Ambassador for Singapore, Chairperson for SUNFO Global Federation, Women’s Wing International

7. Chandra Kishore Tripura, Buddhist Speaker, General Secretary, Biyarong Orphanage, Dighinala, Khagrachhari, Bangladesh

8. Sourav Tripura, who is a Buddhist and Tripura tribal from Bangladesh, an advocate and Khagrachhori District Leader of Global Law Thinkers Society.

Biswadeb Chakraborty said how important it is to include different religious people in the list of friends. He suggested to the youth to make a list of 10 friends and find out if there are any other religious friends present or not. If not present, he advised to include friends from other religions which will help to bring understanding, love for each other and they can be resilient towards each other's beliefs. He also said how he interacts with other religious people by talking to them whenever he gets a chance and suggested doing the same to the youth. Love and respect can bring interfaith harmony he mentioned.

Rev. Kalyan Kumar Kisku said that joining organizations like United Religions Initiatives and interfaith programs help to bring mindset change regarding religious fanatic views. He also mentioned that no religion talks about violence, so we should bring different religious children under a platform, educate them about basics of different religions and guide them for interfaith harmony. If we can arrange this our children will get a free mind and will learn to love people as humans, not based on what their religious belief is.

Amb. Faith Hung Lin Lin said about the importance of interfaith harmony. She said interfaith harmony enhances self-growth, strengthening our sense of identity by form of even deeper understanding of what defines our faith. She mentioned that we have to accept that we are all unique individuals with differences but we have to uphold collective interest for the human race. She said that interfaith harmony can be achieved through community projects that serve common social causes such as economic crisis, climate change and healthcare issues. This brings people together for joint participation in taking common action.

Md. Sazzad Hossain emphasized on to clear misconception regarding religious beliefs. He suggested religious harmony is not about following the beliefs or traditions of each other religions rather to respect each other and create harmony. He has given an example of Bangladesh present misconception “ধর্ম যার যার উৎসব সবার” (Religion is everyone's festival) that created a big chaos in different religions. He said that neither Muslim nor Hindu can follow each other rituals. In Hinduism the cow considered as divine where Muslims are slaughtering cow in their religious festival, so a Muslim cannot invite a Hindu to join the festival or a Hindu cannot come for their belief and respect. Same way, in puja (worship) festivals Muslims cannot take part because this is prohibited in Islam. He mentioned Islam suggested to respect others religions, not to hurt others, not to speak bad about other religions. He said that we need to know own religion well because Islam taught about how to keep peace and in other words religious harmony.

Chandra Kishore Tripura has represented their Tripura tribe and talked about the importance of religious resiliency. He suggested that youth should meet different religious people, learn about different religions and thus religious resiliency can be built.

Dr. Junius Silva suggested interfaith harmony dialogue should be discussed all time. He said that animals, nature and every creation are united where humans are fighting for no reason. Sourav Tripura conveyed a message of peace.

Mohammad Akhtarujjaman said based on Quran, Hadith and the life stories of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) that how Islam restricted to harm other religious people, stop chaos in society and promoted religious resiliency. He said to bring changes in mindset of Muslim youth, they should practice Islam by knowing properly and follow the life style of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).

After listening to all speakers and questions-answers sessions for youth, all agreed upon one point is that religions are created to establish peace not war. The more we know each other the more we understand each other. The more we feel and love each other the more we become tolerant towards each other. To establish interfaith harmony, we need to organize more exchange programs, dialogue exchange, awareness programs, workshops and most importantly our own religious studies. Because no religion talked about division but to bring love and respect to each other for building a peaceful world.