America
Tarunjit Singh Butalia rceives the Luminosa Award for Unity
Dr. Tarunjit Singh Butalia has been selected as the 2016 recipient of the Luminosa Award for Unity, an honor presented annually since 1998 by the Focolare Movement Mariapolis Luminosa of North America. The Focolare movement pays tribute through this award to Butalia’s decades of work in interreligious dialogue and peacemaking, as well as for his scientific contributions to environmental sustainability.
The Luminosa
Award for Unity recognizes institutions or persons who have given a significant
contribution to the building of universal brotherhood through their work in
ecumenism, interreligious dialogue, or any other aspect of social life. The
award is sponsored by the Focolare Center for Education in
Dialogue and was given for the first time in 1988.
A
scientist based at The Ohio State University, Butalia has served admirably by
leading groundbreaking interfaith initiatives with the Sikh community worldwide
and on the boards of the Parliament of the World's Religions, Religions for
Peace - USA, North American Interfaith Network, and the Sikh Council for
Interfaith Relations, among additional local and regional endeavors in his home
state of Central Ohio such as the Interfaith Association of Central Ohio.
Noting
Butalia's contributions to the field of interreligious relations, the Focolare
movement recognizes a special trip taken at the invitation of Pope Benedict XIV
in celebration of the 25th anniversary of the World Day of Prayer for Peace,
when Butalia visited the Vatican as one of only five Sikhs invited from around
the world. He offered a prayer at the event. His efforts to facilitate stronger
ties between these faiths was reflected by his initiating high-level dialogue
between the US Sikh community and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
"It
is an honor to receive this Focolare award focusing on unity," Butalia
told the Parliament after receiving the uplifting news. He added, “In a world
being increasingly divided along ethnic, religious, social, and class lines, it
is imperative for people of faith and conscience to come together in solidarity
to hold up the love we share for our fellow neighbors and citizens of the
world. Our faiths call upon us to be peacemakers - it is time we step up to the
challenge and walk the talk.â€
Transcending
his executive commitments on the Parliament's Board, Butalia has set himself
apart as a trustee by thoughtfully supporting PWR's recent moves toward
strategic interfaith action. Working on the board's first Faiths Against Hate
Task Force established in 2012, Butalia would help to launch the Parliament’s
Faith Against Hate program to strengthen the interfaith movement’s capacity,
capability and will to stop rising war, hate and violence through informed and
organized activism.
Parliament
Executive Director Dr. Larry Greenfield said of the award: “Knowing first hand
Dr. Butalia's deep commitments to the interfaith movement and his far-reaching
involvements in interfaith work, the Parliament congratulates our trustee
colleague and commends the Focolare Movement for recognizing his extraordinary
record of advancing harmony among the religious and spiritual traditions of our
world.â€
Past
winners come from a variety of faith backgrounds, industries and fields and
include the President of the Director’s Guild of America, various United
Nations Representatives, monarchs of nations, activists and faith leaders. A
listing of past awardees can be accessed on the Focolare website, here.
The
award will be presented to Butalia at the Focolare's Mariapolis Luminosa in New
York this September.
Dr. Tarunjit S. Butalia is founding trustee of the
Sikh Council for Interfaith Relations. He is a member of the Board of Trustees
of the Parliament of the World's Religions. He also serves as on the board of
Religions for Peace – USA and is its former Moderator. He is a Board member of
the North American Interfaith Network and is former Vice-Chair. He has served
on the board of the National Religious Coalition Against Torture as well as the
World Sikh Council – America Region. He works locally with the Interfaith
Association of Central Ohio.
More on the Focolare
Movement:
The
Focolare Movement is an international organization that promotes the ideals of
unity and universal brotherhood. Founded in 1943 in Trento, northern Italy by Chiara Lubich as a religious movement,
the Focolare Movement, though primarily Roman Catholic, now has strong links to the
major Christian denominations and other religions, or in some cases, with the
non-religious. It is also called the "Opera di Maria," or "Work
of Mary". The Focolare Movement operates in 182 nations and has over
100,000 adherents. The Movement's name comes from the Italian word for
"hearth" or "family fireside".
Attendees
of the 2015 Parliament of the World's Religions had the opportunity to learn
more about the Focolare Movement from two sessions featuring Dr. Susan Kopp, an
Interreligious and Ecumenical Activities Director of Focolare. One session
entitled "Humanity is One" explored the relationship of Chiara
Lubich, the founder of the Focolare Movement, with a prominent Islamic
spiritual leader in North America and their engagement speaking in an
African-American mosque in Harlem. Attendees would reflect on why it is so
necessary to improve interfaith outreach into African-American Muslim
communities, and how to do so.