2014 has well started for the IRLA
2014 has started well with a successful 15th Meeting of Experts held in Athens, January 7 to 10. I still remember when we launched the idea of such a meeting. It was in Washington in 1998, during a dinner at the Cosmos Club. Our guests were the Director and the Vice Director of the Religious Affairs Office from the Government of Spain, Professor de la Hera and his Associate, Professor Rosa Maria Martinez de Codes. Dr. Bert Beach was also with us. My dream was to gather a small group of the best experts in the field of religious freedom. It would offer the opportunity to facilitate our relations with them in a context different of the usual congresses and symposiums. At that time I thought it could be an event held once every five years like the IRLA World Congress. We had not enough funding to begin. I remember Professor de la Herra was listening to our discussion on the benefit of such a meeting.
At the end of the luncheon, Professor de la Herra proposed to have a meeting in Spain. A few months later, we held the 1st IRLA Meeting of Experts in the historical site of El Elscorial near Madrid. Professor Rosa Maria Martinez supervised the organization and invitations were sent from her office and the IRLA. We worked together on the program. It was a great meeting with experts from prestigious universities coming from Europe, Russia, South America and the USA. Dr. Doudou Diene from the UNESCO also attended. It was the beginning of a beautiful adventure. After each meeting the experts decided to continue the following year. The funding was always a challenge but we were always able to cover the expenses. In fifteen years the Meeting has received credibility through the quality of its Declarations and Statements like the ones on: Religious Liberty and Proselytism; The Teaching of Religions in Public Schools; Religious Freedom and Security; Religious Symbols in the Public Area and Secularism.
I really thought that after 10 years our adventure may end by lack of funding or lack of interest. It has not happened. The 15th Meeting was one of the best in terms of numbers of participants and presentation quality. We had for the second time experts from Middle East and North Africa.
The 16th IRLA Meeting of Experts has already been planned and it will be held in Florence, Italy from August 18 to 22, 2014.
We at the IRLA could not expect a better beginning of 2014 than a successful meeting in Athens, the cradle of freedom and democracy.
May 2014 be a happy and blessed year for the IRLA and Religious Freedom.
-- Dr. John Graz, Secretary General, International Religious Liberty Association