ALL RELIGIONS CARRY MESSAGE OF NATURE CONSERVATION

ALL RELIGIONS CARRY MESSAGE OF NATURE CONSERVATION

Union Minister for Minority Affairs Salman Khursheed has said that all religions carry the message of nature conservation and imbibing the message in its true spirit is the need of the hour.He was inaugurating a three-day international conference on religion and ecology organised by the Nilackal St. Thomas Church and Ecumenical Centre Trust at Angamoozhi on Tuesday,17^th April,2012.Mr. Khursheed said it was a fact that political and economic issues were posing challenges to eco conservation in modern times. It was important that religions should take extra care in their efforts to protect the nature taking it as their social responsibility, he added.Mar Mathew Arackal, Kanjirappally Bishop and Ecology Committee chairman of the Nilackal Ecumenical Trust, presided over the function.

Mathew Koshy Punnackadu, Nilackal Ecological Commission Trust secretary; Kuriakose Mar Savarios, Archbishop of Knanaya Church; Joshua Mar Ignatheos of the Malankara Catholic Church, Joseph Mar Gregorios of Jacobite Syrian Church, Bishop Mar Sylvester Ponnumuthan of the Catholic Church, Joseph Mar Dionysius Metropolitan of Malankara Orthodox Church, Fr. M.T. Tharian, programme committee convener; P.J. Kurien, Rajya Sabha member; Anto Antony, MP; Raju Abraham, MLA, and Fr. Thomas K. Oommen, Nilackal Ecumenical Trust secretary, addressed the inaugural function.Inaugurating the session on various issues relating to water, later, P.J. Joseph, Water Resources Minister, stressed need to check water pollution.Mr. Joseph said every citizen was duty bound to protect the natural water sources and to check its pollution. He said it was of utmost importance to cultivate the habit of rain harvesting in the modern times.

Roy Paul, former chairman of Air India; E.J. James, former director of CWRDM; P.K. Thampy, former director of the Centre for Earth Science Studies; and Varghese C. Thomas, chief sub-editor, Malayala Manorama, address the session.Banwarilal Suman from Jhansi spoke on ‘the Buddhist solution to environmental problems' at the session on ‘Buddhism and ecology' held later.Jaya V.S. from New Delhi, D. Rewatha Maha Thero, general secretary of Maha Bodhi Society of India; Sangmu Thendup from Jawaharlal Nehru University, Subhash Chandra from Haryana, and Sharmila Sutar from University of Hyderabad addressed the session.The three-day meet will conclude on Thursday.

                                          Prof. John Kurakar